Our featured topic: Travel

I never took trips without some kind of purpose being attached to it, and without some kind of timeframe attached to that purpose in which to accomplish it. In the past, the purpose of my travels was always a vacation from What Is My Life. I would literally vacate from the responsibilities, obligations and schedules of my life situation for experiences that would soothe, calm and delight.

This time, I am embarking on a road trip with a very different purpose, and with no timeframe.

Lately, I have greatly minimized my responsibilities, obligations and schedules and now have more time for personal reflection. I realize my beliefs, patterns and stories define me. The good ones I’ll keep, the others I’ll question. I no longer prefer to be a walking bobblehead, telling the same stories, repeating the same patterns, and living within the context of beliefs that were instilled in me decades ago by people I would not even ask directions from today. My deeply integrated patterns and beliefs based in fear, limitation and lack kept life predictable, and there is a comfort in that. If I keep doing what I’ve always done, I know how it will turn out.

Yet, the inquiry into the unknown is the only place we discover more about ourselves. Most people do not want to venture into the unknown because they prefer to have a life that is more predictable. To expand as a soul, I surrender to the unknown and I begin the inquiry, “Who am I, without my limiting beliefs, patterns and stories?”

My living situation with my partner Larry is very satisfying and offers me a lot of personal expansion. I know “Who I Am” within the context of our living together. Now I find my heart desires the opportunity to be by myself, to answer the question: “Who am I, when there is just I?”

I’m in the process of embarking on a road trip to find answers to my questions above. I’m taking my 1997 Mercury Villager mini van with 168,000 miles on it, a tent, sleeping bag and a cooler and I’m heading West. I’ll have my laptop for blog updates and a cell phone. I didn’t take a camera with me. All photos on my webpage will be taken by strangers I ask to take my picture with their cellphones and then ask them to text the picture to my blog for posting. I am undertaking this practice to expand out of my old way of being an invisible, independent traveler, and stretch myself to actually connect with other people.

This practice does not come easily to me. My old beliefs kick in: “Don’t talk to strangers. Mind your own business. Don’t bother people.” Somewhere in me new beliefs want to take hold: “People want to help you. Ask for what you need.”

I’m leaving Monday 4/18/11. I don’t know when I will be back, just that I will be.

Following the Flock
After sleeping in my van at the truck stop, I changed into my Easter outfit in the bathroom at the Quick Mart. I was going to the 9:30 a.m. Easter church service at Mount of Olives Lutheran Church in Rock Springs, WY. They had me at their “Easter Service, Breakfast Follows” sign. I arrived at 9:15 a.m., only to find that the service started at 9:00. The only seats left were in the front of the church. All eyes were on me as I made my way to a seat.

Soon after I sat down, my cell phone rang. I quickly silenced it. Apparently, my mother in Chicago was calling to wish me a happy holiday.

Being the systems buster that I am, I had great fun reciting the prayers and singing the songs in my loud, reverent voice. The quiet flock was perhaps a bit ruffled by my staunch presence, but that only made my joy in who I am greater. I found the beliefs of this religion about Jesus are very different than mine. Yet, I was pleased these folks, my brothers and sisters, were on a spiritual path.

After mass we were all invited to breakfast in the fellowship hall. I had my choice of six homemade egg dishes donated by church members. An Abundant Universe I inhabit! There were also pancakes, sausage, cinnamon rolls, Easter cookies, juice and coffee. I told the woman minister that I enjoyed her service and that I was on a road trip from Minneapolis. A woman told me she liked my shawl. I did exchange words with the grandpa across the table from me. Otherwise, most people ate in silence.

My friend Kori telephoned me that night and asked, “What are you learning from this trip?” I didn’t have a definitive answer, and said I would think about it more the next day. I went to sleep with the question embedded in my subconscious.

I woke up at 5:55 a.m. with the message that I am a soul having a human experience. Intellectually I know this, but I stayed present with the thought and waited to see where it led me.

I immediately recalled when I was driving through Wyoming and an oversized pick-up truck pulling a livestock trailer passed me. I followed the trailer noticing it was packed with live sheep…two tiers of them. You couldn’t fit another sheep in that trailer if you tried, and I scoffed at the inhumanity of the scene. It then occurred to me if the vehicle should brake suddenly, the flock offered each member safety from physical injury, as the sheep would have the cushion of each other’s wool to keep them upright and unharmed.

Looking at the sheep, I felt a kinship with this flock. The sheep offer each other safety and fellowship and make the journey easier. I was traveling in my van alone, without the safety or fellowship of anyone. I left my mate, children, family and friends at home. Was my journey harder?

My eyes caught the eyes of one of the sheep as the trailer passed me. Our eyes held each other’s gaze and time ceased to exist as my spirit joined with this sheep’s. I felt the animal’s uncertainty as to why? it was in this trailer, and for what purpose? I wondered Why? I was in my van, and for what what purpose? Here I was traveling the country without my flock, and suddenly found myself following this one.

Were the sheep going to greener pastures? Or to the slaughterhouse? Where was I going?

In the present moment the sheep and I did not know where we were going, or for what purpose. On a soul level the sheep and I know, no matter where we end up, it is the desire of our souls to expand into greater aspects of ourselves, and we will be okay.

Realizing I was traveling at 70 mph (in a 75 mph zone), I returned my thoughts and eyes to the highway ahead of me and wished the sheep well on their journey.

Now I can answer my girlfriend’s question posed to me over the phone: “What are you learning?”

I am learning who I am without my flock.

Almost Home
It is Day 24 and I’m in Kansas City, MO. Yesterday I drove the most miles in one day since embarking on this trip. It was the second day in a row that I pushed myself to drive more miles than I wanted to. A perceived problem at home with one of my adult children was the motivating factor that seemingly pushed my journey, my adventure, my needs, onto a back burner in favor of my imagined parental obligations.

What am I teaching my daughter if I set aside my needs in favor of hers? For two days I found myself racing home earlier than I want to, to take care of her…to console her…to help her. Coincidentally, the problem is that she is doing the same thing: setting aside her own needs in favor of her boyfriend’s. She is sacrificing who she is, what she needs, and who she wants to be.

Mommy to the rescue! I’ll save you my dear child.

This has been a pattern for me all my life…putting my needs, wants and desires on a back burner in favor of someone else’s. Letting other people manipulate me, control me and tell me what to do. I have allowed myself to be blamed, shamed and guilted. I have spent my life seeking someone outside of myself to love and approve of me. I was born into this pattern, and I kept it alive in my own children. The truth is, Mommy cannot rescue or save you.

This journey is about recognizing my old patterns, old beliefs and old stories. My daughter is merely reflecting me back to me. And now, 450 miles from home, it is clear to me that putting my needs, wants and desires on a back burner in favor of someone else’s does not serve me or my children.

The missing piece here is Self-Love. Therefore, I am loving myself enough to continue my road trip and not come home today. I shall allow my dear child to discover in her what has long been overdue in discovering in my life: That no one will love me, no one will save me, no one will rescue me. It is my job in this lifetime to do it for my Self.

Two days later, I’m home. I arrived home about 3 p.m. after being gone for 26 days and traveling 4,419 miles. It has been an expansive experience filled with serendipity, kindness, magic and joy. I am happy and excited to see my partner Larry.

The yard still had its winter coat on when I left. Now the grass is green, the trees and shrubs are budding and blooming. The gardens are springing to life. The lawn furniture and statuary have been taken out of winter storage. A new granite step rises to the hot tub house.

The inside of the house has taken on a fresh look with new drapes and bedspread in the master bedroom. The baseboards were stained and mounted in the guest room ending its redecoration. I am welcomed with a vase of red roses and star-gazer lilies. The hallways are festooned with red rose petals and candlelight. My little dog runs excitedly around the house, back from its long stay with my ex-husband and his girlfriend.

I am happy to be home. Larry is happy I am home. The dog is happy, too. We have all experienced a lot of personal growth. I am grateful for my road trip experience.

My journey into the Unknown taught me about trust, faith, and being in the moment. The Unknown isn’t frightening, it is filled with love. The Universe saw to it that I was safe, loved and provided for. People are wonderful, helpful, and kind. It also confirmed how I create my own reality. I am looking forward to continuing to re-pattern my beliefs and life and embrace who I am.

Thank you for accompanying me on my journey.

The following channeling of Alexander is an excerpt from the book Spirit Wisdom II: The Enlightened Warrior’s Guide to Personal and Cultural Transformation.

Every culture, from aboriginal tribe to complex civilization, recognizes the significance and esoteric mystery of dreams. Modern Western thought, its vision narrowed by the blinders of materialism, struggles to make sense of dreams. Dreams are variously explained as: the random static of neurological chaos; a means of emotionally processing the day’s events; or the symbolic patina on material rising from the deeper strata of the psyche.

While your conscious mind clings to its waking perceptions as “real” and struggles to make sense of its dreamtime imagery, the fact is that you must sleep and dream. Maintaining the illusions of physical life places great strain on consciousness, which must be “relieved” by restoration to its natural state. In other words, the realm of sleep and dreams is the native state of consciousness, and operates according to natural principles, whereas the illusion of physical reality is a self-generated hallucination that can be sustained for only so long before consciousness must seek relief from operating in such an unnatural state.

The Wall of the Self
At night, when you release the illusion of physical life and return to your natural state, you commune with your higher self to compare your experiences to the life theme and goals it has established.

Two “selves” are involved in the dream exchange: the authentic self and the waking self. The authentic self is the “real” you, a body of consciousness composed of your higher self, your reincarnational and probable selves, and the unique soul or individualized spark of consciousness that animates your mind and body. Probable and reincarnational selves, along with the soul, are embedded within the higher self, which in turn is cocooned within even greater bodies of consciousness. This is the real you, the authentic self.

For you to function effectively in the world of physical illusion, there must be a wall of separation between waking and authentic selves. The wall of separation is nothing more than a difference in the frequencies on which the two realms operate. The ego, holding the body’s safety as its primary concern, tightens its focus to the slow, dense frequencies perceived by the senses – while the faster frequencies of natural consciousness whir undetected.

