This summer I interviewed Panache Desai for Spirit of Change magazine, and the interview, “We’re All Family Here,” is currently in the fall issue. Visit their website to read this moving and inspiring conversation with Panache, as he talks about his work as a vibrational catalyst, facing crisis in life, and the planetary changes we’re all experiencing now: http://www.spiritofchange.org/Fall-2016/Were-All-Family-Here/. If you live in New England, the print version of Spirit of Change can be picked up locally at bookstores, health food stores, and various other sites.
Category: Writing
You Are Unique
There is no other being on this Earth, in this universe, who is just like you. You are entirely unique. Not only in your physical features—your face, hair color, and body shape—but also in your cells, your genes. No part of you is replicated anywhere in the cosmos. Think of that for a moment. Nowhere is there a duplicate of your specific body, mind, and spirit. Just like a snowflake, you are distinctly different from every other person on this planet. If you didn’t exist, your essence would be missing from the fabric of the created world.
Pause. Take that in. To be you is such a gift, an honor really. You came into this life for a reason. You were created to be the essence of who you are in your soul. The overlay of personality traits that you have developed to exist in a world that doesn’t always embrace your uniqueness is just that: a surface layer of coping mechanisms, of past history. Those things do not define you. At the deepest level, within your heart and soul, you are pure light expressing as loving presence in this world. You are a love song, a sonnet, an improvised dance, a spark of fire, here to ignite the collective consciousness of all humanity through the sheer power of your beingness. Each of us is that.
Sounds like a big responsibility, doesn’t it? Actually it’s so much more than that. It’s an entry point to the playground of possibility that is life on Earth. We who have incarnated at this time are here to live out the furthest reaches of expanded awareness and creative expression that human beings can embody. We are doing it together, each of us in our own lives but connected through an invisible network of human/divine energy that makes our planet, too, unique. Earth is a planet of polarities, true, but it is also a place where we can come into harmony and balance in the midst of everything as we create lives based in oneness, love, and ongoing transformation.
How do we do that? Well, it’s a little different for every one of us. For me, it means writing my soul self into the world: sharing my experiences, insights, and visions and expressing my vulnerability and my humanness. It also means being completely present to those who cross my path each day (people, animals, birds, everything). To love and appreciate it all. To make every step, every breath, a prayer or an offering to life. And to continue to be open to the expansion of who I am and who I can become in my lifetime. We are each here to live our unique gifts into the world and constantly stretch ourselves into more. And to remember it is a shared journey, always.
So, every morning, look in the mirror and smile at that beautiful unique reflection before you. There is not another like it anywhere, and you are here to show us all that special something that makes you you. Celebrate your unrepeatability! Express your soul self in the world, and soon you will be surrounded by others doing the same. In multi-part harmony, we will fill the planet with music and song.
New Writing Video at Soul Spring
My new video “Writing as Soul Expression: Blogs, Books, and Being Yourself” is being featured at Soul Spring from August 30 to September 5, and available at the SoulSpring Tuesday replay link after that (as well as here: click on Video in Menu). Also, while you’re at the site, check out Soul Spring University, where I am now part of the faculty. My book Lose Your Mind, Open Your Heart is offered as a free class there. You can read the entire book online. Includes discussion questions for book clubs and two new videos. Link: https://soulspring.org/.
Losing Your Self
What does it mean to lose your self? People talk about losing themselves in their work, or in music, or in a movie. This refers to a merging of the individual self with an experience that is completely absorbing. Another connotation is that of losing yourself in another, a kind of loss of identity, implying dependency or instability. What do these two have in common? Perhaps that they both refer to the personality self, as opposed to the soul self. The personality self is connected to the ego and can be in constant flux; the soul self, on the other hand, is always steadily present and can never be lost.
So what happens if the personality self loses itself within the soul self? Well, now we’re entering the realm of spirit, and the conversation can get really interesting. The personality is shaped by the struggle to live in the real world, to cope, to survive, to “rise above” life’s trials and tribulations. In many ways, the personality “just wants to have fun.” It seeks out pleasurable experiences and avoids unpleasant ones, not always successfully. Thus human suffering. Meanwhile, the soul is in the background, witnessing it all. When the personality suffers, the soul is at peace. Sounds like an impossible situation, but it isn’t really, because if the personality can connect to, or merge with, soulness, it too is at peace, no matter what experiences or emotions arise. That has been the quest of spiritual seekers through the ages.
