This time in consciousness is about healing that needs to take place in the core of your being. All the parts of you that you wish to stay in the dark now must be illuminated and that can involve pain if left unconscious. I have done a lot of work on myself over the years… a lot…but there are still moments when my ego rears its ugly head and I realize that I have so much more healing to do. In that moment, I ask myself for the higher light of my being to illuminate the darkness so the depths of my unconscious pain does not hurt another rather it be transformed…Where pain exists, also lies the desire to heal it. The desire for healing arises from your soul’s longing; a depth that is eternal thus the reality of your own potential for personal healing and redemption is limitless…that is where the possibility to transform your pain into something beautiful exists…but first the pain has to be fully acknowledged… You have to see yourself and fully accept yourself in your imperfection. You have to see yourself in all your ugliness yet see the divine spark barely visible that lies buried beneath.  You have to see how deep and wide the pain thread lies and follow it back to its origin. Once you follow it back to its origin, you will often find a limiting belief that has kept you in that painful place.

I had this experience recently in seeing myself in all my ugliness, that painful shameful place that I would rather not knew existed inside of me. I had to see it and it was not a moment of glory for me rather it was my dark, shadowy, scared fragile self that existed in the depths of my despair. I realized that by projecting my unconscious pain at someone else that it would bounce back with incredible force in the opposite direction thus exponentially potentiating my pain in the process. I had to make it conscious and I had to find its origin in me. When I traced the pain thread back, there existed a small frightened child that felt she needed to be punished for her imperfection. That small frightened child chose to punish herself via starvation when she was younger and thus was hospitalized twice in her teenage years. The 40 year old woman that I am today wants to let go of the belief that I need to be punished if I am not perfect. I also need to let go of the belief that others need to be punished if they are not perfect. That is a dark side of me that needs to be illuminated and transformed. I want to leave this pain behind by making it conscious and live my life in an awakened state, knowing I will always make mistakes but I can love and accept myself completely in my imperfection and love others and accept them completely in their imperfection…and in that moment I will be set free. I choose to reflect on things in the moment, be more vigilant in terms of my reactions to others around me versus impulsively acting out when my pain body get activated. Rather I choose to witness it silently and ask for it to be illuminated so I can understand how I can best heal it in myself so it does not inflict harm on anyone else. Then I ask for personal forgiveness and ask for God to help heal the situation for all parties involved…

When I did a life review, what was amazing to me was that I had no idea who I was. I looked back on my life path and who I was for most of it was someone who followed the rules, did what I was told, and bought into all the messages that I was programmed to believe about myself and the external world. When I woke up at 33 years old and realized this, I had a major identity crisis on my hands. Who was I without my external programming? Who I was, before I realized this, was somebody who based my self esteem on externals versus internals. If I was achieving things then I had more self esteem. I didn’t have a solid sense of self esteem that was built from the inside; rather I relied on accomplishing things in the outside world to build my self esteem up. This created pressure on me from a young age to achieve. This was not always a happy space for me to inhabit but this was how I learned to operate in the world based on my perceptions of my upbringing. My perceptions of my childhood created belief systems that did not serve me in my life; belief systems that necessitated achievement to get my love line. This pattern created a false sense of self esteem that was based on externals which could collapse at any time…

To further your state of awareness, I recommend you do a life review. A life review involves looking at the whole of your life, in all its entirety. An ego shattering experience will naturally cause you to reflect on your life, but this is a little more detailed, a little more complex… It is looking at your entire life path from a spiritual vantage point. It is connecting the dots from a different perspective, a perspective laced with your own personal awareness. Note significant events that happened in your life, the ebb and flow of your own personal well being along the way, forks in the road, paths you took or chose not to take, influences that shaped your particular path…Look not only at the path itself but also how far you have come on the path – note your progress to date. It is too easy to look back on a life, your life, and view it through the eyes of a critic. I want you to view your life from the place of your best supporter, your fiercest ally, your most compassionate friend…Spend at least a few hours on this exercise if not an entire weekend and watch the process unfold with almost a detached eye free of any emotional charge – this is viewing your life from a spiritual vantage point…you might see certain themes arise in your life or repeating patterns, if so, take note of them…you are starting to see things from a spiritual perspective and finding out more about yourself in the process…