Just what IS a Mortal Crow?

TO define a Mortal Crow, one must first take apart the phrase.

Mortal: ie. opposite of immortal, one who is finite and has a limited lifespan. Usual refers to Humankind.

Crow:
Meaning 1: a small (usually) black bird. From the genus Corvus in the family Corvidae.

Meaning 2: Crow symbols in Myth, the wise and wily spirit, protector of humankind.

In Irish mythology, crows are associated with Morrigan, the goddess of war and death.

The god Bran the Blessed whose names means 'crow' or 'raven' is associated with corvids and death.

In Norse mythology, Huginn and Muninn (Thought and Memory) are a pair of ravens that fly all over the world, Midgard, and bring the god Odin information.

In Australian Aboriginal mythology, Crow is a trickster, culture hero and ancestral being.

Crows are mentioned often in Buddhism, especially Tibetan disciplines. The Dharmapala (protector of the Dharma) Mahakala is represented by a crow in one of his physical/earthly forms. Avalokiteśvara/Chenrezig, who is reincarnated on Earth as the Dalai Lama, is often closely associated with the crow because it is said that when the first Dalai Lama was born, robbers attacked the family home. The parents fled and were unable to get to the infant Lama in time. When they returned the next morning expecting the worst, they found their home untouched, and a pair of crows were caring for the Dalai Lama. It is believed that crows heralded the birth of the First, Seventh, Eighth, Twelfth and Fourteenth Lamas, the latter being the current Dalai Lama, Tenzin Gyatso

(** Some of the above taken from Wikipedia)

Suffice it to say that crow/raven myth exists in most cultures, often associated with death, intelligence and cunning. Some stories see the Crow Spirit as a stand-in for the creator. In some, he brings fire to humanity, sometimes he gifts us with knowledge of harvesting and other things that are useful.

Sometimes Crow can be misunderstood. In the guise of the trickster, he can feared (or laughed at as a fool).
Just what IS a trickster? I think this it the key to the misunderstanding. Is it someone who plays tricks on others merely to make a fool of others? Just to be mean or for no other purpose than to cause harm? Or is it someone who teaches you a lesson you needed to learn?

Admit it, some of us can only learn the hard way. You can only be told so many times not to be vain, not to be materialistic, not to steal, not to touch that boiling pot. Sometimes the only way to truly learn a lesson is to step into the pit of your own making and be forced to climb and slip and climb again. Once you spent weeks or months and years climbing out, what are the odds you would fall in again?

The other part of this is that in order to teach you this lesson, Crow must know what lesson you need to learn, and this is precisely why he is feared. He knows you. He knows your deep dark secrets that you don't want the world to see. And that is a scary thing.

There are many spiritual paths that teach you that in  order to be whole, to find your center, your balance, you must identify and face your shadow self.

This is how I see Crow, he is the mirror that I can hold up, see my Shadow self and acknowledge my limitations, my weaknesses and  then laugh at the silliness of it all. Laugh at yourself. He helps me see the humor in all things. Being mortal, with a limited time on this planet, what is really so damn serious? Absolutely nothing. And yet everything.