Soul Reunion

Photograph © 2015 Peggy Kornegger
Photograph © 2015 Peggy Kornegger

Last month I attended my fourth Global Gathering with Panache Desai in Orlando, Florida. At these events, hundreds of people from around the world gather for what is in essence a reunion, even though many have not yet met one another in person. Some individuals know each other from Facebook, others from past gatherings; still others have had no previous contact at all. Yet the one thing that becomes clear very quickly is that every single person there is a member of a greater soul family who is reuniting. This year’s gathering, “The Power of Community—Coming Together as One,” was the most profound and transformational of any I have attended, and that’s saying quite a lot.

Panache’s view of the current shifts and changes on Earth, which is at the core of his gatherings, is far beyond mere speculation or forecasting. The divine wisdom that flows through him opens into an expansive perspective that is grounded in oneness and community. Basically, we are human souls here to evolve, and the exquisitely woven tapestry within which that occurs provides the context for our constantly shifting lives. Everything is unfolding perfectly for our souls’ and the planet’s greater evolution. Beautiful words, you may say, but are they true? As I live that truth more and more each day, I can only answer, “Yes.”

Over the past four years, my own personal journey has been one of opening to all that I am, all that I came here to be, expressed uniquely in the world. As I share my inner soul self through my writing and in my life, I am one voice, one starburst of life energy, within a continuously evolving collective consciousness. Each of us is integral to this process; each of us has a part to play—really an essence to BE. For more than doing, it is about being. At this year’s Global Gathering, there were artists, musicians, writers, dancers, teachers, tech experts, scholars, financial planners, energy workers, nurses, performance artists, activists, poets, singers, retirees. Parents, grandparents, children. It didn’t really matter what job title or role the world had assigned us. In truth, our lives, fully lived, are the heart of who we are. We were born at this time to love those around us and to be a loving presence in a world often fraught with division, polarity, and fear. Our hearts guide us as we navigate the birthing pains of a new way of being human on Earth.

At GG15, we came together in community for a completely experiential weekend of deep meditation journeys; full-out rave dancing to every kind of music from rap to rock to Disney; intense heart-to-heart interactions; and nonstop “vibrational transformation,” as Panache calls it. Change at the cellular level. Throughout it all, our souls were in silent communion with one another. Oneness and unconditional love permeated everything, even painful breakthroughs and emotional releases. There seemed to be no closed doors within our consciousness. All separation fell away. Language itself fell away. We were emptied out of everything that had come before and filled with infinite divine awareness. From that space, each human face was beautiful, eyes radiating love, no words necessary.

Synchronicities led us from one miraculous moment to the next. Those whom we encountered outside our program seemed to step into their own inner radiance, reflecting back to us all that we were experiencing ourselves. I found this to be true on my return to Boston as well, making soul connections with friends and strangers at unexpected moments. My heart was filled with tearful gratitude and appreciation for every person and every aspect of life, even the upcoming winter and longer hours of darkness. Each morning I awoke in awe at the miracle of being alive. Sounds like a cliché, but that’s exactly what I felt.

This is what we are all living into. Not vacuous bliss without any sadness or fear, but the full spectrum of human emotion and experience, held in our collective hearts as precious and unrepeatable. When we come together and meet at the level of our souls, the reunion and communion that arises carries us forward into our individual lives embodying a greater spirit of oneness and community. We are no longer separate and alone, pitted against one another and alienated. Looking into each other’s eyes, we see our common humanity and divinity. Heart to heart, we are connected; we are in harmony. We are One. This is what I experienced at Global Gathering 2015, and this is the wave of inclusiveness and love that is now emerging planet-wide from countless sources. We are not alone. We never were.

 

 

Trust

Photograph © 2015 Peggy Kornegger
Photograph © 2015 Peggy Kornegger
For as long as I can remember, I’ve wanted to experience it all—everything. Live in different places, travel to different countries, work in different jobs, expand into different identities. I did not want to be stuck in any one location or persona all my life. For the most part, I’ve lived that. My life has been full of change and exploration: shifting experiences that have opened me to a continuously growing beingness in the world. Only recently, however, have I come to know the shadow side to that inner desire: regret, fear of missing something. This too is a part of the human quest for a fully lived life.