Breaching the Wall
The ego evaporates as you fall asleep. With the ego’s low, earth-based frequency dissolving, consciousness is liberated to flow toward its natural frequencies. The early, light stages of sleep are a period of gradual acceleration of consciousness; the day’s experiences are processed during this transitional phase, teased apart into their physical/emotional/mental/spiritual components, examined for their relevance or irrelevance to one’s life theme, evaluated for their significance to life’s deeper purpose.

In a sense, this is a period of sifting and sorting through the mementos and souvenirs of each day’s earthly experience, separating the precious from the petty. Those experiences ripe with significance are retained and passed on to higher levels of consciousness for more meticulous examination. This early, light phase of sleep still operates through the boundary between waking and authentic selves, and it ensures that only deeply significant events pass through to higher levels of consciousness.

Deep Communion
The phase of deep communion can be envisioned as multiple strands of consciousness, humming at varying frequencies, intermingling and exchanging tendrils of information across permeable boundaries. The waking self’s consciousness must “ascend” — accelerating its vibration — while the higher self “descends” – decelerating its furious whirl – and they meet on common ground, at a mutually compatible frequency.

In deep communion, the individual strands of consciousness rising from probable and reincarnational selves intertwine with strands flowing from the higher self, and at the point of intersection a rich vibrational dialogue ensues. Powerful daytime events, the body’s overall health, the swelling tide of thought — all these are carried as vibrational matrices flowing from each individualized soul to its higher self. The higher self evaluates these strands in light of its intended growth and experience for a lifetime, to determine whether the waking self is “on track” or veering off into unanticipated, and possibly detrimental, paths of experience.

Freedom and free will are the cornerstones of your system, and a higher self never directly intervenes in the lives of its offshoots. It sets them up with certain characteristics, tethers them to a specific life theme, selects a birth mother, and then releases them. From there, the waking self takes over, aided by the powerful but undetected influence of the higher self. Final choices always rest with the waking self; it has every power and right to backslide into retrograde and primitive behaviors despite its higher self’s expectation of growth toward enlightenment.

At the nexus between each offshoot and its higher self during deep communion, after the offshoot has offered vibratory fragments of its day’s experience, the higher self offers a flow of responsive material. Couched in dispassionate respect, the higher self proffers its comparison of the offshoot’s anticipated growth versus its actual experience. The great probable swirl of potential choices is laid before the offshoot, the better for it to understand how it came to actualize one slender strand and what alternative potentials lie ahead. The danger of further entwining karmic ties with others, as opposed to loosening them, is emphasized, for all karmic bonds must be dissolved before earthly life can be released.

Each offshoot also shares, to a greater or lesser degree, information and experience with its brethren offshoots. The insight and inspiration you may occasionally feel upon awaking – a sudden zest to face your challenges with redoubled vigor and determination — stems from deep communion with your brethren selves offering their wisdom for your benefit.

In deep communion, each offshoot offers its day’s experiences to the higher self, which responds with a flow of guidance and direction to encourage the offshoot to stay the steady course of growth toward enlightenment and release of karmic bonds. Among probable and reincarnational selves, experiences and wisdom are swapped in a free-flowing exchange which encourages all participants to face their waking challenges with renewed strength and creativity.

I would like to share with you a glimpse of what is possible – a journey only a few human beings have ever taken. To travel deep into the Essence of Self, in the realm of the “Nothing!”

I personally have ventured deep into My Conscious Essence of Self many times. Each excursion into My Self reveals more than I was aware was present in a previous moment. I actually see and feel My Self traveling into the deepest levels of My Multi-Universal Self, into the vast and expansive “Energy of the Nothing.” When I choose to go there, I see and feel My Self consciously flying through all the “Energy of the Something.” Energy that I can see and feel has been and was attempting to block My journey. It is my determination and resolve to know, feel and Be the I AM, I AM! It is my desire to be free, that encourages me to go deeper and deeper within My Essence of Self.

On Wednesday, March 24, 2010, I again made this journey. As I traveled deep within, I could feel and see the energy that kept coming forward to block me and stop me. It was almost like a wall of energy, that if I focused on it, as it desired me too, would draw my attention away from continuing the journey deep into My Essence of Self as I AM in the Energy of the Nothing. Undaunted and undeterred, I continued to focus on what was beyond the wall of energy in front of Me. Time and time again, for an entire hour, this went on until there were no energy walls left for me to move through.

Behind me, I could see this Universe I AM physically participating in – and the light of this Universe got smaller and smaller until it simply disappeared behind me.

The Energy of Nothing does not hold light and does not hold dark. Light and dark are energies of the experience and the something. I have ventured into the “Energy of Nothing” many times, but this was the first time I could feel I was experiencing My energy flowing and coalescing with another conscious energy in the Energy of the Nothing.

A conscious energy and essence in My Multi-Universal Self? Why is it here? How did it get into My Multi-Universal Self?

Connecting with this conscious energy took place for about 40 minutes. When I opened my eyes, this conscious energy from the Energy of the Nothing discovered it was within My body, within My Life Force Energy Center in My chest. I felt the reaction of this consciousness within. Whoa! How did this happen? When this consciousness saw through my eyes the ceiling above me, there was a realization that it was now within me. Twelve times my body catapulted into the air like a caged animal attempting to escape, as this consciousness attempted to leave.

I heard, “Let me go!” But I knew in that moment this conscious energy that existed in the Energy of the Nothing was now experiencing being fully conscious through my body. Through the connection I made with this consciousness in My “Energy of the Nothing,” in returning consciously to my body, it returned with Me into the “Energy of the Something.”

I became aware that this consciousness has existed in the My Energy and Consciousness within the Nothing I AM. I became aware in that moment that each human being is born with a conscious energy in their Multi-Universal Self that is not true to them, that hides in the Nothing Energy of Self. This conscious energy is effecting ALL of humanity and the human experience by existing in a place within our own Multi-Universal Energy of Nothing, without our being able to be aware it is there.

By venturing into the Nothing of My Self, I became aware that it has held the ability to control My experiences and choices as I participated in this human experience!

I have also become aware that this conscious energy holds a power over the human experience and each human being that has not been visible or could be understood before. Each human being has been affected to different degrees – some more, some less. It is still there within each of you.

What I am sharing is not to alarm you or create unnecessary fear or concern. It is what it is, and it will continue until it does not. But, unless an individual has traveled into the Energy of the Nothing and encountered this consciousness from within, it is My Understanding that You will not be free of it.

Now I AM not asking you to believe that what I have shared really happened. I cannot prove it, for you it may only be possibly plausible. But for me it was real, and so I share it here with you in these words.

How does this conscious Energy of the Nothing affect you or deceive you within? Do you struggle with relationships? Do you struggle with anger, frustration, resentment, disgust, intolerance, addictions, petty issues? Do you feel blocked within, and no matter how much energy work, purging and looking within you do, some energy still seems to be blocking your energy within? Do you see and feel many different energies holding you back, and coming back time and time again? Do you call them yours, then those energies own you, as you believe they are yours to deal with?

Look at the many different people who promote and advertise their ability to look and dissolve what issues you may be struggling with. It is being promoted and many are telling you that these are your issues. These are your past-life issues. This is Your Stuff to deal with!

Whoa! What is really being promoted here? If there is a conscious energy within your Multi-Universal Self that you cannot see and have not been able to be aware of that is promoting your continued struggles within, would you like to look at it and free your Self of it? Are you interested in going right to the source?

Energy is Energy! See it as dark and it is! See it as light and it is! See it as yours and it is! I say, see it as simply energy – neither light or dark, good or bad, and certainly do not own it as yours! This will only continue to mire you in any energy that is there, as it can relate and correlate to your present Self and your past experiences.

Do you desire to travel into Your Multi-Universal Energy of Nothing and discover the I AM Self You are, which is separate from the Energy of Something but controls your life and experiences as a human being here in this world and dimension? Look at what controls you from the neutral space of nothing within Your Self?

If you are truly ready to take this journey within, you will know it as you read these words – and there will be no doubt. Are you ready to explore where you have never explored before?

We have come to call who we are a holistic community. We are people who see the bigger picture, collectively and individually. We inherently know there is an interrelated web that connects everything, and we acknowledge it in the life choices we make. We are healers and therapists, teachers and spiritual guides, artists and shamans, and men and women who lead otherwise normal lives while instinctively recognizing that we are all part of the whole. We always were and will always be.

Sometimes it is quite easy to feel the connection to everything. The morning walk before the sun rises, just as the birds begin their song. A heart-touching seminar that changes our life.

We know how good that feels. We may find ourselves wanting to share how we feel with others in our lives, our friends and family – wanting to inspire them so they are right there with us, sensing that same connection with all of life, deep down in the core of who we are.

But we learn, sometimes through painful experiences in relationship with others, that we cannot make that leap for someone else. All we can do is invite them to the experience.

The Zen proverb says: “Before enlightenment – chop wood, carry water. After enlightenment – chop wood, carry water.” It also applies to all of us in the holistic community who may feel like we have the secret, that we see more and know more than others about the nature of reality.

As we now take in more of the picture and see things in a new way, our way forward is clear: We must remain humble.

Sometimes in our quest to be spiritual, in our steadfast knowing that we understand the Truth, we view ourselves as better than, or wiser than, other people. We sometimes judge others as less than. Sometimes we judge ourselves, as members of the holistic community, as hypocrites when we don’t live up to the high standards we have set for ourselves. It’s not easy to walk the walk when we anoint ourselves as saints.

The truth of the matter is that each of us – every person on the planet – is a spiritual being having a human experience, even if we don’t sense the extraordinary. In reality, no one is any more special than anyone else.

You, with your unique gifts, and me with mine, are just two pieces of the larger puzzle, interlocked among many others. The puzzle would not be complete without us. And, our two pieces, sitting alone, mean nothing without all of the others.

It is when we separate ourselves from each other – seeking the specialness that seems to exist in our select groups (yes, even the holistic one) – that we lose touch with our humanity.

In the final act, all of us on the world’s stage will come together in a group. The first thing we do is remove the labels we have placed on ourselves. Then we take a hand, and take one more, creating a giant circle. And then we look around, marveling at the light in our eyes and the shared love in all of our hearts. And we say to ourselves, “Why didn’t we do this sooner?”

