I’ve received many wake-up calls in my life – and I’m sure you have too.
There’ve been times when something moved within me and took me by surprise, and my being opened like a flower in the desert, vivid with colour and promise.
And there’ve been times when an outer event – a death, a landslide, a global catastrophe – ripped through the fabric and routines of my life, laying bare how impermanent and fragile our human lives are.
Whether awakening comes with a kiss of benediction or a painful stripping away of the glue that’s held your life together, it brings an opportunity for new choices, coming into alignment with Soul, and saying YES to life.
Today, I’m going to tell you about the wake-up call that has come to me over this last week, since I started to read Liz Gilbert’s memoir, All the Way to the River.
Cocooning
I’ve been a big reader all my life. I remember how, as a child, I’d make frequent pilgrimages to the local library and walk home with my arms full of books. And I’ve been that way ever since. Reading has been my sanctuary, where I can disappear into the land of story, relax and open my heart and mind, and be nourished.
But then, earlier this year or maybe last – I can’t remember exactly when it happened – I lost my appetite for reading. This left a void in my life, which felt strange and uncomfortable. It was part of a process of cocooning which has lasted a year or more. While I’ve been keenly focused on a creative project, I’ve felt trapped and isolated in a long tunnel, and I didn’t know if I’d ever get out the other end. Or even if there would be an end. I’ve felt strangely numb and separated from the tribe of humanity and not sure if even I wanted to stay in the game of life. I could feel my old identity and story peeling away and I didn’t know who I was or what I was becoming.
Then, slowly, over the last two or three months, I began to glimpse the light and feel free at last to reach out and connect with others. But it hasn’t been a consistent awakening. Energy and motivation return, only to disappear again, and then I’m back in the tunnel. Is that how it feels as the birthing time draws closer?
Appetite Returns
Anyway, 8 days ago, on the 31st October, Samhain, the old Celtic New Year, I suddenly felt my appetite for a new book, and a new story. I ordered three books and the next day they plumped comfortingly onto the doormat.
I broke my reading fast with All the Way to the River, a book about Love, Death, Addiction, Co-dependency and Redemption. Not a light-weight read then!
I am in awe of Liz Gilbert’s skill with writing. She had me captivated from page one and my attention didn’t falter until I reached the end at page 383. She held me tight even through the most harrowing parts of her tale.
What impressed me the most is her ability to describe what it is like to live in the shadow side of human nature – how the mind deceives and torments, how the emotions become so intense that all perspective disappears, how we give away our power and manipulate others even with kindness and generosity, how we abuse ourselves and those we love. She lays all of this bare, with radical honesty, without flinching from the pain. And, what is even more surprising, her ruthless honesty and bravery cut through any possibility of judgment or separation.
My story is different to hers, and yours will be unique to you, but I knew she was writing about me and giving me an opportunity to take a deeper look at my own addictive and co-dependent habits, all the small everyday ways I numb myself and keep myself in a comfort zone that stifles me and keeps me from feeling fully alive. And she was writing for Us – we human beings who can delude ourselves about so much and in so many ways. In particular, she shines her light onto our human tendency to reach for more, for that something outside us which we hope will fill up the inner void and take the edge off our pain. And how easily, when left unchecked, the seemingly innocent reaching for the comfort of more can become a suicidal drive. And how our unconscious longings and desires have taken us right to the very edge of the cliff, threatening our individual and collective well-being and life itself.
The Quest for Wholeness Can Lead Us to the Shadowlands
I’m sure you know what I’m talking about. It’s the part of us that thinks, oh if I only had a new relationship then I’d feel loved and whole. Or, if only I could finish my book and get it published, then I’d know I’m ok. Or, perhaps if I have a change of scene and go on holiday or retreat, then I’ll feel well. If I had a better car, a new home, more friends, more Facebook likes, more money, a glass of wine – then this loneliness would go away, and I could be my light and shining self again.
I know this part of myself and, in the forty years I’ve been privileged to work with people exploring their inner landscapes, I’ve met this place of inner emptiness and longing, and the feelings of worthlessness and shame that go along with it, so many times I know it to be a part of the human condition. It’s that part that has been handed down from generation to generation and which now so many of us are doing our best to heal. And it’s not easy. Likening the healing process to stripping away the layers of the onion is a cliché but it’s true. The patterns of limitation keep coming round again and again until we fully meet them and integrate what they are here to show us.