This past August my high school graduating class held a large reunion celebration in Lockport, Illinois, where I grew up. For various reasons (travel logistics, other events scheduled that same month), I did not attend. A few days afterward, when individuals began to post photographs of the weekend, I began to feel a deep sadness that I had missed out on something very special: the opportunity to see again friends I hadn’t seen in decades, some whom I had known since first grade. I couldn’t shake it for days, and a week later, I experienced similar pain at not being able to attend a six-day intensive spiritual immersion. It was Panache Desai who pointed out to me the unconscious pattern of regret that I had been carrying inside me, a fear that I would miss out on something extraordinary that everyone else was experiencing. Bringing it into my conscious awareness helped me see it pop up in other ways in my life.

Even in my spiritual practice, I found it intertwined with my deepest desire for divine connection. There it was: Fear that I would be somewhere else when everyone else got “enlightened.” Fear that I would miss hearing the key words of wisdom that would open the door to samadhi, awakened oneness. Fear that I would never experience again the expanded consciousness that embraced infinity and God as part of me, as part of everything. Within my most profound spiritual experiences and connection to something greater lay a fear that I might be missing something or I might lose what I had found. And at the heart of that fear was the issue of trust, surrender.

The more I surrender in my life, the more I see that needs to be surrendered to. I thought I had reached the deepest possible acceptance of “all that is.” I had recognized and embraced the divine orchestration of everything in life. Yet, there I was, feeling that I had somehow made a mistake in not attending a high school reunion or a spiritual retreat. Inside me was a kernel of apprehension that I might miss something KEY to my own evolution as a human being, as awakened spirit. The next step, of course, was to surrender to that too. Accepting the fear itself as part of being human opened the door to a deeper letting go.

With that surrender came another level of realization: that there are no mistakes. I’m always where I’m supposed to be for my soul’s experience and growth on Earth. Spirit has the road map for my human journey, and there is never a wrong turn. Wherever I am, all is in divine order, always. It’s about trust. Trust in something greater and wiser than my own mind’s idea of what I should be doing or experiencing. More and more, I am letting go into infinite unquestioning. I still want to experience everything, but I also have faith that wherever I am and whatever I’m doing is perfect beyond my human understanding. Ultimately, I am surrendering to trust itself. As Panache often says: “Your soul has already chosen. You’re just along for the ride.”

Goodreads Holiday Book Giveaway!

kornegger-loseyourmind-cover-front-final-150pxJust in time for the holidays! My book Lose Your Mind, Open Your Heart is currently part of a Goodreads Book Giveaway running from November 19 to December 19. Enter to win one of five free signed copies, for yourself or as a gift. https://www.goodreads.com/giveaway/show/162359-lose-your-mind-open-your-heart-limitless-love-on-an-evolving-planet.
For anyone living in the Boston area, come and see me on December 5, 6-10 p.m., at a free author event at Arlington Center for the Arts, hosted by Maat Publishing. I will be reading from, signing, and selling my book, along with a number of other authors. https://www.eventbrite.com/e/authors-event-at-aca-tickets

Peace of Mind

Photograph © 2015 Peggy Kornegger
Photograph © 2015 Peggy Kornegger

Everyone aspires to “peace of mind,” but is it possible to access it when the mind often seems at war with itself? We in the Western world have long been a left-brain-dominated culture. We inherited a worldview in which rationalism and scientific thought predominated and have grown up and lived lives in which logical thinking and behavior was valued above all else. Left-brain orientation is often seen as directly opposed to intuition and emotions, associated with the right brain (and with women). Feminists in the 1970s and 1980s pointed out that feminine attributes have been undervalued and often denigrated within the prevailing patriarchal systems. This split between masculine and feminine and left and right brain caused an imbalance and disharmony that divided individuals against themselves and undermined day-to-day human interactions.