As a farmer lay dying, his four sons sat by his bedside awaiting his final words. “There is a vast treasure buried in the family’s field,” he whispered.

“Where is it, father?” the sons pleaded. But it was too late. Their father was gone.

Soon after his passing, the sons set to the field, trying to unearth the treasure. For many days the sons desperately worked pick and shovel, digging everywhere in search of their promised legacy. Eventually they turned over every inch of the field, but alas, no treasure was to be found. Finally, dejected and discouraged, they gave up their search and returned to their families and vocations.

The next year the farm yielded its greatest harvest ever.

This parable yields a lesson richer than the treasure the sons so fervently sought: The fortune their father hinted at was not a magical boon that would transform the sons’ lives in one glorious instant. The treasure was the untapped potential of the field, capable of yielding riches to the family if they worked with the materials and natural potential before them. The power of the treasure lay not at the end of the rainbow, but in the journey toward it.

I hear people talking about waiting for their big break; or for Oprah to hold up their book on television; or to win the lottery. Certainly these events would be wonderful if they occurred, but if you sit on your duff waiting for a record producer, Oprah or a lottery number to save you, you may wait for a very long time and miss the wonder and gifts of the journey. Wisdom-guided action and integrity build success far more substantially than a magic pill.

The apparent goal of a journey is simply the carrot the universe dangles before you to call you to the adventure and learn the lessons the journey yields. Martin Büber declared, “All journeys have destinations of which the traveler is unaware.”

If you think about most of the things you have striven for, you will realize that the lessons you learned in the process of striving were far more powerful and long-lasting than the material object at the end of the trail. While you sought for a soulmate, you may or may not have ended up with that person; but the self-knowledge you gained and the growth you experienced in the search ran far deeper than the form of the person you sought. Or perhaps you worked hard for a financial or career success. You may or may not have attained your goal, but what happened to you along the way made a far greater difference in your life than the specific goal itself. Then, when you obtained the car, house, or promotion, you were satisfied for a moment, but sooner or later you set your sights on the next achievement. Something inside you recognizes that the power of stretching to achieve something yields you more value than the something itself.

We are a quick-fix oriented culture. We want lots of stuff and we want it now. What we often leave out of the equation, however, is that we would prefer stuff that works. We want computer printers that last longer than a year, a job we can grow into a passionate career, and a soulmate we can love for a lifetime. Because we often sacrifice integrity for expedience, the art of quality engineering, true craftsmanship and meaningful relationships is shrinking to the domain of a dedicated few.

When I visited Japan, my friend Koichi told me that the oldest company in Japan – and the world – is 800 years old. The company is an architectural firm that specializes in building temples and pagodas. The company, Koichi explained, does not use nails in their construction. Instead, they make a series of tabs on the ends of wooden pieces and fit them together. Over eight centuries, when there have been earthquakes, this company’s structures, including five-story pagodas, have stood firm while buildings around them crumbled.

If you want a life that stands while others crumble, pay more attention to how you till the field than finding the buried treasure. The real treasure, you see, is buried within you. If you are going to mine anything, mine the gifts you already own. Don’t wait for a soulmate, talent scout or Oprah to put you on the map. You are already on the map, but if you are holding it upside down, you won’t recognize and claim your true domain.

It’s a wonderful thing when people or events come along to change our life. But you must do your inner homework and own those changes by right of consciousness. Otherwise the boons that arrive will disappear as fast as they came. But if you have tilled your field with love, care, and integrity, the harvest will be bountiful and you will have plenty for yourself and many others.

A radically different way of life and of being is calling us, with every breath. If you listen deep inside, you can sense its voice. As a flower blooms and a baby matures, as a caterpillar becomes a butterfly, so we as human beings are now metamorphosing into something new. Something radically different is beckoning us. It is the unknown.

I invite you to realize that this opportunity is here now. It’s time has come. Whether or not you individually embark upon this journey is not in itself important. It will happen anyway. For our species has reached the point where it must transform. It has no choice.

Universal consciousness is able to taste the great diversity of our experience through the billions of human beings that compose its very cells. For although we may think of ourselves as individuals, we are making a collective journey as a species and as an integral part of the greater universe. We have provided the greater universe with a unique opportunity to enjoy this entire adventure, to witness it all, through our eyes.

Until now, as our species continued to grow in a state of immaturity, we have been left free to destroy ourselves and our home, the planet earth. We have been left alone to indulge in wars, power, possessions, injustice and many other traits that are foreign to much of the cosmos. Now we are being gently asked for something else – that we take full responsibility for our own creation, and that we become conscious in a new way — fully aware of who we are among the myriad life forms that inhabit universal space. To live in peace, without hostility, aggression or territory. To know at every moment that we are interconnected to everything in the universe, and that whatever harm we appear to do, we do to ourselves.

Remember that there has likely not been a single day in your life when you have lived outside of the agreed upon frames of reference of your society, your prior conditioning, your religious upbringing, and your countless and mostly unconscious habits and routines. Understandably, this is all you have ever known. It is difficult to conceive of how limiting this has been. Of all the infinite number of ways you could have lived, you have been locked into repeating this same basic patterning again and again. Even if you have spent considerable time in examining and trying to change these patterns, this has likely occurred within the context of the general mindset and customs of your society. This implies a prevalent way of thinking, a dependency on the mind, a fear of potential problems or calamities, a fixation on controlling yourself and your environment, and innumerable other attributes which have become ingrained in your behavior. Even if you are aware of and have consciously resisted these influences, the resistance itself cannot change them.

None of this is necessary. It is simply a natural consequence of how your family life or society or past life experiences have developed and imprinted themselves upon you. And while you might have had a very different and far less mind-dominated experience if you had grown up in an indigenous society, the influences of that society would in their own way be just as limiting.

What if you could just leave all of this behind you, in its entirety?

It can only exist within you with your approval. You sustain it in each moment through consciously and unconsciously supporting the multiple habits and patterns that you have learned from billions of ongoing sense impressions. These have imprinted your brain much as data fills a computer, and it is gradually deleted, along with the entire programs that process it. You will find that the past itself is recreated as you witness and hold your life from a very different place, and you will clearly recognize that much of what you consider to be yourself, including your thoughts, beliefs and emotions, has little to do with who you really are.

Focus on seeing your journey from as wide a place as possible and you will see that who you are is an eternal being. Your prior way of seeing the world gradually recedes.

For as you do so, your relationship to the entire universe changes radically. You no longer process information or see the world through the distorted lens of the ego-mind or the collective eye of your family or society. As your brain becomes free of its past programming, you become consciously aware of yourself as an integral part of the greater universe. From this new experience, you realize that nothing has gone wrong. Everything simply is.

And in each moment, another potential presents itself out of the unknown, which you now experience with a sense of wonder and gratefulness.

Earlier today I got a phone call from a friend who is studying hypnosis. Her first class was Saturday. One of the exercises they did was to create a safe place for themselves. Just this morning as I was lying in bed thinking about the day ahead, I was thinking how much I needed a safe place. As we discussed the need for a safe place, my friend told me how important it was as a child to have a safe place. She said that was a big part of her hypnosis lesson, learning to help clients find their safe place and the reasons why.

All this discussion reminded me of the hypnosis sessions I’ve experienced in the past. I realized that the reason we need that safe place is because we subconsciously hide things from our conscious mind. The most common reason for this is because we are trying to protect certain parts of ourselves. Most of us have memories from experiences we had in childhood or past lives where we did not feel protected. We guard these memories, or vulnerabilities, as a way of feeling safe. This causes conflict and sets limitations, and it can be so painful that we are stopped in our tracks, but we don’t know why on a conscious level.

As my day went on, I thought more about this whole process, the need for emotional safety, and why I chose hypnosis. Having been aware of my psychic and intuitive gifts for most of my life, I often felt conflict within myself. While I was growing up, it was not acceptable to be psychic. It was very scary for me to let anyone know this was my reality.

I have always been able to feel a person’s soul essence and know their truth. If they were telling me something that was out of alignment with that truth, I would feel it as physical pain within me. However, they had no reason to lie to me, and I so wanted to believe them.

By using hypnosis from a professional hypnotherapist – as well as self-hypnosis – I could connect with my subconscious to get answers to these difficult questions or situations, and hypnosis is a great way to get confirmation about what I knew as truth and what I was feeling as physical pain due to their misaligned energy.

Another very important reason I chose hypnosis was to get answers to my own tough questions: Why am I here? Am I on the right track? Why did I choose a particular situation in this lifetime? Hypnosis helped answer these questions for me by bringing the information from my subconscious mind to my conscious mind, all the while feeling I was in a safe place to do so.

We can only access information that is for our highest good at the time. If we are not prepared, or if it will not serve our highest good to know something, the information will not be available to us. I had this experience in one of my first hypnosis sessions. While my mind was saying I was ready to know something, my soul knew it was not the right time. I was protected from the information until a later date when I could consciously accept the knowing.

I found hypnosis to be a wonderful tool to help me with my life’s journey. All the information I brought forth from my subconscious was positive. It was like putting together more pieces to my life’s puzzle. Having the conversation with my friend this morning reminded me how important it is to be aware of my safe place. I will continue to use hypnosis to find answers and information as I need it.

Time and again I wonder about the soul’s indifference to our feelings, yet it allows us to choose a direction or path that we will take. From the smallest choice to the larger, more dynamic family or career choices, our soul watches.

Many people ask me what does the soul look like. Mostly, it reminds me of a lava lamp. About 16 inches tall. Brilliant in color and light. A gold and silver flowing intermixed. Illuminated by the source within it. Rays of light and energy escape its boundaries filling our physical being. Never faltering in its desires. Never waning, the light we all seek is inside us. We all look the same.

I wonder about the soul. Suffering from a recent illness, I’ve been not too keen on spreading this around. So, I stay home. I miss opportunities to share with my friends. Recently I’d been reminded that I was missed. Sudden warmth of friendship and companionship filled me.

I again wondered about the soul. How does the soul “feel” what we feel, or “see” what we see. So I went to find out from my soul’s perspective, seeing me.

From my soul as it discovers a journey:

He misses his friends too, though he has been a windshield warrior of late. Still, he does his job the best he can. He fulfills someone’s expectations of him.