Becoming Conscious and Staying Conscious is a Lifelong Task with Different Phases
One of the most telling passages of Liz Gilbert’s book for me was towards the end when she was on her road to recovery, and she said:
“This is my sober life, and it is good.
Having said all this though, I must acknowledge that we have been here before.
Readers of my earlier work may remember that I reached nearly this same level of peace and tranquillity, back when I was in India, in the middle of my Eat, Pray, Love travels, after months of disciplined prayer, meditation, and retreat. At the end of my stay in the ashram, I really felt like I had found it – that I had reached inner contentment at last. And in many ways, I had found it. The only problem was I didn’t have a programme to help me keep it. Left unsupervised and with no community, or sangha, to support me, I dropped all my spiritual practices and returned to my old ways of being….And eventually I drove my life off a cliff all over again.”
I can identify with this. Over a period of 22 years my life was a spiritual quest, filled with meditation and fellowship, under the bright sky of Aotearoa- New Zealand where I lived among a local and nationwide community of other conscious seekers who were practicing living in harmony with the land and with each other. During those years I experienced expanded states of consciousness as the current of the light-love force flowed through me and blessed me with joy, connection, companionship and visionary inspiration.
Beware, the Comfort Zone
Then I returned to the UK ten years ago and slowly the bright light of spiritual certainty has faded, and I’ve missed it.
My choice to return here, to my homeland, was a soul choice and I don’t doubt it, even though it’s been hard.
Nor do I judge myself for succumbing to comforting habits from time to time. I’m talking about a liking for sweet treats and the occasional glass of wine, not a secret cocaine addiction or raging alcoholism. But the comfort zone can creep up and, what begins with just a few swees can easily turn into something denser and more mind numbing. Those of you who have ever been cigarette smokers will know the folly of “I’ll just have one puff..”
Who can blame any of us for wanting a little comfort and numbness? Covid and lockdown in 2020 were a global wake-up call and with each year the dominating narrative has grown darker, more menacing, surreal and insane. It takes courage to face into the realities of our collective crises with all their dangers and opportunities. It takes commitment to simply be with our experiences as they arise, rather than trying to avoid, transcend, by-pass or resist. It takes trust to witness all the heartbreak in our world and let the grief flow through and change us. It takes mindfulness and discernment to know when it is time to heal and when it is time to act. And it takes a strong sense of purpose to value our gifts and know that you and I are the difference the world and the cosmos are waiting for.
Integration
The sense I have made of my experience over these last years, is that for those of us on a conscious Soul Journey, it’s not helpful stay on the quest forever. For me the quest was about coming to know myself as a spiritual being – as a free spirit in a vast sky of endless possibilities. Then, after the quest came a period of grieving followed by integration. For the last ten years I have been called to know myself as a human being, with all the limitations, suffering and capacity for illusion that entails. The weaving together of the spiritual and the human selves into one embodied soul is a slow and dedicated process, which, in my case, has required me to stay still and be with long periods of what I described earlier as cocooning – isolation, boredom, frustration, confusion. It’s not an exciting or sexy process but there is satisfaction in the slow and detailed work which leads to patience, humility, simplicity, compassion and a deep gratitude for what is here. Being part of a living Earth and a mysterious Cosmos is already the best and biggest gift we can ever have and all we have to do is be still, receive it and let it all flow through us.
Join Us in the Sangha of Soulful Practice
Liz Gilbert’s dazzling memoir has reminded me of the radical aliveness and spiritual clarity I’ve been missing during my time of walking through the shadowlands. She found her redemption through the 12-Step Recovery Programme and a growing trust in her God. My path has also led me to the recognition that we all need to be held within a sangha of like-hearted souls through these troubled times and I have a trust that I am in relationship within a purposeful and intelligent nature and cosmos, with which I can learn to live in harmony and co-creation.
All of this has led me to create a container within which the Tribe in Transition Transformational Practice Community can grow. It’s a Soul Sanctuary within which we can practice the skills of staying free, response-able and embodied, while in relationship. Find out more here. We’re beginning our journey tomorrow and I’m keeping the Founding Members offer open for another few weeks. If you’d like to join just drop me an email.