Gradually, over time, people have opened to the idea of a healthier whole-brain orientation and functioning. In 2008, neuroscientist Jill Bolte Taylor published her groundbreaking book My Stroke of Insight, which chronicled her experience of how her left and right brain functioned after she had a stroke. Initially her left brain (language, organization, linear time) was almost completely nonfunctional. On the other hand, her right brain (nonverbal, intuitive, timelessness) was providing her with brand new life-altering perceptions. A deep inner peace filled her, and a profound connection to something greater opened her heart. It took her eight years to completely recover the functioning of both halves of her brain. Part of her motivation was to be able to tell others how crucial the right brain is to our well-being. Each part of our brain has important functions, and when they work in tandem, we are more whole as human beings. We now need to consciously welcome our right brain’s input to bring about balance.

My own spiritual journey over the past 25 years has brought me to some of the same insights as Jill Bolte Taylor. Like so many others at this time, I am opening to an experience of consciousness that includes everything and everyone in its infinite expanse. In deep meditation, I have at times felt no separation between my physical body and the outer world. Boundaries fall away, and I am just open-ended awareness. Recently, in fact, I had this experience while walking in my neighborhood at dusk. My body was part of infinite consciousness, as were the crickets and locusts I heard in the trees. And I heard them not from inside my head but from within that conscious awareness which was simultaneously everywhere. The crickets and I were points of life within that vast awareness, the God essence that is experiencing the world through me and the crickets and everything else. A deep sense of peace and oneness arose from this awareness.

That is the peace and oneness we are beginning to access now, individual by individual and group by group, until ultimately it will fill the planet with a new way of being. Harmony, balance, wholeness, loving-kindness—these will no longer be utopian ideas but instead real ways of living our lives. When we allow our hearts (and right brain) to guide us, that high vibration entrains the left brain like a tuning fork so that both parts work harmoniously together, and we human beings do the same. It is an incredible cosmic shift we are living through, and we incarnated to do all of this, for ourselves, for one another, and for those who come after. Peace of mind and harmony of heart—that is the promise and fulfillment we are individually and collectively stepping into now.

Slo-o-w Down…

Photograph © 2011 Peggy Kornegger
Photograph © 2011 Peggy Kornegger

So many of us find ourselves rushing down the “fast track” at one time or another these days, focused on our next destination or goal. Whether walking rapidly down the street or moving briskly through the day, we forget to connect with our inner selves, the part of us that is unhurried and centered in the present. When we move forward at a breakneck speed, we miss the moment. Everything becomes a blur, and the sweet details of life are lost to us. This culturally acquired habit can be easily broken, however, through meditation, yoga, or some other practice that cultivates conscious awareness.

I have been a fast walker for most of my adult life, so when I learned walking meditation many years ago, I found it to be the perfect antidote to that old pattern. Now when I’m out on my daily walks through the neighborhood, I usually become aware fairly soon when I begin to move too quickly. I consciously slow down so that I am fully present to the world around me, not lost in my head, with my body on automatic pilot. Peacefully observing my breath in meditation has helped me to peacefully observe my life as I live it. From my soul’s point of view, there is no need to rush. Everything is unfolding just fine without my foot on the accelerator. Any attempts on my part to control things are both irrelevant and self-defeating. Let go and let life, as the saying goes.

Yes, surrender—the recurring theme in my life these days, and certainly one of the greatest paths to wisdom I’ve ever known. I believe all of us are learning to let go at deeper and deeper levels now. Just in the past few months, I’ve felt a new layer of resistance fall away; I’m allowing life to flow through me, to carry me. As I surrender more and more, every moment becomes a new opportunity to release all expectation and just experience open-heartedly everything that life brings me. There is such freedom in that. If we let go of the desire to personally direct our own destiny and that of the world, a weight is lifted off of us. We don’t have to do it all alone.

You and I are being perfectly carried forward by life’s river. If we let go of judgments about events or people, and see them as part of that river, everything becomes alive with motion and possibility. Take a deep breath, relax, and live life as it presents itself, moment to moment. Meet the day with all the doors and windows open, no barriers to what is showing up. If you let your peaceful, timeless soul lead the way and just witness and experience, life will open up into more synchronicity and magic that you could possibly imagine. More and more, this is what I am experiencing as I slow down, breathe deeply, and let life live me. That’s the blessing, that’s the gift each day offers you and me.