Real Freedom is Facing all Facets of Yourself
Welcome back my sacred friends, thank you so much for all your love and support and encouragement. This week I would like to talk about fleeing the scarier, harder aspects of ourselves, how this creates the only real confinement in this world, and how true freedom is facing whatever waits for you within and without.
We all have some part of ourselves we do not love or accept, some place we simply wish was not there, often without even consciously seeing the level and depth of rejection in operation. When a pattern takes a subterranean path like this making any inroads towards healing can be almost impossible, until some person or event arrives to help trigger us into awareness. However, often we project these negative emotions onto the person and then further miss an opportunity to learn something new about ourselves.
We then come to believe confinement is our work or our relationship or our family or any other number of things. This is a rather tricky and comfortable place to be, we get to side-step responsibility and avoid a confrontation with some undeveloped part of our being, one which would undeniably challenge and push us towards the tremendous discomfort which is the first stage of all growth.
We have inherited a pattern and belief that if something is uncomfortable, we should not have to do it, making the reasoning, oh it doesn’t feel good so I don’t have to. In the 50s there was a tightly controlling and rigid structure in place where individuals could not properly express their innate desires and talents, but then the backlash of the 60s left no structure or limitation left, creating a generational attitude of doing only what feels right. But here is the problem, feelings can be just as false and inappropriate as anything else in this life, they are not always going to lead to the wisdom of the soul. Most times I would say they are highly fallible, easily manipulated to justify stasis or actions which continue a habit or pattern.
Yet we are here to grow, we are not meant to be static, to be rigidly lopsided in the living of our lives. Such a stance creates the only real confinement in this world, the imprisonment which awaits all who refuse the call to change. And let me suggest here we all at multiple points of our lives are being sent such a call. We must not be naive about the movement towards growth, expansion, and development each of our souls ask and demand of us.
But we live in a culture of endless confinement. We supposedly live in the home of the brave and the land of the free, yet we rarely, rarely ever see or experience such brave and free souls. We see frustrated, blocked, inhibited people. I have been one of them, I have been one of them when I too thought I was especially free and courageous. But courage is vulnerability, bravery is moving towards the undeveloped within, freedom is embracing responsibility and communal accountability. Freedom is stepping right into the midst of your life and knowing you possess the strength, valour and wisdom to bring your gifts into this world for the betterment of yourself and your community.
We are at the glorious moment when we can acknowledge at last there is nothing to hide from, there is nothing to avoid or escape. We are responsible and capable beings, we are here to improve the world around us in small yet meaningful ways. We do not have to stop wars and violence on the whole of this planet, yet we can stop the war being waged within, the prejudice and self-hatred we subconsciously feel towards the shameful and ‘dark’ within. Move towards what you find disagreeable within yourself, challenge yourself with task of integrating this energy, seeing the gift it has to offer you. There are no ready-made solutions. You must be willing to collapse and drop down to your knees, you must be willing to be less than perfect, all for the sake of growing, participating in the miracle and radiance and mystery of being alive. It is hard, we do not have to candy-coat this fact. Let that part of you ready for a truely heroic challenge rise to the opportunity awaiting all trials, difficulties, odysseys. You will be positively surprised each time.