In today’s world of rapidly accelerating change and radical shifts in beliefs and behavior, nothing is certain anymore. Certainly not a “personality.” People change overnight, or seemingly so. Beneath the surface, something greater is transpiring. We are living in a time of soul discovery, or perhaps soul recovery. Within the larger framework of changes in social consciousness, individuals are increasingly being drawn to the idea of authenticity, of living their true selves, not who society has always told them to be. And when the focus is authenticity, what’s really going on is soul connection. You can’t be your authentic self and be disconnected from your soul. This is the paradigm shift we are living into.
So are we all really losing our selves now, as the world also seems to be losing itself? That would actually be the best-case scenario. To lose your fabricated self within the wisdom and peace of your soul would probably be the most life-affirming thing that could happen to you, and to the world. Because as each person aligns with their authentic soul self (and in conjunction the love that resides in their heart), a connection to something greater also occurs. And in that greater connection is universal sisterhood and brotherhood, or oneness. A oneness that encompasses all beings and Mother Earth herself.
In losing our selves in this way, we are not really losing anything. The personality can live in harmony with the soul, and we can all live in harmony with one another. At the level of spirit, or soul, there is no separation. In truth, we came to this planet as souls for the extraordinarily diverse experience of being human—every poignantly sweet moment from birth to death. And within the trajectory that is life on Earth over the millennia, we have now reached the evolutionary point of complete soul immersion: living as conscious spirit in physical form. So celebrate the re-union of personality and soul. It is truly one of the greatest gifts you could possibly receive—or give to the world.
The Unexpected
We take so much for granted in life. Our ability to walk, to hear, to see, to touch and taste—all such incredible blessings. If we lose any one of them, even temporarily or partially, it is shocking. We feel vulnerable, uncertain, fearful. And unfairly robbed of something so integral to human life—seemingly. Yet, so many individuals live without complete access to one or more of these abilities, and they live full rich lives grounded in gratitude. Yes, you may say, but I don’t want to face that kind of challenge. That is the kicker. We want, and expect, life to be a certain way, and we are devastated when it is not. We learn over time—if we are wise, if we are open—to accept “what is” as life unfolds before us, moment to moment, completely outside of our control. Because if we do not, we suffer, and we hang on to our suffering.
Loss is part of each of our lives here on Earth. We don’t escape a lifetime without being touched by some kind of sadness or pain. But extended suffering is optional. We can grieve without holding onto the sorrow tightly and tormenting ourselves with “what ifs.” We can allow the tears to flow through us and cleanse us of our grief. Every emotion we have, if experienced fully, can free us of suffering. If I can let life be whatever it is, my suffering softens and eventually dissolves. If I sit quietly in stillness, I get in touch with the calm peace that resides at my core. I often find this to be true yet learn it anew with each challenge that arises. In this case, my eyesight. The situation continues to be filled with unknowns, and each new doctor’s appointment brings more shifting realities—and more waiting (to see if any change occurs). I find I have to repeatedly dig deep for patience and acceptance. I move forward one step at a time, reminding myself to feel everything and still remain open.
Dear friends and family, and one particularly kind doctor, have also helped me tremendously.* Again and again, the empathy of friends and strangers alike brings me back to some sense of balance and relationship to everything. Because not all of life is loss or fear of loss. Life is also connection. There is so much beauty and love in the world everywhere, visible and invisible. Other people reached out with kindness and caring when I most needed it. Love guides us out of solitary sadness and isolation and shows us our commonality with all of humankind. The sweet tenderness of shared experience, of heartfelt understanding and compassion, makes life worth living. That is why we came into this lifetime—to feel that essential oneness in the midst of our separate life challenges, our fears and our sorrows. We are here to love one another into wholeness—one whole human family, living unpredictable, uncontrollable, but always deeply connected lives.
*My heart’s deepest gratitude especially to Panache, James, and my partner Anne for their love and support.
Spiritflower 
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