Well, I guess it's obvious what music I was listening to yesterday!
A longer read shared from Soulful Living yet I dedicate this to those whom are still struggling with Authenticity, Your own.
The reason for sharing this is to allow ones to see that this is a commonly shared experience we all have together at some point and to say that you really do know and if you are feeling still not knowing, Know that you will break through. Not knowing is the place of being emptied of the small self to allow the Authentic Self to be seen and known.
May this uplift you and InPower you today. Sustanance for your Soul today.
Remember, You are not alone.
Love and Blessings,
Julia
Recovering Our Authentic Selves
by Meredith Young-Sowers
"You already are authentic; the challenge is to feel that you are." The room was quiet. Fifty men and women sat in front of me, waiting for the much-anticipated beginning of the year-long training in Intuitive Perception and Energy Diagnosis at the Stillpoint School of Advanced Energy Healing which I founded and direct.
As I looked around the room, I thought of conversations I’d had with many of the students. Among them were men and women who were healers, accountants, physicians, nurses, therapists, social workers, carpenters, artists, interior decorators, investment bankers, and moms and dads. What we shared was a yearning to heal our lives. My students came to School to learn how to become intuitive healers but also wanting to understand themselves and their lives better. We all wanted to renew ourselves and make peace with our failings, fears, and negative attitudes, to find the sacred within us and to find a spiritual community with whom to share experiences on the journey.
We needed to understand the nature of our relationship with the Creator, both as the energy of the Universe and as a personal friend and mentor to whom we could turn for guidance, comfort, and unconditional love. When they started the year, like most of us, the students felt inauthentic, burdened by fears and anxieties. By year’s end, they saw the truth—that they were genuine splinters of God’s love, and their fears dissolved.
All of our success in the world and our progress on a spiritual path comes from learning to maximize the insights we receive from our authentic selves. Sensing a divine guiding hand is the way we look past our old emotional blocks, even though they come from real problems that we’ve actually experienced. We learn that our lives aren’t made up of what we know through our intellect but of the love and compassion we experience in our hearts.
The Voice of The One
To find the spiritual directions we’re seeking—the ways to love and have love returned—requires us to visit the voices of our spirits to show us how to live without an agenda. At first we’re frightened and disbelieving. We think it’s impossible for us to love without a deal that binds us at the level of our weaknesses rather than our strengths. But the voice of the sacred doesn’t dangle relationships in front of us, whispering, "If we just do or become something, then…" Instead, this inner voice tells us we are more than enough; we are Divine. We can, of course, have relationships that are nourishing and fulfilling as soon as we learn to be ourselves without apology. This voice speaks with the assurances we need. This is the voice of our authentic selves, with a capital S.
By comparison,
the voice of our personalities is the one that, until now,
we’ve always believed. This very familiar voice separates us from others by telling us that we’re not enough: we must do better, try harder. This is the voice that is relentless in pushing us to secure the material needs of our lives, even at the risk of our health and sanity. We push and struggle for our rightful share, and we are convinced that our responsibilities are limited to our little corner of the world and our individual families.
This is the voice of our (small s) selves—our personalities.
The way I found The One true and essential voice inside me unfolded one sunny summer morning. I was on vacation in Maine with Errol, my husband. My morning routine was to sit quietly for a time watching the water, read a few pages of an inspiring book, and then walk for a while. I often would found surprising insights while meandering alone along the quiet country roads.
This particular day I had an amazing realization. I’d been working on trying to love and care for myself, not out of fear or resentment of others but out of compassion and acceptance for myself. But I wasn’t sure how I could find the inner voice of my authentic self. I reflected on a statement I’d read earlier that morning written by the Indian spiritual master Sathya Sai Baba. The piece suggested that I should try to understand my true nature, my authentic self, in much the same way I think about my children, my home, my work, my friends, and my physical body. When I thought, "This is my body," I was to consider who it was that was announcing it possesses a body. It isn’t my body itself, but something in me that guides and directs my body; it’s not my mind, because that, too, is part of my physical composition. It is my spirit. And my spirit is none other than The One—the Creator.
