Sometimes you have to die to truly live.
Waking up is an endless losing of what you think you know, like a wave of destruction that leaves nothing but what is true. — Unmani
Sometimes life sends me “messages.” Situations that are for my learning and growth. I got one today: To step into life, parts of us must die.
Here’s how it went: As I walked up my driveway with pruner shears in hand to deadhead my basil and mint, I noticed my crepe myrtles.
Arg. Those pesky little branches are growing at the bottom of the tree. They take away energy the myrtle needs to grow tall and blossom at the top.
I took my pruning shears and began to arduously cut through the pinky-finger-thick new growth. Hacking and hacking away.
I started to feel like some kind of horrible murderer. What was I doing to this tree? Why was I doing it? Killing part of this living plant.
I talked to the tree. (Because I am an empath through and through.) I told it, “I am so sorry, but I have to trim off some of this so you can be in shape and grow tall.”
THEN IT HIT ME.
Sometimes parts of us must die so that the best of us can live.
I have been on a soul journey for many years. Most recently I have been 100% focused on finding my authentic self and finding out how to recognize and live my purpose. So this moment with the crepe myrtle was big.
It all starts with our ego.
Our egos are our sense of self—our identity. The ego does not like it when we go poking around in our psyches. It knows death of the identity we have created could soon ensue. That identity is the elaborate story we’ve crafted through our experiences and “beliefs” and makes us who we THINK we are.
It’s all just thoughts that make up our belief about who we are.
But we aren’t those thoughts. We’re so much more. And for any true spiritual seeker, this is key to finding our authentic selves. The ego MUST die. It can be a mind-blowing experience and a horrifically frightening one, too.
But when we live through the lens of our ego, it causes suffering. It makes us fabricate beliefs about right/wrong, love/hate, good/evil. And from those things, fear arises and drives us away from who we really are.
Until I began this intense process of ego death (which I don’t think I really knew I was even doing), I had no idea how much my own crafted story of my life was causing me pain. All I knew was something had to give.
I have been pruning away at my ego. It is scary and frankly, hard as hell. I often end up with: Who am I if I am not the story I have been living all my life?!
The abyss must be approached with courage, because only then can you discover that the fear is an illusion.
Terence McKenna
It takes courage to be ready to step into your dark places and emerge transformed and infused with your soul’s truth.
But for me, it’s time to shape my life into my reason for being—my purpose. Prune away all that old stuff. Yes, it takes guts. Are you ready? Then face those fears and leap into your own “death” of self to be free. Because isn’t that what we all want? To be free?
