7 gates, 7 symbols: what Inanna’s descent teaches about becoming your muse
There’s a story older than empire, older than organised religion, older than patriarchy itself.
It’s the story of Inanna, the Sumerian goddess of love, war and political strategy, who willingly descended into the Underworld.
Not to be rescued. Not to be reborn. But to face off with everything beneath the surface: her shadow, her power, her rage, her sister.
This story emerged in ancient Sumer, in the cradle of Mesopotamia, in what is now Iraq, sometime between 1900 and 2500 BCE. We know it at all because the Sumerians invented the first known form of writing, cuneiform, and pressed this myth into clay tablets that outlasted empires.
Inanna predates the systems that told women to shrink. To be small. To be docile. To be “saved.”
“The Descent of Inanna” is the name given to this myth: her journey into the Underworld and her return from it. In her quest to know all of life’s mysteries, its full complexity, she knew she had to visit the Underworld herself.
She didn’t go for transcendence. She went for truth.
This isn’t just a spiritual metaphor. It’s a strategy.
Because let’s be honest: every woman who’s ever tried to live fully in this world has been through her own descent. Not the love-and-light kind.
The kind where your career dissolves. Your identity unravels. Your social capital evaporates. Your old ways of coping don’t work. And you’re stripped down to skin and nerve.
That’s not failure. That’s the gate.
Seven gates. Seven surrenders. No performance.
Inanna doesn’t get to waltz into the Underworld draped in symbols of her status. No crown. No credentials. No curated brand. At each of the seven gates, she’s told:
“You must give something up to pass through.”
That’s what power reclamation looks like. Not adding more. Stripping it back.
Here’s what she gives up, and what you might be called to surrender, too. At each of the seven gates, a symbol of ego and attachment to identity.
Gate 1: The Crown
Symbol: Authority
Modern equivalentYour LinkedIn headline. The “I have it all together” armour.
SurrenderPerforming competence to feel safe. You can be messy and still powerful.
Gate 2: The Staff
Symbol: Control
Modern equivalentOptimisation. The illusion that burnout is noble.
SurrenderThe hustle. The grind. Control as a trauma response.
Gate 3: The Necklace
Symbol: Connection as currency
Modern equivalentPlaying nice to be liked. Softening the truth. Swallowing the scream.
SurrenderThe need to be understood by people who benefit from your silence.
Gate 4: The Breastplate
Symbol: Sexual power
Modern equivalentSeductive self-objectification. Or disembodiment.
SurrenderSexuality as strategy. You don’t have to be desirable to be powerful.
Gate 5: The Gold Ring
Symbol: Binding agreements
Modern equivalent“Good girl” rules. The pact to never rock the boat.
SurrenderLoyalty to oppression. Burn the contract. Rewrite the terms.
Gate 6: The Anklets
Symbol: Ritual movement
Modern equivalentThe self-policing that happens in every boardroom, family dinner, school pick-up line.
SurrenderRespectability. The performance of normal.
Gate 7: The Robe
Symbol: Persona
Modern equivalentThe curated version of you that gets applause.
SurrenderBeing the person everyone can project their comfort onto. Be real instead.
Descent is not a breakdown. It’s a breakthrough.
Inanna enters the Underworld stripped of everything she was told made her worthy.
She’s judged. She’s silenced. She’s hung on a hook.
It reads like punishment, but it’s also an initiation. Because this isn’t just about surrender. It’s about what comes after.
Descent isn’t the end. It’s the beginning of clarity.
And when Inanna rises, she doesn’t just return. She comes back differently aligned, no longer tethered to the performance. No longer mistaking power for permission.
She rises with her voice. Her knowing. Her way.
This is what it means to become your muse.
Not an ideal. Not an icon. But a living, breathing, sovereign force who creates on her terms.
This is what it looks like to find your way in the world. Not by mapping the external systems, but by descending into your truth. Your rhythm. Your myth.
What’s the cost of staying at the surface?
We live in a world that tells women to rise and shine before we’ve had a chance to quieten and breathe. That rewards the right performance and punishes the honest descent. That sells us wellness as a costume and calls it freedom.
But Inanna reminds us: real power comes from going under and returning.
From stripping away the scripts. From walking through the gates and remembering who you were before they dressed you up in expectations.
If you’re on the floor right now, you’re closer than you think.
Your creativity isn’t gone. Your brilliance isn’t broken. You’re just between gates.
You are not lost.
The muse is already inside you. And she’s not asking you to perform. She’s asking you to remember that no one returns from the Underworld unmarked.
