Transform Your Wounds Into Wisdom
The expiration date is long overdue.
Life strips you down. It’s meant to be that way. It’s all part of the deal. We can be torn to bits by life’s endings and detours if we resist. Being willing to change for the better is how we get our wounds of loss transformed in the magic of mystery.
When I speak of loss I’m not speaking solely of the loss of a loved one.
Here is how Oxford Dictionaries defines ‘Loss’
The fact or process of losing someone or something
The state or feeling of grief when deprived or something or something of value
A person or thing that is badly missed when lost
That ‘thing’ can be a job, a relationship, finances, a business, a static idea, an argument, or a story of who we thought we were.
Loss is the fact of no longer having something or having less of it than before.
What feels like a loss to the mind is often the material for spiritual awakening. We can savor our life without believing we possess or control it. Without clinging to the good or the bad. Without disappointment and loss, there can be no transformation.
Isn’t that beautiful?
The spiritual passport no one talks about
In our ‘we can have it all’ culture our grandiose egos often confuse surrender with defeat.
But spiritual surrender is something else. It feels like a burden being lifted from our backs. We finally admit we are not the choreographer or the conductor of the orchestra; we are the dancer and the instrument.
Surrender is the spiritual passport that can take you anywhere you hope to go.
Instead of disempowering, surrender empowers, allowing us to take more risks without attachment to the outcome.
We learn to lean in and let go. Committed and yet unattached. Self-centredness relaxes and there is harmony with the energy of grace and presence.
Recognize surrender as your passport to transformation, welcome challenges as opportunities, and lean into your resistance.
When you shift from control to surrender there is an acceleration of self-empowerment which shapes your life intention and purpose.
The one lesson that changed my life forever
My grandmother taught me the greatest lesson. As she watched me ‘cling’ to people, things, and experiences I perceived were ‘mine’ as a child. She would gently say to me many, many times;
‘Everything changes, nothing stays the same.’
It took a while to integrate the implications.
Nothing is permanent and nothing is ‘mine’.
And we are always changing.
I learned to consider the possibility that adventure is available at every moment of letting go. To focus on where there is beauty, and goodness in the world and to let the rest go.
As the years progressed I have learned to let most things slide.
It’s taken a century or two.
Let go, let go, let go.
Opinions mean jack sh*t, especially mine
I am no longer driven by the need to be right, to be heard, or to win useless arguments. I probably won’t make a difference by arguing with intolerance, so I simply back away from the noise.
To help the ego take a back seat in moments where I find myself being pinged into clinging or resisting an opinion. I quietly ask myself ‘how important is it?’
‘Opinions mean nothing; they may be beautiful or ugly, clever or foolish, anyone can embrace or reject them.’ Hermann Hesse, Siddhartha.
My grandmother encouraged me to quietly question everything. To see the truth of things. To look at things from a different perspective. To sit with things a while.
And hush.
There is always so much more to reality and any situation than meets the eye. Circumstances have many different faces.
And we are always changing. Sometimes for the better, sometimes for the worst.
She gave skin and blood to her wounds and her losses. And transmitted how to live intensely, curiously, creatively, and mend from life.
She was rich in stories of transformation. Rich in wounds.
And I learned to embrace the losses in my life. Accepting them and understanding each one was for learning.
I didn’t need to understand why, but I did understand it was for my learning.
Why you should bless your losses
When we bless our wounds we stop being a victim of them. We can look at the ways we have organized our life myths around them.
With humility and acceptance ‘why me?’ transforms into ‘why not me?’
Our ability to embody this knowingness that we’re not immune to life’s losses deepens our humanity.
And paradoxically, within this knowingness is cultivated a taste and comfort in not knowing. The ability to move with the magic of the unknown with grace and openness.
In this way, loss becomes an opportunity to dive deeply into the mystery.
Uncertainty is the doorway toward a shift in attitude. Listening to what life is telling us. Moving in this direction we are guided by an awareness of a loving intelligence animating our personal life.
It’s okay to live and let live
Love completely and openly. When we can forgive and hold no debt. When we can cancel all debt and let go. We can say wholeheartedly, you owe me nothing.
Forgive, Forgive, Forgive.
Totally.
And you have strength. And you can be tough.
But the heart remains as innocent, warm, and protected as a soft baby’s blanket. The heart protects and radiates out to all that you love in this world.
We do not learn to love.
We ARE love.
We came to this earth as love.
And some of us are still catching up to what we truly are.
Ready to transform?
It’s time to move on. You’ve suffered enough. Turn those wounds into the wisdom this world needs to hear;
- Be willing to change
- Be the dancer not the choreographer
- Let go, forgive and love completely
And try to see the blessings in the tough times.
Final thoughts
I will always be grateful for the lessons from my grandmother. She gathered so much light through knowing so much darkness in her lifetime.
And I finally learned there is one thing that never changes.
Grandma, the one beautiful thing that makes a difference between what lasts and what doesn’t — is the light of consciousness.
Turn into the light. Turn into the light. Turn into the light.
It’s never too late to turn toward it. Not even on your deathbed.
May you let go and be filled with much love.