He misses being able to play in the sand. He wonders what wonders might be revealed. He knows the resolve of play figures that are dancing in the sand and cannot be still, though held firmly in place. He knows that a future can be seen and does not worry about a past. Pasts hold no future, only parts of a whole. The sand and its infinitely small size can be observed when the grain of sand is as large as him!

As the grain of sand grows, he sees the corners of the grain of sand are sharp, each giving a direction. The colors of the grain are infinite at this size, mingling and blending a chaos of flowing patterns. Other areas are smooth like a mirror, fresh and new. Reflections show his truth. He knows who he is and embraces the grain. The sides are scarred with memories of conflict, contact and contentment. Each telling a story of a crusade to survive, an event that helped him follow his way. Each telling a story of missed friends that touched him and spun on by, leaving only a wanting of another to follow the first.

He remembers the feeling of compassion and grace in others. The excitement of an encounter pending raises his level of hope. Others will offer their wisdom as he listens. Their wisdom is for the future, he thought. He is tired. Tired, Tired. Rest, you all say, but he doesn’t hear you. You offer coaching from afar, offering hope. He knows he is missed.

The grain of sand is huge at this size. Its shadow creates a coolness around him. He does not like the past or references to it. Just judgments we carry. He sees the now that he exists in and is happy to be him. He has looked for those alike, but some only drift by, not wanting the more of this life. They hold to their crap. He sees more chaos intersects his life.

Onward and upward, a Superman he will be. He sees visions of fate expressed in his dreams. A level of self exists, a level of fulfillment and desires drives him now. Not feeling sad, but happy and glad. Touching lives and feeling the emotions in their moment can lead him away. Following a new light that had escaped him for years. He is following a dream that started many lifetimes ago. “Fulfill!” is shouted at him now that he listens. Hears his own heart, he does, and says thanks for the wisdom.

As the grain of sand travels on, it bounds off others. Each grain an individual, each immortal in its faith. Each grain chooses a path. Some grains we touch, some we never see. Those that touch us leave their mark, their imprint on who we are. He shudders to think, “Can I touch them all?”

Back in this world he is still seeking friends. Ones that he says will share the light of their grain of sand. He sees deep inside, a gift he was given. A gift to see the soul for who others are. A gift the he shares to the grain of sand in you.

It’s time to go back, to be human again. Or is it easier to become as small as the grain of sand. The soul has shown me a place of wonder in one of this world’s most common sight. If we look closely enough, if we can look small enough, we can see sand where we walk. If we look inside ourselves, we can see the individual grain of sand. Just like you, my soul has a history inside like the grain of sand. It’s who I am and will be.

Wow, what a lesson.

Some of us spent years exploring whatever spiritual pathway drew our attention, trying to find something that answered our questions or matched what we were feeling. We may have shifted focus several times as we continued to grow past the limiting dogma of any particular practice. In my case, I left behind a typical religious upbringing as soon as I could. I found channeling, psychic development and training in energy healing and consciousness were better fits for me.

There’s a bigger story that gets lost in all the personal searching, with books, lectures and classes high on the list of pursuits, but at some point, we sense that we are part of something larger. I’m not talking about only remembering that we are aspects of Source, but realizing that we have been participating in a kind of collective experiment designed to create a new reality. Through our personal journeys we have been healing and transforming much more than ourselves. We have also been acting on behalf of the whole, for every shift in ourselves is a shift in the hologram of consciousness within which we exist. Healing is really an act of dismantling old structures and replacing them with something new. To paraphrase Gandhi, we are becoming the change we wish to see in the world.

Our soul has guided us through this journey, always aware of the bigger picture. Along the way we may have found plenty of philosophies and words to digest and debate, but that’s mostly a function of the mind attempting to make sense of something larger than it can grasp. The thought about something is not the same as the experience of something, so a philosophical argument is mostly a mental exercise. It is not real. The real experience in such a discussion is usually tension in the body for those participating or sometimes a liberation of stuck energy when insights lead to a shift in perspective.

As we move into the energies of the New Field, thinking gives way to experiencing and seeking gives way to creating. Our deepest desires are for experiences, not just more information. We can’t think our way into this new reality, but we can call it into our experience. Perhaps you have noticed certain changes in yourself these past weeks, like the glow down low, that sense of something astir in the Root and Pelvic areas? This pulsing in the Root and Pelvic Chakras is life, creation at work. Our understanding of this creation energy has been limited and we’ve been told it was for procreation, even then with severe limitations imposed. What if we are expanding our creative possibilities from essential acts of procreation to delicious acts of co-creation? What if we get to experience magnificent ripples of pleasure just from the sheer act of creating with others, free of dogma. Count me in.

Have you begun to feel an expansion in your chest of a heart that strains for release into the world? Do you find yourself more deeply connected with those who are around you, with a love that not only ignores differences but gratefully cherishes the unique qualities of another? Have you recently felt like crying for no clear reason, but with a deep knowing that all is well? More light streaming in gives us a much deeper experience of Love. I believe we ain’t seen nothin’ yet.

And have you begun to notice how certain things have arranged for you with almost no effort on your part? Did you catch yourself at some point going “wow” about an experience because it was so unexpected or meaningful that you had no other words? This is the New Field at work. If a gushing waterfall is our future flow, I would say that we have barely seen the vapors of the first drop.

And finally, a peeve. There are schools of thought that dis the material world as inferior, illusionary or unreal. Please understand my point of view: I believe those teachings are missing Mr. Huge Point. That point would be the one that sees the plan of creation as one designing a materialized form through which Creator could experience its creations. Start with the thought of it (Light), come up with a plan to create a densification into matter (Life), then merge the two in a form that can deeply feel and experience. What do you end up with?

Us.

I recently heard from the mother of a newborn that her baby was considered underweight because her pediatrician’s statistic tables didn’t match her child’s reality. I joked that her child had her first opportunity to practice not living up to the expectations of others.

The mother returned the humor, asking where was I when she was growing up and I, at twice her age, responded that I’d only resolved the issue for myself a week ago and was now free to talk about it. In truth, I’m not sure I have completely purged that old training that I am responsible for the experience of others, but I’m definitely working the recovery steps.

As I write these words I am reflecting on my 1950′s childhood and the pervasive cultural messages. TV shows such as “Leave it to Beaver” and “Father Knows Best” projected the image of correct behavior, with unpleasant consequences (but eventual salvation) for straying off course. Religion declared me imperfect, asked for my time and money to perpetuate the message, and informed me that sacrificing myself for the benefit of others was the proper choice. Benefits to me seemed made of fuzzy promises without much clarification.

The weight of external expectations from parents, schools and peers was intensified by my belief that almost anyone carried more authority than I did, and like a well-trained soldier I delivered without questioning. This pattern of behavior continued into adulthood with me subduing my own senses for the sake of those who might feel challenged by a differing viewpoint, with conflict avoidance high on my list of personal priorities.

My journey has unique qualities to be sure, but many experiences are similar in our collective pasts, including the ways we learned to be someone for someone else. The repression of honest emotion and true expression creates a festering swirl in the dark corners of the unconscious, which eventually will demand attention. If not uncapped with awareness, the releases can be twisted and frightful. Many people recently became concerned that a virus would wreak havoc on humanity, but pandemic can also refer to a general large-scale fear. I’m thinking there are pandemics galore, unrecognized for their sheer numbers like missing the forest for the trees, and all that.

My path of healing has been a relatively gentle one, but these days we are witnessing more of what happens when the lid comes off without awareness. Our planet is undergoing a shift both expected and impossible to control. Healing (a restoration of wholeness) cannot take place while anything remains in the shadows, since all aspects of who we are must be included. What has been repressed is rising, and we sometimes see horrific actions as the fetid energies burst from their containment.

Fortunately, the shifts bring with them new potential. A change of consciousness opens an opportunity to re-frame meanings, because our perception shifts as a result of the change. For example, in the old story of living up to others’ expectations we were taught to be of service in a particular way, usually illustrated by giving of one’s energy for a cause. Give your time, give your money, give your life. To be clear, I am not speaking of voluntary actions that feed our souls, but rather the agendas born of systems that demand we set aside our beings for the sake of behaviors designed to support the system.

In the old story of duality, our consciousness gets split into self/other. The shift we are making is creating a new experience for us. In the old story, integrity is seen as how well we live up to expected moral or ethical principles decided by another. In the new story, integrity is about authentically expressing ourselves from the core of our true being. We may hold a memory of what this expression feels like from our experiences in the world of spirit, but we are now creating the possibility of such experiences in a material world. To me, that’s a magnificent achievement.

Service takes on a different meaning in the new story, because we are no longer focused on meeting external demands. It has been said that the greatest gift we can give is the gift of ourselves, and I would say that in the new reality that statement is precisely true. Perhaps the greatest service we can offer each other these days is to continue moving into greater alignment with our own souls and expressing the gift of ourselves into the world.

My spiritual journey began when I was young with the thirst for the truth, but I never found the right path until I attended the Inner Engineering program offered by Isha Foundation. The first thing I noticed after the program was that my need for food and sleep dropped drastically and I now was able to function well with five hours of sleep.

Before I went to this program, I always found myself trying to enjoy life by experiencing the finer things in life. I had to sample the latest fine-dining venues, taste the wine I read about in Food and Wine magazine and take lavish vacations. I did all these compulsively, thinking that this is the way to happiness and bliss, but through this practice I became more aware of my habits. This awareness created a grateful attitude toward everything I have to sustain my life – from the water I drink to the air I breath. Naturally, I started cutting back on going out and buying items that I didn’t need, and everything in me became grateful for everything I have and don’t have.

As I contemplated this change in my perception of everything around me, the economic environment started to take a turn for the worse. My business as a consultant came to a halt. In the past, this situation would have made me nervous and would have created a lot of fear within me about what could be lost. Now, I simply see the situation for what it is and I am focused, calm and joyful by my own nature. The natural shift in my consumption was a blessing, because I didn’t need as much income to sustain my current lifestyle. This simple, yet powerful, practice has connected me to the abundance of joy that lives within all of us.

