One way or another, each of our journeys led us here, to reading this email. To exploring “spirituality.” Perhaps it was a deep sense of dissatisfaction with life. A seeking of something more. A brush with a well-realized person. A sudden insight into the realization that we can look nowhere else but within to understand the challenges and lackings in our lives.
And yet, this journey will take from us more than we bargained for. It has taken from me so much more than I ever thought I would be willing to let go of. Because the journey can only lead to one place. As we walk upon this path, inevitably, it leads us to the only place it could ever go, the only place that ever was. Now. Here.
What we begin to see is that which we always wanted and that which we were always most terrified of is the same thing. We wanted freedom, abundance, clarity, and joy. What we were afraid of is that nothing would ever change. That we are helpless. That we are broken.
When we come truly into contact with presence, we find both these things. We find every belief that dictates our experience, no matter how sharp, no matter how painful. We find every emotion that we spent so long avoiding – fear, guilt, shame, hatred. We often find ourselves less capable of defending, avoiding, or escaping and we feel deeply helpless in the face of what we see.
But we also begin to find a vibrancy. Because we feel truth in the experience of now. It is what it is. How could it be anything else? And we begin to realize that so much of our lives – so much of everyone’s lives – was spent fighting this, avoiding the truth of the moment because we did not like it. And we begin to stop fighting. We begin to experience truth. And this truth sets us free.
This truth shows us that what we were most afraid of – that we were incapable, broken, lost, not-enough, bad – were nothing more than energetically-charged thoughts that we lost ourselves in. We lost ourselves in the stories but that does not make the stories true. And so as we allow ourselves to look into that shadow, at the very places we for so long avoided, we see that they were not shadows at all. They were always just now. Nothing more. They did not mean anything.
We let go of the fight. We let go of the resistance. And then we begin to find all that we could have ever wanted. Connection. Ease. Love. Joy. Dance. Song. Abundance.
The journey begins and ends in the same place. A snake eating its tail. The mind cannot understand this. But the heart does. Everything in reality hums with this living truth. It is no more mine or yours than anyone else’s. It can not be owned or taken from. It cannot controlled or sold. But it can be doubted, avoided, and forgotten.
Thank god we’re remembering. Wishing you all ease on your journey.