The Story of Inanna
If you’re just arriving here, you’re invited to read the series in sequence: Introduction, Preconception, Conception, When Conception Doesn’t Happen, and Pregnancy. This is part two of Chapter Two.
I was in a “Birthing From Within” class when our teacher told us the story of Inanna. She used metaphors for preparing to birth, like journeying to the underworld and finding our way out of a labyrinth, transformed.
I didn’t quite know why she was telling us this story, but in hindsight, it was deeply meaningful to remember as I shifted from pregnancy to birth to new motherhood.
I remember we had an email thread with the group from our class and as each couple passed through the threshold of birth they would reply something like, “Inanna, I get it now!”
As my pregnancy progressed I sat in the mystery, watching pieces of my life begin to transform before stepping through the gates of my own initiation. But before I share more on that, here is the story of the Goddess Inanna:
Inanna’s Story
Inanna is the world’s first goddess of recorded history and the beloved deity of the ancient Sumerians. The tales and legends of the ancient Sumerians date back to around 2000 BC. The Sumerians were considered the creators of civilization as modern humans understand it. And their control of the region, which is present-day Iraq, lasted for almost 2,000 years. They were known for their innovations in language, governance, and architecture.
Inanna was later identified as the goddess Ishtar, as well as Astarte and the Greek Aphrodite. She is the goddess of love, war, fertility, sensuality, procreation, divine law and political power. She’s deeply connected to the planet Venus, known as the daughter of the moon and the morning and the evening star, who also goes through a cyclical death and rebirth process when viewed from Earth. Venus rules transitions ~ from night to day and day to night, as she appears at dawn and dusk. When she crosses paths with the sun she is considered to be making the journey of descent and re-emergence, a path that Inanna also wove.
As I tell you this story of the descent of Inanna, I invite you to get comfortable, maybe even imagine yourself sitting around a fire. Let your consciousness open to receive the story in whatever way it’s meant to land for you.
I’m going to tell you an ancient story — one that has lived for thousands of years, a story of descent, stripping away, initiation, and re-emergence. It is the journey of Inanna, Queen of Heaven and Earth, but it is also the journey of every woman who has ever felt called into the mystery — into birth, into motherhood, into loss, into transformation, into her Priestesshood.
Long ago, in a land of temples and bustling cities, Inanna reigned as the Queen of Heaven and Earth, the world of light, the upper world similar to the world we know now. She was powerful, dignified, capable — the kind of woman who seemed to manage her life with ease. She held authority, beauty, recognition. People admired her. In many ways, she was a reflection of the modern woman who has everything “together.”
But beneath the surface of her well-ordered life, a whisper begins calling to her.
A voice from the Great Below, the underworld — a place of depth, shadow, and the unconscious.
Inanna… Inanna… Inanna…
She tries to turn away, but the call becomes stronger. It isn’t threatening; it is insistent. It invites her to see what she has not seen, to feel what she has not felt, to learn what she does not yet know.
This call lives inside all of us.
It appears in moments of transition — loss, grief, illness, heartbreak, spiritual awakening. It is the mystery, what is unknown, beckoning us into our greatness.
It is the voice that says:
There is more. Go deeper. Something inside you is waiting to be reclaimed.
Preparing for Descent
Knowing she could not ignore this calling, Inanna prepares herself in the only way she knows — by gathering the symbols of her identity and power.
She places a crown upon her head, symbol of her sovereignty.
Around her neck she fastens her lapis necklace, the adornment of her voice and truth.
She drapes her body in royal beads, slips a golden cuff over her wrist, and fastens her breastplate over her heart — the armor she believes she needs to remain protected from the world.
She wraps herself in her royal cloak, a sign of her status and protection.
Finally, she takes up her measuring rod, a tool of judgment, helping her discern right from wrong, good from bad.
These adornments represent the ways she holds herself together — her confidence, her identity, her defenses, her sense of self.
We all have versions of these:
The resume. The clothes. The makeup. The mask. The persona.
The ways we hold ourselves “above” the chaos so we feel in control.
But a descent doesn’t begin with control.
This initiation will require surrender.
Inanna’s faithful servant, Ninshubur, watches her prepare. Seeing the queen dressed in full regalia, she asks, “Where are you going?”
“To the underworld,” Inanna says, “to learn what I do not yet know.”
Ninshubur’s face pales. “No one returns from the underworld unchanged.”
Her fear is a familiar voice — the friend or mother who warns us to stay safe, the internal voice that questions every leap.
“Ninshubur,” she says, “if after three days I have not returned, gather my allies, mourn me, and ask the wise ones to seek my return.”
In giving her loyal companion a task, Inanna transforms the fear around her into support, and finds someone to hold vigil for her return.
With her preparations complete, Inanna begins her journey.
The Gates of the Underworld
At the entrance to the underworld stands the first gate, guarded by Neti, the gatekeeper.
“Who are you?” Neti asks.
“I am Inanna, Queen of Heaven and Earth. Let me pass.”
Neti descends into the depths to bring this news to Ereshkigal, Queen of the Underworld — Inanna’s sister.
Ereshkigal represents Inanna’s shadow side, the part of her that she never lets see the light. They are two sides to the same coin.
When Ereshkigal hears her sister has come, she bites her lip and slaps her thigh. She understands that this descent will change everything.
Ereshkigal orders, “Bolt the seven gates. At each gate, strip her of one of her symbols of power. Let her enter naked and humbled.”
This is how many descents begin, with unraveling.
When Inanna approaches the first gate, Neti removes her crown.
“What is this?” Inanna protests.
“The ways of the underworld are ancient,” Neti replies. “Carry on.”
At the next gate her lapis necklace is taken, then her beads, then her golden cuff.
Piece by piece she is undone.
Each removal asks her:
Who are you without what you’ve built? Without what protects you? Without the identity you show the world?
This stripping is familiar in a transformative season of life.
Something must fall away so something deeper can be revealed.
By the time Inanna reaches the last few gates, she is crawling through narrow passageways, her body becoming dirty, scraped, and bare.
Without her breastplate, her heart is exposed.
Without her cloak, her body is unprotected.
Without her necklace, she has trouble speaking her truth.
The deeper she goes, the harder it becomes to remember why she had come.
This too is part of descent — the forgetting, the fog, the disorientation.
At the final gate, when she is asked who she is, Inanna whispers, “I am… this.”
No titles. No accomplishments. No adornments.
Just essence.