I do this practice daily for about 20-30 minutes, and I am able to deal with life however it plays out. This slow time in business is giving me an opportunity to offer my efforts toward the well-being of others – and my life is richer than ever. Now I live my life fully and know that nothing is lost that can’t be gained by the creator when you are in touch with that aspect of your being.

Elsa Kiflu lives in Eden Prairie, MN.

Judy Smith lives in Maple Grove, MN.

Read Inner Well-being by Sadhguru Jaggi Vasudev

Read an interview with Sheela Rajdev, who works with Sadhguru Jaggi Vasudev

It’s easy for those interested in consciousness to look at Bush’s legacy disdainfully and wonder how he could have successfully tricked so many people for so long. But while it’s simple to see the consequences of his unrealistic and neo-conservative beliefs regarding economic, environmental, energy and global policies, it’s harder for these same people to realize that their own beliefs about awakening have just as little in common with reality. Yet, the consequences of these beliefs impact them far more.

It’s not just a coincidence that so few people have truly awakened. It’s a direct result of their not being able to abandon widely held misconceptions about the awakening journey – myths that those few who have already awakened try to refute at every opportunity. Often accepted because they appear to be politically correct, these myths serve as both barriers and ready excuses for millions of people to remain stuck in the dream state.

We wish it was easier to wake up. Out of compassion, we wish that you didn’t have to make your freedom your absolute priority; that you didn’t have to be willing to give up all that you think you have (including the story of whomever you think you are); that you didn’t have to go through literal hell at different points in this journey and feel the rug being continually pulled out from under you. It would be so much easier if, as so many people seem to assume, awakening would just “happen” to them – that as “we’re all waking up together,” one after another would truly see the light on a regular basis to enter a place of authentic inner freedom.

We don’t want to program you, but overwhelmingly, this doesn’t seem to be the case from the evidence. And your pretending otherwise doesn’t seem to help – it just makes awakening that much more unattainable. In essence, you can keep your myths or you can wake up. You can’t do both.

Maybe you’ll be different. Maybe you’ll be one of the unique few who awaken gently or spontaneously, as a result of gradually “getting better” – without having to challenge the very foundations of your existence to their core. But if you’re putting all your eggs in that basket, you will probably have about as much luck as you would learning Chinese in your sleep. It might make more sense to follow the advice of those people who’ve already awakened than to keep this fiction intact.

Why aren’t more people willing to recognize what seems obvious – that only a relatively few are actually waking up, despite popular, politically correct beliefs to the contrary? We think it’s because their egos have realized that awakening entails the full and complete reorganizing of their priorities, ultimately dissolving both their identity and the ego itself. So it does everything in its power to trick, deceive and resist you. It loves having you assume that you are well on your way to waking up, which still allows it to maintain its control over your thoughts, emotions and your actions.

With this in mind, we’d like to continue our discussion of widely held awakening beliefs so that those truly interested in waking up can begin to move in a more fruitful direction. While it may seem discouraging to realize that what you thought you were doing is not taking you where you wanted to go, if you can let go of your pride, disappointment and fears you might now begin a new journey that can actually do that.

In the previous article in this series (in February’s Edge Life), we discussed Myth #1, contrasting the great differences between one’s sense of “getting better” and one’s truly “waking up.” Here we take a look at another key myth that continues to delude serious seekers.

Be forewarned – and proceed at your own peril!

Myth # 2: The awakening journey should be relatively gentle.

Numerous commentators have described the awakening journey, and almost none of them have called it “gentle.” That experience is quite rare. While this journey is quite often exciting and even intoxicating, it is just as often lonely, tedious and extremely painful. While incredibly “rewarding” in the end to emerge from the dream state and see and accept things are they are, it is not for the faint of heart!

If we had to choose a word to describe our own experience of this journey, it would be intense. Eric Putkonen, who also serves as a guide in awakening in the Twin Cities, compares it to an apple falling from a tree. As it leaves its former life on the tree, it gradually decomposes and shrivels up – adjectives we don’t usually associate with pleasantries. This dissolution applies to our identity and everything we thought we were, including whatever we previously thought was important. Often you feel like you are dying, sometimes for weeks at a time – and in reality this is true, for your old or former self must die, or burn away, for a new consciousness to take hold.

So we can almost guarantee that if you’re still seeking after pleasant experiences or running from greater levels of intensity, you’re probably looking in the wrong place. And if your experience is consistently gentle or if that’s what you think this journey is all about, you can probably assume that despite the apparent benefits of whatever you may be doing, they’re not waking you up!

Often people say to us, “I want to wake up, but I don’t want to look at certain incidents in my past, because it’s just too painful.” Whatever you need to look at is in your present, and you will call it to you at the appropriate moment. Yet, you need to be fully willing to do whatever it takes. For whatever you deny or avoid constitutes the very areas you most need to look at, areas where you’ve tied up your energy through resistance or avoidance. The experiences where you consistently sell out to your fears or your pain are used by your ego to keep you from moving further.

Those who assume they will eventually find an easy route to avoid this dilemma are very likely deceiving themselves. For the world of the mind is by definition one of illusion that interprets, reacts and resists. Here is Adyashanti writing in his new (and appropriately titled) book, The End of Your World:

“We must give up the pursuit of positive emotional states through spiritual practice. The path of awakening is not about positive emotions. On the contrary, enlightenment may not be easy or positive at all. It is not easy to have our illusions crushed. It is not easy to let go of long-held perceptions…If our orientation is simply to feel better in each moment, then we’ll continue to delude ourselves, because trying to feel better in the moment is exactly how we delude ourselves….

“For most of us, the path to enlightenment is not rosy. We need to acknowledge this, because otherwise we’re only going to let ourselves travel toward that which feels good, that which supports our image of what the path of awakening should be….

“But the real, sincere impulse toward enlightenment is something that goes far beyond the desire to make our dream state better. It is an impulse that is willing to subject itself to whatever is needed in order to wake up…no matter if it turns out to be wonderful or terrible. It is an impulse that puts no conditions on what we have to go through.”

Are you ready? Let the journey begin!

This is the second in a series of articles about the awakening journey. It describes both the common myths that stand in its way and real steps available for those brave souls who are truly interested in waking up now. The material is controversial in that it questions and challenges many of the assumptions most people hold dear and asks for each of us to instead examine what is really true.

As you look inside yourself, you already have the guidebook for your awakening there. You only need to access it. But to do so, you will need to put aside all ideas of who you think you are.

The guidebook is clear. Look no further than what is in front you. Hide from nothing. Welcome everything, however painful in the short term. It’s not easy. For real growth, real learning, often involves pain. It involves honesty. Yet what else do you have to do? After all, this is why you’re here, to find yourself again. And have compassion for yourself along the way.

In a real sense, you are searching for who you already are, yet you are looking in the wrong direction. You can’t see this because it’s so simple. And everyone is waiting for you. They have infinite time – you can take as long as you like. But why wait?

Everyone you meet is here to serve you, even though it might not seem so at first glance. Each person, each moment, is an opportunity to learn, to urge you awaken to yourself. Thus, welcome those who criticize you. Embrace those who doubt you. They are your real teachers. It’s best to call them by their proper names.

The awakening journey is not a straight path. It is a spiral, and you often won’t have a clear perception of where you are. It is easy to deceive yourself, however sincere you may be, for there are probably more misleading assumptions out there than truths about its nature. With this in mind, the following may be of help to you.

COMMON AWAKENING MYTHS

"To dare to even speak about radical transformation, let alone call other people to a higher level, is against unstated rules. And of course, one’s definitely going to be put in one’s place for doing something like that. But unless the possibility of genuine transformation is actually declared, unless one is willing to demonstrate it publicly and to call other people to the same, no one is even going to know that it’s possible. And then unknowingly, everybody’s going to be participating in the conspiracy of mediocrity." – Andrew Cohen in "The Conspiracy of Mediocrity," What is Enlightenment? (Fall-Winter, 2002)

Myth #1: I’m Already Awake or in the Process of Awakening

Many thousands of sincere people are engaged in the process of "getting better," in self-improvement and in becoming more self-aware. There is a large and growing metro area economy composed of dedicated spiritual practitioners, healing professionals, therapists, spiritual discussion groups, fairs and conferences, channels, publications, psychics, and New Age churches, usually with the unspoken assumption that all of this eventually leads to awakening. But does it? For if all of this was truly effective, wouldn’t we notice that there were more people who had actually woken up? Where are they?

Many people are feeling better, feeling freer and more able to cope with life, and that’s laudable. But are they waking up? Jed McKenna, Leonard Jacobson, Adyashanti, Ken Wilbur, Bernadette Roberts and many others have written extensively about this distinction. And books, such as Halfway up the Mountain: The Error of Premature Claims to Enlightenment by Mariana Caplan, discuss it in great detail.

For contrary to popular opinion, "getting better" and "waking up" are often like apples and oranges. For example, Ken Wilbur, in "A Spirituality that Transforms" (Fall/Winter 1997, What is Enlightenment?), sharply contrasts one’s translation of the world, or the process of building ourselves up – with transformation or awakening, which involves the dissolution of the same individual identity that seeks to get better:

"With translation, the self is simply given a new way to think or feel about reality. The self is given a new belief – perhaps holistic instead of atomistic, perhaps forgiveness instead of blame, perhaps relational instead of analytic. The self then learns to translate its world and its being in the terms of this new belief or new language or new paradigm, and this new and enchanting translation acts, at least temporarily, to alleviate or diminish the terror inherent in the heart of the separate self…(I)n today’s America, this is…disturbing, because the vast majority of…spiritual adherents often claim to be representing the leading edge of spiritual transformation, the ‘new paradigm’ that will change the world, the ‘great transformation’ of which they are the vanguard. But more often than not…they do not offer effective means to utterly dismantle the self, but merely ways for the self to think differently….

"(For a)uthentic transformation is not a matter of belief but of the death of the believer; not a matter of translating the world but of transforming the world; not a matter of finding solace but of finding infinity on the other side of death…. Transformative spirituality, authentic spirituality, is therefore revolutionary…. (I)t does not render the self content, it renders it undone….

