As far as my personal spiritual journey is concerned, this year has been the most challenging and yet has also led to the greatest breakthroughs in my personal growth, and I could not have done it without the guidance and support of my coaches, mentors, community, and soul friendships.
What I’ve noticed along this journey is, the deeper I go, the more apparent the difference is between the two worlds.
When I say the two worlds, I’m speaking of the underworld and the topside world.
The practical world and the spiritual world.
The world of rationality and the world of mystery.
At times I feel like a spiritual girl living in a material world. (cue the referenced Madonna song.)
The world of every day life (jobs, business, clients, relationships) and the world behind the veil (the world of quantum physics, the Goddess, of archetypes, of the collective unconscious).
This year I have been dancing between the two worlds.
Like a game of double-dutch, I’ve been bouncing back and forth – one day in rationality another in mystery.
And it’s been the acceptance of both, that has allowed me to more fully embody myself in this lifetime. Meaning, the more I accept that there’s what we consider the “real world” AND another world that is beyond our physical senses, the more I am able to move through my life with more joy and less suffering.
Understanding that there are just some things in this world that we cannot logically rationalize or categorize or control, allows us to let go of that which is out of our control, and step into a more empowered role of being co-creators of our lives.
We cannot control everything. And attempting to do so in our lives sets us up for unnecessary frustration, which pulls us out of our FLOW.
In regards to this pursuit of the SELF, Carl Jung warns us of potential of dangers:
- We can take the experience of the SELF too seriously and become spiritual addicts, always on the pursuit to do the “work” but never actually integrating into our lives.
- We may not take our SELF serious enough and ignore lessons we’ve learned, ignore the signs life shows us and continue to repeat patterns that keep us stuck in our lives.
- Or, if we’re not ready for the jolting experiencing of delving into the psyche, we are so shaken by what we’ve uncovered we become ungrounded and end up floating in space, becoming spiritual lost puppies.
In my experience I’ve tasted all three.
What I also find interesting about the two worlds, is that the world of mystery can be very difficult to understand logically.
And that for me has been one of my greatest challenges – learning to trust the underworld without trying to rationalize it in my mind as there are times I find myself with 1 foot in each of the worlds. In a sort of spiritual purgatory.
In her book, Women Who Run With The Wolves, Clarissa Pinkola Esés tells us that:
“This land between the worlds is that inexplicable place we all recognize once we experience it, but its nuances slip away and shapechange if one tries to pin them down, except when we use poetry, music, dance or story.”
This is an incredibly important piece of information to remember if we are on the path to embodiment, meaning, if we are on the path to stepping more fully into our greatest version.
Keep in mind, when double-dutching our way between the world of rationality and the world of mystery: Logic cannot explain the mysteries, the underworld, we must access these points through the arts, through creativity, through story, through dance, through song, through poetry.
And in our overly rationalized, left-brained dominant culture, it’s no wonder why these mysteries, the underworld, the things we just cannot explain, is so under-valued.
In my own pursuits to become a more whole and fully embodied human, I’ve gone on a journey to understand the land of my psyche.
I’m re-learning to speak it’s language by rekindling my love for drawing, and most recently taking up to teaching myself the guitar.
Even though my chords are rough and my transitions are choppy, I find myself completely lost in time when I engage myself in either art of playing the guitar. I have a greater sense of ease and the presence of feeling like I’m failing at life because I’m not doing something “productive” wains away.