Man cannot discover new oceans until he has the courage to lose sight of the shore. – quote from “A guide for the Advanced Soul” by Susan Hayward.
You may have noticed it’s been a while since I’ve written a blog. For years, I’ve written every two weeks like clockwork. It’s been easy, as I draw from my most powerful “ah ha” moments in my life. But 10 weeks ago, my words dried up.
I wasn’t worried. I recognised it as a by-product of the process of deep transformation that I’m in right now. When we let go of all that is known, of that shore that is sooooo familiar to us, there is a period of uncertainty and emptiness. Everything we believe about ourselves is thrown into question.
Usually by this point in our life we’ve achieved a level of personal comfort, and we guard it with our life. We know who we are, how to operate in the world, and we have a defined sense of “self”.
It takes enormous courage to let go of this comfort and certainty, to throw all the cards up in the air and see how they land. That’s why it is indeed the “road less travelled”.
Although few people undertake this journey, it’s the one thing that can take us to heights of self-awareness we’ve never known before. I’ve felt like the magnificent Phoenix, walking into the fire as I’ve allowed everything I thought I was and every dream I thought I had to be dissolved.
And what an explosion it’s created!
As I share the gifts of this journey, there’s one thing that’s crystal clear to me. It’s where I’m placing the power.
This was something I learned from Scott Washington. Back in 1996 I attended a one year self-mastery course with him. He would often ask us “Where is the power?” In fact, he encouraged us to have these 4 simple words on stick-it notes around our home to remind us.
It’s a rhetorical question. In any situation, the power is either outside us (meaning we are the victim of another person’s actions), or the power is within (meaning we have the ultimate choice in any situation as to how we respond, react and see ourselves within this experience).
When we own that the power lies within us, we see the circumstances and triggers of our life as just that – an opportunity for growth that has been placed directly in our path.
It doesn’t mean it’s any easier to navigate these challenges. Some of them are gut-wrenching and can de-rail all expectations we have for our life. Yet these challenges offer us the opportunity to explore our inner world and the power of our Soul in a way that an “easy life” could never do.
They allow us to recognise and hone our inner gifts, so that these gifts come into focus and shine even more brightly.
As my life gently (and sometimes forcibly) unravels before my eyes, I know that the power is with me. This is my own journey, and it’s presenting so that I can know myself so deeply, that my trust in myself becomes unwavering.
But to get there, I need to go through a dark and confronting tunnel. This is the dark night of the Soul. It’s where we must face the Dweller on the Edge of the Threshold - that most rejected and unbearable part of ourselves that we’ve spent a lifetime running away from.
A Course in Miracles has a great message for us. It says:
“You must look upon your illusions and not keep them hidden, because they do not rest on their own foundation.”
This statement invites me to look behind the mask of my beautiful, caring, loving and controlling personality, and see what lies buried behind it.
Who am I, really?
When I’ve done previous work on unravelling my patterns, I’ve come to see that under all the beauty, all the grace, all the kindness that I aspire to, I have a belief that I’m inherently evil.
You will also have a word. It may not be the same word as mine. Your word may be “unlovable”, “unworthy”, “stupid”, “cruel” or any variation of these. But all words that are not from love are essentially the same. They are words of death that we speak over ourselves, which attempt to extinguish that spark of Love that is our true self.
Beliefs are formed in our childhood, and no matter what our logical mind will think and argue to the contrary, our inner child believes them to be true.
If I’m so evil (or unlovable, unworthy, stupid, cruel, etc.), how do I live in this world? In my case, I chose to polarise away from that ugly thing I saw in myself. I became someone who focusses on others, who is attentive and helpful, kind and compassionate, who will put others always before myself.….because that makes me a “good” person, and it helps me to atone for this darkness I believe lives inside.
Yet while I hold that belief that I am evil, how can I fully be Light? I can’t. And the closer I come to that part of me that holds that belief, the harder it is to show up as Light in the world.
This is why my words dried up. I could no longer find the part of me that was inherently strong and wise and kind, who is self-assured and has wisdom to offer.
I could only find the wound, and the mask.
Then another piece of the jigsaw puzzle found its perfect place.
Some 25 years ago, I had my one and only experience with a psychedelic. Psychedelics have never been my thing, as I love to access my higher states naturally, through intention, spiritual practise and essential oils. Yet on this one occasion I decided to be experimental, and I tried a psychedelic with 2 friends.
During this experience, I went into the most ecstatic state of love. But that love wasn’t directed to a person – it was directed to God. I felt my love for God, and my desire to be loved by God. Yet just as I reached that awareness, my world crumbled into tears. I turned to my friends, and said, “But I can’t get close to God! He will kill me and send me to Hell!!!”
As I came out of the visionary state I was in, I marvelled at these words that had come from my mouth. Although I was born into a Christian family and went to church and Sunday School as a child, I’d left that behind when I was 13 and began exploring other religions and spiritual paths. “Hell” is not something I believe in, and is most definitely not part of my vocabulary. I have a connection with Spirit (rather than the Christian version of God). Yet there it was, straight from my mouth.
I had assumed this was something I’d brought from a past life, ie. a belief that God was going to punish me for my sins and send me to Hell. But a month ago, I realised where those words came from.
They were the words my father spoke to me when I was 6.
In my blog Snuffed I shared how I’d played doctors and nurses with my best friend. When my father found out, I knew he must have shamed me, because a month later I tried to run away from home. But I had no recollection of anything he’d said. I only knew that he closed his heart to me on that day, and he never allowed me close again. The details were all hidden behind a veil of amnesia, designed to protect me from that most painful memory.
When I realised where those words came from, their power instantly disappeared.
I saw that they were words of fear spoken over me by another person. They were not God’s words, and they are not the truth of me.
What a powerful and life-changing realisation! Yet this is one of many at present. I am literally in the process of unravelling myself, pulling that bit of wool in a jumper and watching its form disappear before my eyes.
I’ve brought a microscope into my life, bringing mindfulness to every thought, feeling and interaction I have.
I shared in Snuffed that I had developed feelings for a man, and that it was in its chrysalis stage. At that time, I felt that we were in each other’s lives because a future lay before us. But I came to see that he was the bridge to my father. Through my feelings for him, I was able to explore two parallel Universes (the present and the past), and not only see but actually feel the depths of the joys and pains I had with my father.
It's never enough just to comprehend something. True healing requires us to feel it.
And that future I imagined was instead a season, which is now over.
Rather than feeling sorry for myself for something that “could have been”, I know that I’ve been given exactly what I need for my own growth right now. And I can see there’s still more unravelling to go, and I’m willingly embracing that.
Who will I be at the end of this? I have no idea – I just know that I will be a truer and more authentic expression of this power and Light that is within me, and that every time I need a helping hand, one will be there for me.
The power lies within. It always has, and always will. All we need to do is to claim it.