"Let it start right here, right now, with us – with you and with me – and with our commitment to breathe into infinity until infinity alone is the only statement that the world will recognize. Let a radical realization shine from our faces, and roar from our hearts, and thunder from our brains – this simple fact, this obvious fact: that you, in the very immediateness of your present awareness, are in fact the entire world, in all its frost and fever, in all its glories and its grace, in all its triumphs and its tears. You do not see the sun, you are the sun; you do not hear the rain, you are the rain; you do not feel the earth, you are the earth. And in that simple, clear, unmistakable regard, translation has ceased in all domains, and you have transformed into the very Heart of the Kosmos itself – and there, right there, very simply, very quietly, it is all undone."

And consider the following from Jed McKenna:

"Self-realization isn’t about more, it’s about less…. (You) don’t wake up by perfecting your dream character, you wake up by breaking free of it. There’s no truth to the ego, so no degree of mastery over it results in anything true. Putting attention on the false self merely reinforces it.

"Spiritual awakening is about discovering what’s true. Anything that’s not about getting to the truth must be discarded. Truth isn’t about knowing things – you already know too much. It’s about un-knowing. It’s not about becoming true, it’s about un-becoming false so that all that’s left is truth. If you want to become a priest or a lama or a rabbi or a theologian, then there’s a lot to learn – tons and tons. But if you want to figure out what’s true, then it’s a whole different process and the last thing you need is more knowledge."

And this, from Adyashanti’s new book, The End Of Your World:

"Make no mistake about it – enlightenment is a destructive process. It has nothing to do with becoming better or being happier. Enlightenment is the crumbling away of untruth. It’s seeing through the facade of pretense. It’s the complete eradication of everything we imagined to be true….

"Our greatest contribution to humanity is our awakening. It is to literally leave the state of consciousness that the mass of humanity is in and discover the truth of our being, which is the truth of all beings. When we awaken at the level of the mind, we begin to think, ‘my goodness, the way i saw the world was a complete fabrication. Literally the stuff of dreams. It had no basis in reality whatsoever. The way i saw myself was also completely fabricated.’"

Leonard Jacobson states in "Time of Crisis," (10/8/2008, www.lightworkers.org): "Our whole world view has been carefully constructed to protect our story, our interpretation of reality." And he strongly advises us in Words From Silence: "To awaken, you must be willing to accept that you are not fully awake."

Thus, it might make sense to carefully examine why you might not want to awaken – your fears of rocking the status quo, fear of worsening, fear of what your family or others might think, lack of security and an unknown future, fear of the void, etc. Unless you begin with this and not some idealized version of it, there’s no place you can go.

In light of all of this, we would like to offer you an invitation. We sincerely invite you to open yourself to honest self-examination and to consciously give up whatever positions you may hold about whom you think you are and reality itself – and to welcome authentic truth wherever you find it, no matter how challenging this may appear.

This invitation is there for the asking. It is a path many others have taken for millennia in the interests of transforming our species. This path is not for the faint of heart. Yet, it is available to you at all times, if you only take the first step.

A very young me startled my relatives by telling them what they were about to say. The looks on their faces revealed disbelief and shock before they politely laughed. Their response then and at other times let me know that adults were uncomfortable with a child telling the future. In my day, children were to be seen (as little as possible) and definitely not heard! Eventually I learned that lesson well.

It was hard to ignore the psychic messages. Learning history was often a rediscovery of things I knew – not about everything, but about certain times and places. I had no idea where the knowledge came from, but I sometimes annoyed teachers and fellow students with my "know it all" confidence about things I couldn’t have known. Eventually I stopped. Once a person closes themselves off and rejects psychic information, it becomes very difficult to rediscover those connections.

Everyone is born with some psychic gifts. Female (and also male) intuition are real. The feelings of foreboding we get about certain people or situations is real. As we mature, many are taught to ignore their psychic gifts like I was. However, I never forgot that once I had this gift. As an adult I sought more information, so I read extensively: Roberts, Browne, Cayce, Bodine, Chopra, Redfield and many more authors.

As I read I developed my own understanding of God, The Universe and Everything. I formed a "unified theory" that was reinforced through studies of religions, metaphysics and science. Through my studies, I arrived at conclusions that were reinforced by the claircognizance that made me the "know it all" when I was young. I started reclaiming my psychic gifts.

When the time was right, synchronicity led me to take hands-on healing classes. After many lessons in a number of modalities, my head learned to allow my intuition to direct my healing work. My hands tingled when I was near someone I could help. The more I practiced, the better the resulting healing. Eventually I picked up on things related to the person I was working on. Unfortunately that led to becoming a psychic sponge, picking up on everyone’s troubles. I became more moody, short tempered and intolerant.

The person that I had become was a beast. Members of my healing group suggested meditation. After meditating regularly for a month, even my students saw the difference in me. I was noticeably more calm and easy going. I still find meditation to be a valuable tool in staying balanced and giving me stronger psychic connections to my guides and angels.

The next step in my journey was to take classes directly from a master psychic, Echo Bodine. In her classes I learned how to prevent psychic headaches, to remove the energetic residue that I picked up from others and a number of methods to receive psychic information. These classes taught me how to get and give information. When the classes ended, I needed more practice and got it through advanced classes and the Practice Circle at Lake Harriet Spiritual Community. I’ve found that this practice time has been extremely valuable in learning how to hear, see and feel messages from my guides and angels.

Eventually, five of us from Echo Bodine’s classes and the Practice Circle formed a company, The Circle MPLS, LLC, and started doing readings professionally. While I still consider my primary calling healing, I also give psychic readings through The Circle. Our monthly galleries and our Conversation nights at Echo Bodine’s Center provide further proof to me of the importance of using psychic gifts for the benefit of others.

You can develop your innate psychic gifts. Meditation helps some. Others never shut it down in childhood and have always enjoyed the ability to hear and see messages from the other side. Most of us benefit from classes that teach us how to use our gifts wisely, how to protect ourselves from dark energy, and how to open and close our third eyes – skills that are learned from an experienced mentor or teacher.

When you set out on a journey, the direction in which you are pointed at its outset makes a huge difference where and when you arrive at your destination. If you alter your course by one degree when you begin, where you end up could be altered by a hundred or a thousand miles.

So it is when we begin a new year. If you are clear on where you want to go, you will get there far more rapidly and efficiently than if you harbor intentions that are mixed or other than your true choices.

To upgrade your year, begin by upgrading your expectations. I know a woman whose father was the vice president of TWA Airlines. When she was a girl, her father took her on lots of flights with him. Since he was a VIP, the two always flew first class. When this girl grew up and travelled on her own, lots of airlines gave her upgrades without her even asking. "It’s sort of a miracle," she told me. "They just put me up front." The airlines did not know who her father was, but the Law of Attraction was operating flawlessly. The experience of flying first class was imbedded deep in her psyche. Although she did not think about it consciously, her expectation created results. The folks who gave her the passes had little idea they were agents of a system far broader than the airlines.

Take a few precious moments this month to decide where you really want to go this year. When touch typing on a keyboard, the first step is to position your right index finger on the letter "J." From that point your other fingers are aligned with the keys they are intended to press. Once your fingers are on the right keys, you can type for an entire session without having to look at the keyboard again. If you misplace your starting finger, all of your other fingers are out of position and nothing you type will make sense. The word "hello" will be printed as "jr::p" and "love" will come out as ":pbr." When you at the right place, everything that follows makes sense.

If you really want to make your year extraordinary, consider not just the material things you wish to accomplish, but place your spiritual experience at the top of your list of priorities. In addition to your "to do" list, make a "to feel" or "to be" list. Each morning choose a word that describes the primary experience you would like to enjoy during your day. Flow…ease… joy… connection… exhilaration… inner peace… wholeness… self-honoring… and expanded life are all good choices. Then decide that no matter how many items you check off of your "to do" list that day, you will consider your day a success if you stay true to your "to feel" list. What’s the use of getting 12 out of 15 things done if you feel harried, stressed and lacking as you go? Behold the blessed contrast between ongoing frustration and a sense of having danced through your day. This is the difference between hell on earth and heaven on earth.

The only true measure of success is happiness. If you grow happier this year than you were last year, the year will be a huge success. If you achieve more in the outer world but are no happier, you cannot count the year as a success. Imagine how different our lives would be if we all placed spirit at the top of our priority list!

In Paul’s famous letter to the Corinthians, he notes, "When I was a child, I used to talk as a child, think as a child, reason as a child; when I became a man, I put aside childish things." Paul is not speaking of material things. He is speaking of spiritual growth. When we are spiritually immature, we seek answers and fulfillment primarily from the outer world. As we mature, we find satisfaction in inner wholeness. We move from a standard of material nourishment to a standard of soul nourishment. That is the degree of shift that makes all the difference.

It matters not how many mistakes you made last year or in previous years. Regretting or bemoaning what happened will only keep you stuck in that energy and move you to repeat those experiences. It matters only what you want to do this year.

Back to our typewriter analogy, if you find you have been typing on the wrong keys, the only reasonable action is to shift your fingers to the proper keys as quickly as possible. You don’t need to apologize to the typewriter, flagellate yourself or make an offering for your sin. You just need to get back on track. Any time you spend other than getting on the right keys is just more time wasted.

Imagine how powerfully your life and all of our lives would change if we all agreed to make this the best year of our life! The year will be great because we choose it to be so. As Thomas Paine declared, "We have it in our power to begin the world again."

This is the first in a series of articles about the awakening journey that describes both the common myths that stand in its way and real steps available for those brave souls who are truly willing to wake up now. The material is controversial as it questions and challenges many of the assumptions most people have about awakening and asks instead for each of us to examine what seems really true. The authors’ purpose is to create a mindset that authentic awakening is truly possible and that others can support and potentially join you in this journey. The path now lies very much in front of you. All you have to do is take the next step.

In each moment, we can choose to try to control and understand the "dream" we live in, or to focus instead on fully awakening from that dream. For in that dream we remain a constant prisoner of our own minds, beliefs, thoughts and fears – a character in our own story.

Whether or not we are aware of it, each of us is on a journey to awaken to who we really are and to our integrity with the greater universe. Yet most have lost sight of their ultimate purpose on Earth – to reawaken as free human beings. For living on this Earth is not easy and no manual for how to do so is readily available. For most people, just surviving and the ongoing pursuit of comfort or companionship takes all of their energy and focus. And everyone deserves great compassion for just having made it this far.