I read a concluding thought that made a lasting impression as I tried to grapple with realizing that the "me" that was making decisions about what to think and do was none other than my authentic self. I realized that the path to greater understanding, love, and compassion was to find the "I am" that creates life rather than the "I" of my physical body and mind. I was looking for the part of me that is the originator of ideas, the genuine Creator within. My inner voice was the place where The One abided. This voice was my authentic self, and my Compassionate Healer was another aspect of this voice.
Growing Authentic
Working with people over the last twenty years has taught me a great deal about myself and other people, including how we can grow to accept ourselves and our life circumstances. Acceptance gives us power and courage to stay steady and strong instead of shifting the blame for what we don’t like to others and losing the will to make our own choices. Often we don’t understand why things happen in our lives, but we don’t need to understand why if we consider what; what will I do now? Or: how can I respond to this challenging scenario?
Life is a difficult journey. There is no way to change how our lives are put together. We know that we are born, we live, and we die. We know that we can’t control the elements and that some of us are unhappy more than we are content. If we can’t change the framework of our lives, how can we live out our years, getting the most from them? My answer is: by seeing our experiences as gateways to greater understanding and compassion.
When we connect with our authentic selves we learn about our courage and grace as much as our suffering and betrayals. When we only remember the misery and the pain, we remain locked in yesterday. But the reason we feel upset by dwelling on old suffering is not what we think. By refusing to find the meaning of our negative experiences, we think we are protecting ourselves from discovering how we have fallen short in the past.
But the reality is that by finding the courage to look squarely at our old pains and sorrows, we see the ways we truly are authentic, thus liberating ourselves from past suffering. As we learn to detach from the criticisms of others and become our own loving parents and mentors, we are able to see that "The Source" sees our value and helps us to make our own unique contributions to life, making the most of opportunities we might otherwise have missed.
The End Becomes Our New Beginning
Nothing is set in stone. We know that many possibilities lie before us. No illness is absolutely terminal, no relationship is irrevocably doomed, no loss is forever, and no suffering needs to shroud our futures. We are The Creator’s charges—His/Her hands and feet here on Earth to experience and enjoy the sacred seeds of the love He/She has planted in our hearts.
For me, writing my new book, Wisdom Bowls, was a rebirth of greater confidence and commitment to the work of spreading love in the world. I hope you will read it and it inspires a rebirth for you as well, as you face new possibilities in your life with renewed energy and determination. We have everything we need in order to live full, successful lives, assured that we are kin with all the life on earth. Our circle of caring is large, embracing all people and all nations. Every creature and habitat is part of our web of life, and every effort we make to strengthen it, no matter how small, changes our future for the better.
The Earth and her children depend on each of us to be wise, to have vision, to speak in joy, to extend love and compassion, to own our power, to accept our true natures, and to allow others to share our bounty. If our capable hands and steady hearts shift ever so slightly in the direction of loving, we move the planet in an entirely new direction from where it has been in the past.
If we each lean just a little toward love and understanding, what might our lives look like? What might our children grow up to believe? What suffering that we’ve borne through the years would we heal? Our futures rest in our ability to love each other enough to overcome our differences and reach out to one another in peace and understanding. Peace in our hearts will create peace on the planet. Fear is not in charge of our destiny; we, as our authentic selves, are the creators of the future we will pass along to those who walk in our footsteps.
The exploration of our authentic nature leads to an amazing realization. Rather than being the dim and unenlightened persons we may think we are, we find that deep inside we are as brilliant as the sun, no matter what tragedy has befallen us. We can experience joy, love and power when we understand what has blocked those aspects of Love in our lives. We can open our hearts to loving in ways we never have before. There is no perfect time to find the answers to deep questions. The right time is whenever and wherever we begin our journeys toward an authentic reconnection with our true Selves.
© Copyright 2003 Meredith Young-Sowers. All Rights Reserved. The above is excerpted and adapted from Wisdom Bowls; Overcoming Fear and Coming Home to Your Authentic Self, by Meredith Young-Sowers (Stillpoint, 2002).
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