But first, a song. It’s my current ‘on repeat’ for July…. so many feels.
back to it…..
We all have pieces of ourselves that we’d rather not claim and pieces of ourselves we have YET TO claim.
Sometimes these pieces of myself come roaring back to the surface; other times, they arrive so subtlety that I don’t even notice until I hear the tone of my voice, or the edge to my words.
They say you are the smartest you will ever be on the day you are born. I would like to think that you are also the most whole. There is no identity, no ‘sense of self’ that separates ‘you’ from what is.
By the time we are three years old, the beginning of our ego is forming. This is where our identity as a separate being forms. There is so much that happens before our brains have a way to conceptualize or express what we experience. Memories from these times are largely connected to our senses like smell or hearing.
As you grow and experience the different forms that life takes, your sense of self begins to take a more defined shape. It begins to form a personality and become an identity.
It becomes solid, a some- thing that you can hold on to.
And we begin to mistake our true form for this ego-form, this sense of identity that is limited by the past experiences we have encountered — both positive and negative.
The sun dancing behind a forest of tall pines against and cloudless, clear blue sky in the Black Forest in Germany.
For a long time in our lives, we become hypnotized by the identity we think is so solid until the rumblings for something deeper and truer in your life shakes things loose.
Those things that get shaken loose as we grow and let go are the shadows and nuances of living that makes each person’s story, their life, more than what can be seen on the surface.
That is the Prima Materia we have to work with on our journey back to realizing and hanging on to the understanding of our soul’s wholeness.
These shadows of our past experiences can leave us with very limiting beliefs, trauma, or trapped in chronic cycles of self sabotage which can manifest in many different forms of mental, physical, or spiritual dis-ease.
We can take the same actions from our Shadows (from our fears, subconscious beliefs, limited perspectives) or from our Light (in trust, love, and acceptance) and get completely different results.
Sometimes we don’t show up the way we would like to.
We get angry, anxious, irritable, and sad. We snap at loved ones and can’t find the good in ourselves.
We have mental and physical traumas that have changed the way our minds and bodies react.
There are some schools of thought that suggest remaining positive at all costs by controlling your thoughts and emotions - lest you attract more of what you don’t want.
There are others that may offer quick fixes and done for you answers in one form or another.
But there’s a couple of things I need to remind myself of often and perhaps this is something that could help you, too.
My thoughts and emotions are temporary, but my breath will always be with me.
So take a deep breath and let the truth that neither your thoughts (that swear you aren’t good enough, have enough, do enough) nor your feelings (that swear you’ll get hurt again or that you don’t know what you’re doing) are telling you the absolute truth.
That’s why we do the work.
Because each time we defy the thoughts and feelings of not enough…
each time we face those Shadows and love them so fiercely they are transmuted, we come closer to the Truth of our infinite self, and we let more of the Light move through us.
As soulful healers, creatives, entrepreneurs, and those who know they are here for more….
Each time we choose to show up to dismantle the barriers to love within our own hearts,
We show up more openly, lovingly, and fully for those in our lives and those we are here to catalyze.
Part of that work is forgiving yourself in those moments and recommitting to expanding your own capacity to hold all of your paradoxes, contradictions, and feelings so you can hold space for other’s.
When you don’t show up in all your light, it’s okay.
And it’s okay to own that part of you without letting it own you.
We are all both light and dark and to be human means to hold all possibility.
Love first, love always,
Ae
Thank you for this reminder x