Yet an increasing number of people are seeing through the illusion of their lives and are intently searching for the next step. We are writing now to serve these brave individuals by clarifying and demystifying the awakening journey. We do so by first exploring and then challenging many widely held and idealized perceptions associated with it. Potentially, this might catalyze an open dialogue or forum about the true value of whatever people may be doing, both individually and collectively, to effectively awaken.

An Abiding Awareness

What is awakening? Awakening embodies an abiding awareness and trust of the unity of all things – and the recognition that we are not separate. One recognizes that while everyone is playing a role, the true source of who we truly are remains the totality of all being. As you trust far more in this greater awareness than in your personal self, these dissolve into each other. As a result, you experience the dissolution of your separate identity – the role and personal history that you spend most of your energy carefully constructing and defending.

At the same time, we know very little about the universe – far less than we might think. And awakening is a subject about which no one can be an expert. Obviously, there isn’t any one way that people awaken, and the paths that they take often seem contradictory. We have chosen here to examine a spectrum or approach that has recently gained greater support in this country. It includes those paths, authors and teachers that do not depend on and even discourage established traditions, rituals, structures and hierarchies – to provide more freedom for each individual to explore this journey in his or her way.

Because most of us personally interact with so few, if any, awakened people, many of the barriers to waking up stem from widespread misconceptions regarding the process itself. We can look at these as superstitions or myths ("things with no real existence"), and they create a collective hypnosis or veil that tends to keep most seekers anesthetized within their illusions. In upcoming Edge Life issues, we will divide these into two categories:

• Those myths that tend to engender overconfidence in one’s
  ability to awaken and to overcome the difficulties encountered on this journey.
• Those myths that may cause people to doubt or underestimate their
  real capacity to wake up. They will also address real options, steps and
  paths currently available to those who may be truly willing to embark on
  the awakening journey right now.

Of course, not all of these myths apply equally to everyone, but because they are so widespread it’s very likely that some are held by you. They are simultaneously humorous and sad – humorous because so many people continue to hold beliefs that upon closer examination are illogical; and sad because these same beliefs often block one from taking the leap of faith into the unknown that awakening demands.

The Overwhelming Experience

What is true? Unfortunately, in some consciousness and New Age circles, it’s politically incorrect to challenge a number of these myths even though they contradict the overwhelming experience of those who have already "woken up." In fact, people may grow indignant once their spiritual beliefs and imagined futures appear to be threatened. For most of us want to feel good, have expansive and peaceful "spiritual" experiences, and be reassured on our journey. Yet as the awakening experience is just as often difficult and painful as it is reassuring and peaceful, our seeking after peace and avoidance of pain can often become attachments that keep us from moving further.

Simultaneously, some myths serve to absolve us from taking full personal responsibility for our own awakening process – from confronting our true priorities and sincerity and making the critical changes in our lives that this process requires. It may be far easier, for example, to place the focus or responsibility onto a collective "we" (such as in "we’re all waking up") and to focus on the cosmology of humanity’s awakening than to truthfully examine what each of us as an individual is fully committing to in this very moment. Unfortunately, the latter may be very different than we would like to assume.

Yet, while a lot of people may be misguided, it’s clear that all of them are doing the best they can! For awakening involves finding your way out of a hall of mirrors – no easy task – to surrender to an unknown reality. Anyone embarking upon this journey deserves tremendous compassion and support. It has nothing to do with good or bad, right or wrong, better or worse; and as we are all one being, no one can really be ahead or behind anyone else. And as no one can do anything wrong, everyone is right on course. However, it’s helpful to have some sign posts as you choose to head into truly unknown territory.

Dissolving All Resistance

While most people seek to alter their experience to make it better or more comfortable – and thus spend their time attempting to control their lives and environment – awakening involves dissolving all resistance to "what is." It is accompanied by the dissolution or unwinding of the perceived "I," one’s identity as a separate individual. Thus, as Leonard Jacobson writes in Words from Silence, "The one who sets off on the journey of awakening will not survive the journey."

Byron Katie, in her amazing book, A Thousand Names for Joy: Living in Harmony with the Way Things Are, puts it this way: "Who would you be without your story? …There is no story that is you or that leads to you. Every story leads away from you. You are what exists before all stories…. When you become a lover of what is, the war is over. Since I don’t believe my thoughts, I have no hopes, fears or expectations. I’m a woman without a future. I live in the open space where everything comes to me."

It takes determination, surrender and trust to withstand the complete breakdown and unwinding of your known reality. Yet, to the extent you’re truly willing to see reality differently, whatever illusion you’re inside of can break apart. This experience will be the most challenging and encompassing you will ever encounter, or probably ever imagine. There are no rules. It is not easy or even logical. As you will see below, it has little in common with therapy or "getting better." It cannot be undertaken through intellectual exercises, discussions or concepts – for it embodies a heart-felt sense of humor and a surrender that transforms life itself.

The guidebook for this journey is straightforward, although not easy. Disillusion yourself to all of your concepts and ideas about who you think you are. Look only at what is true, whatever this seems to cost. Leave everything else behind and don’t look back. Stay on this course no matter what or who you may encounter. And then, if you are persistent and sincere, at some point you will encounter "all that is," the energy behind all things. Then the journeyer is no longer needed to take the journey, as there is no place else to go.

In a blink of an eye, my mainstream world was turned upside down forever.

An allergic reaction to an antibiotic left my world a place of desperation and despair. I was immersed in a world of chaos and confusion. Every aspect of my life had to be examined and redefined. This life-altering event took me to the very core of my inner world to experience the most amazing miracles and gifts of spirit from across the world. I was sent on the most amazing path of discovery of the mystical and magical. I traveled the road of suffering and was able to transform my spirit into the lotus of ascension.

I was raised in the Catholic faith, but I always knew there was more, that somehow a piece was missing. This crossroads in my life allowed me to expand my awareness and define what spirituality meant to me. I was deep within my illness and there was little hope for recovery. A friend approached me with a prayer card for St. Therese the Little Flower. It is said St. Therese answers your prayers in the form of roses. I began to use the prayer card each and every day, asking that my health be restored and the gift of roses would be sent to me.

One day I went to our pastor and told him of my journey and my belief in St. Therese. He expressed his relief that I had not used the word "miracle." Instead I used the phrase healing path. He then told me of his trip to Italy. It was the 100th anniversary of St. Therese. and a special Mass was being celebrated. He had no intentions to attend and didn’t even have tickets for the event.

I left that day feeling like I had not been heard. Upon his return from Italy, he came to me before Mass. I sat down and he explained this incredible experience he had in Italy.

To his unexpected surprise, he had found a ticket in his room for the day of the Mass. He then discovered it was for a seat in the fifth row from the altar. Tickets for this very special Mass were impossible to find. The most astounding part of this story was that at the end of this Mass, fresh rose petals were dropped from the ceiling, just over the first five rows. He then thought of my story and picked up a few petals to bring back to me.

This experience offered me a bridge to travel from mainstream religion to discovering the mystic within. My experience was like a spark of light. If I could experience this miracle in my life, what else could be accomplished?

I grew so hungry for answers outside my limited view and of other religious practices. I explored the I AM presence that is within each of us. My journey through this portal created a new world for me to explore and create.

I began to wonder, "How does our spirituality define us in a new world?" It is our path to be in joy and peace. It is a blend of ancient teachings and new thoughts and ideas. We can create a sense of spirituality based on our hearts and inner sanctuary. Being in spirit and finding the true connection to the oneness of our hearts is the first step. This then allows us to continue on the journey to remembering who we are.

I have discovered that the true essence lives within each one of us, and it is our greatest gift to find it within. It is our relationship with source that defines us. The inner temple of our own lives is where the greatest mystery lies. Spirituality is not held within one practice, for it is omnipresent in all that we do. As we move through this next stage of enlightenment, our spirituality can be the place we find refuge in the eye of the storm. As we watch the old world fall away, we can find comfort and peace in the knowing we will be safe. Together as sovereign beings of light, we can come together and create a new world and a new age of miracles.

A number of years ago I bought a T-shirt embroidered with the words "All who wander are not lost." I am not all that fond of the shirt, but I have kept it for the motto. It seems to sum up my life in six words.

I am rather known for my wanderings (or wandelings as I tend to call them) – and yes, sometimes I do wonder when I wander. I have found a good "wandle" will heal most of what bothers me. It takes me out of my busy-ness and puts me smack dab in the moment.

I think wandering has a bad reputation in our world these days. We hear a lot about focus and purpose and meaning and very little about the value of a good wander. Yet, most of my best discoveries have been made serendipitously.

Now, I am all for focus. But I also believe that sometimes it gets in the way of our discovering who we are. We are so focused on staying on "the path" that we forget to look for the interesting side roads.

Years ago, I occasionally worked as a guest lecturer on various cruise ships. I was on a cruise that left from Seville, Spain, stopped at various places in the Mediterranean and then crossed the Atlantic and finally docked at a Caribbean Island. It was a grand adventure.

My older sister had just died of a sudden heart attack at age 47 and I was grieving her while watching the waves on the transatlantic portion of the journey. Even with today’s modern cruise ships, it takes five full days to cross the Atlantic. I spent a lot of that time staring at the waves and wondering at the uncertainty of life.

On day two of our crossing, a small exhausted bird lighted on the deck. The crew was amazed. I had never thought about it, but small birds do not fly over the Atlantic. There simply is no place for them to land or anything for them to eat.

The tiny bird became a sort of mascot of the crew. For three days it huddled, tired and hungry in the far corner of an upper deck. The crew fed it and gave it water and wondered about where it had come from and what it had been thinking.

The day we were scheduled to arrive in the Caribbean, the bird flew away. Somehow it knew that we were close enough to land. So, off it went on a great adventure.

I sometimes think of that tiny stowaway, landing so far away from its home. Did it survive? Were there others of its kind to welcome it? Wandering is like that. We never quite know where we might end up.

Of course, life is like that. I am now 10 years older than my sister was when she died. I’ve had plenty of time to wonder and wander. She was cheated, I think, of so many years. Yet, I know that she went on her own great adventure across a large uncharted expanse. Rather like my tiny bird friend, she did not know where she would end up or who would be there to greet her.

Ah yes, wandering is good for one’s soul. With all the bank failures, mortgage difficulties and concern over pensions, perhaps this is a good month to remember that we are all just wandering on a journey we call life.

In 1995, I had just started a new journey in my life. I had a great opportunity to see who I was a person and start discovering more about myself. I had just gotten a divorce and didn’t even really know anything about myself. I started by making little changes at first.

I started changing my household cleaners to organic ones and my headaches started to decrease. I started to take classes at the Open U to get an opportunity to just play and explore what my likes and dislikes were. I had just started to finish up my bachelor degree. I started to explore things that I was interested in before I got married.

I decided to take psychic development classes, a ghost busting class and aura reading classes. I was exploring my job. It not longer fit me. I had never really been crazy with my employer. I decided to put my resume out there and take chances. My resume was out there for two years without any nibbles. I wasn’t too crazy about my house. It was 636 sq. ft. I felt like I was going nuts in such a cramped house. I decided that if the job wasn’t going to change then I was going to at least be in the house I wanted.

I had heard stories about how people looked for months. My house sold in about the first week. It was a seller’s market. Worried that I might not find something in time, I asked to close in August. I found my house in the third week in June. Between June and August, I went on a total of three job interviews. By August, I was to start my new job in the first week of September and close on my house in the end of August. The best part was that I would receive a hiring bonus.

Who knew that when I started my journey that I would see such beautiful returns on my future. All by just exploring and being true to myself and goals. The miracles that I see happen in my life always make me smile.

"The joy, satisfaction and peace we experience when we live a life that is not defined by our weight is a miracle!" The Journey to Weight Loss Freedom Workshop was created out of a deep desire to teach other people that we have the natural power and the wisdom within us to create weight-loss miracles in our lives. I am now a 75-pound weight-loss winner living the life I have always dreamed about and I am no longer defined by my weight.

It’s a universal truth that when we follow a nutritious, healthy diet, with almost 100 percent certainty, this will lead to a healthy body and lifestyle. We all know what the basic food groups are and that too much of anything will have adverse affects. Knowing this, why is it that this country is faced with an epidemic weight crisis with nearly 120 million American adults considered overweight or obese?

We lose weight, and after a period of time the weight creeps back. We quit trying in the middle of a weight-loss program because a crisis comes up, or we become ill, or we change jobs, or we suffer a loss…. Life happens, and for many reasons the diet no longer works for us. Have they ever? Each time we try to lose weight and fail we become more discouraged. We tend to look for the magic in a new diet and when that doesn’t work we begin to feel hopeless and say, "What’s the use to even try again?"

The solution lies in the truth that "It’s not about finding the right diet."

I believe this weight crisis exists because the thoughts and beliefs and feelings we hold about ourselves and the limitations we have placed on ourselves throughout our lives have created our circumstances. Until we examine the limiting thoughts and emotions we hold about ourselves, we will continue to receive the same results. How many times have you decided to "muster up the determination and will power" to get started again, only to find yourself right back in the situation you were in before?

The Journey Workshop is a holistic path on which to examine your thoughts, feelings, loving and accepting yourself, and discovering the inner certainty, peace and freedom that has always been within us. In the workshop, you will choose a holistic food plan based on nutritional values that will serve you for life. You will learn the skills to call forth your ability to lose weight.

I am a passionately obsessed seeker who spent a lifetime seeking the right "diet," the one that would perform magic and miracles. Today I know that the magic to perform miracles is within me and that weight loss success happens from the inside out.

My greatest passion is to help others re-discover the amazing human qualities within each of us and to share with others how we can achieve our dreams and desires and live fully by allowing life to be just the way it is. My desire to find a different, more simplified way to live combined with my personal experiences moved me to create the Journey Workshop as an experience that embraces our entire human cosmos coming from a place of knowing that we are already whole and complete beings. It is my sincere desire to share this experience with all who want to experience weight-loss freedom.

I spent a lifetime seeking the right "diet," the one that would perform magic and miracles. The magic to perform miracles is within each of us and weight-loss success happens from the inside out.

Join Paula Caldwell for a full day’s workshop on October 11 or November 8 and begin a new journey to places you never dreamed were possible. For details go to www.personaljourneycosmos.com.

Real Happiness empowers you to live the life of joy and purpose that you were meant to live.

Many of our definitions of happiness are shaped by Madison Avenue. They define only the outer shell, or the mask that we show to the world. They describe how we look to others, not how we feel about ourselves. If we accept these definitions, we probably believe that a happy person is physically attractive, rich, influential, liked and respected by others, and powerful in the world. Those are the people we see on television and in the magazines. But if we look a little more deeply at the lives of these models of happiness, we see that they are not really any more happy than the rest of us. They have the same struggles and frustrations that we do, and their lives also fall apart, just as ours do.

Just because we have a good "happiness mask" does not mean that we are really happy. We are just good at pretending to be happy when we really aren’t. It takes courage to pull off our mask and show up as a real person, especially if we have a public image to protect. Yet even if we aren’t famous, we are still trying to save face. We still don’t want others to see the pain that lies behind our mask.

Both Madison Avenue. and Wall Street give us a very superficial definition of happiness. They give us the veneer, not the heartwood. It is easily tarnished. Hollywood doesn’t do much better. Idols are not only made in a flash; they fall and crash just as quickly.

Real Happiness is not based on how we appear to others or what others think about us. It really has very little to do with that. Real Happiness is not about the outer shell, image or mask, but about the inner core. It is not about how good we look to others, or about our ability to please them and get their approval. It is about how we feel about ourselves in our hearts.

In other words, happiness is an internal state not an external condition. It is not about surface things like money, lifestyle, possessions, role or image. It is not about what we do or what we have, but about who we are and how we feel about ourselves.

This is a radical definition. While many people continue to define happiness by how good they are at what we do or by how much money or material possessions they have, the truth is that they can have name, fame and riches and still be unhappy. Real Happiness does not come from the outside. It comes from within. It must be measured from the inside out, not from the outside in.

Real Happiness is a journey

Another important characteristic of Real Happiness is that it is not a static state. It is not just a goal that we aspire to. It is a dynamic process. Most of us are in the process of becoming happy or, to be more precise, "happier" than we have been in the past. No matter how happy we are, more happiness is possible. That is because, at any given time, we are actualizing only a small percentage of our full potential.

So how do we maximize our potential to be happy? How do we take the next steps on our journey to self-actualization?

The same people who gave us the Madison Avenue version of happiness also gave us the most common prescription for happiness. That prescription was "make the best mask you can and put a big smiley face over your pain." In other words, "Deny your pain and pretend to be happy." That prescription doesn’t work for most people. Or else they need other more serious prescriptions to reinforce it. It’s not long before the mask begins to degrade and they return to the doctor for a back-up prescription of Prozac, tranquilizers or sleeping pills, or they might reach instead for a joint, a hit of cocaine or their second bottle of wine.

Numbing ourselves out does not lead to Real Happiness. It just helps us try to cope with the fact that we are not really happy. It helps us feel better for an hour or two when it becomes clear that our mask is not working and the pain behind it is leaking through.

To be really happy, we need to stop doing two things: Denying our pain, and medicating it. And we need to begin to do two very different things: Feel our pain, and heal and move through it.

Healing our pain

Have you ever wondered what your life would be like if:

• You believed in yourself and knew you had a gift to share?

• You could move forward with your dreams instead of questioning them?

• You could face life problems without fear?

• You loved yourself no matter what happened?

You would be well on your way to manifesting your full power and potential as a human being, would you not? So what stands in your way?

There could be several things that stand in your way. For example: You could have childhood wounds and could be carrying a great deal of fear, guilt, anger or hurt inside. While you might have a handle on all that, there may be times when you lose control and what comes out it isn’t very pretty.

Your wound-driven behavior may undermine your relationship with your children and loved ones. It might challenge you at work. Because of your shame around your wounds, you may show up with a mask or a False Self, either apologizing for yourself and seeking approval, or taking charge and dominating others. You might be under-confident or over-confident. You might be hard on yourself or hard on others. You may be a victim or a victimizer. Either way, the bottom line is that you might not like yourself very much. You could judge yourself mercilessly. Or you could judge others harshly, which is the flip side of the same coin.

We don’t like to talk about our reactive behavior or the wounds and beliefs behind them, but they are the root of our deepest pain. If we don’t find that root and heal it, we cannot be happy. We will simply continue to recycle our pain and pass our wounds onto our children.

Loving without conditions

How do we heal? We learn to love and accept ourselves unconditionally. We learn to bring love to the wounded parts of ourselves so that we can heal and stand in our power as authentic human beings. Once we are able to bring love to ourselves, bringing love to our loved ones and our human family becomes a lot easier.

Now this idea is a fairly simple one. Yet, loving ourselves unconditionally seems to be the most challenging assignment for all of us.

Fifteen years ago I wrote a book called Love without Conditions. It was an international best-seller. Other books on this subject followed, including The Laws of Love, The Power of Love, The Presence of Love, and Love is My Gospel. Many people have read my books and subsequently come to my retreats and workshops all over the globe to learn how to heal, to forgive the past, and to love themselves unconditionally.

During the last year I have synthesized and condensed the transformational material from over 35 books into a weekend experience that can be life changing. Participants in my Real Happiness Workshop learn to surrender the False Self and connect with their True Self. They are empowered to stand in their strength, attract honest, fulfilling relationships, and create meaningful work that expresses their true talents and gifts.

A joyful and empowered life

This work assumes that genuine happiness is possible for all of us. There is no defect or deficiency in us that prevents us from being happy. However, there are false beliefs that need to be challenged and hurts that need to be healed so that we can open our hearts fully to love and to life.

I have spent the last 35 years of my life coming up with a roadmap for the journey of healing and transformation and concrete tools that can help us learn to love ourselves without conditions. The Real Happiness Work is the result. I feel that it is powerful, authentic and effective. I hope that you will experience it for yourself and, if it speaks to your heart, learn to teach it and bring its message of hope and healing to others.