take it to a higher spiritual level…
– Photo by Jan Ketchel
Today’s channeled message addresses the true reality of Now, the place where all our worldly involvement and focus has taken us.
The mention of destruction and violence refers not only to the earthquake in Nepal and the warring situation in the Middle East, but includes every thing every where.
We are all far removed from what is right and natural. We are all part of the problem. Time to be part of the solution—the SOULution!
“How did your innocence survive?” Chuck asked me. I reminded him of my childhood mantra: “It will soon be over; it will end.” I think that was my innocence speaking to me, the part of me that was ready to walk away as soon as possible and move on. Innocence gets bruised but it bounces back. “I always had that innocence in me; it never left me,” I finally concluded, “and that combined with my spirit certainly helped me survive.”
My spirit was strong; my innocence was intact. I knew I could trust them. They taught me that no matter what someone did to Me, the real Me, my innocent spirit was unreachable. That part of me resided elsewhere, separate from the physical, in what I now know as the High Self, untouchable and unaffected by everything that happened to my physical body. That High Self was fully available during my childhood.
That High Self held the memories of my abuse, however, and I just wasn’t really interested in them for most of my life, too painful and horrific to go near. So not only did I distance myself from that strong, innocent and knowing High Self, but I cut her off. I moved on. The farther I moved the more distance I gained from my past and my High Self too. I released myself into the world as best I could, but there was always a part of me that knew that I would one day return to that High Self.
Why do some people survive terrific abuse and others perish? Why do some people give up on themselves and others find the means to change and move on? Why do some people declare themselves hopeless and unworthy of change, while others forge ahead no matter their background or imposed limitations? Is it possible to impart a sense of survival to others? Can you really help another person?
There are many ancient teachings, and not so ancient ones too, that teach us how to find and recognize our High Self and how to work with it. And yet for me, it was never a question of finding or recognizing it, my High Self was always with me, always recognizably part of me, a participant in my life. Even when I had kept her at a distance I knew she was still there, waiting for me. Did I have something that others do not have? I don’t think so. It’s not something that’s unique to me; we all have access to our High Self, to the place where our strength and our innocence reside.
I believe we are all born into our present lives with everything in place, that children are fully equipped with language and wise knowing. When I was still a tiny child, perhaps about a year and a half old, I remember clearly thinking in full sentences though I could not articulate what I was thinking; I did not have the physical dexterity yet that would allow me to speak.
When I did finally learn to speak, my mother said that I spoke clearly and distinctly, in full sentences. My own children were the same way. I had the same experience when I learned to speak Swedish. I had lived in Sweden for about six months, daily listening, and when I finally dared to open my mouth and speak the words just poured out, once again in perfect diction. Complex thoughts are present from the moment of birth, I believe, and perhaps even before. Why not? Consciousness doesn’t need a body and neither does spirit.
Just suppose we all come into life from other lives fully equipped as intelligent, wise, and knowing beings. Life in this world is set up to erase our knowledge and educate us in the practices of the world we are born into. It’s as if our fully functioning hard drive is erased during our earliest years and new programs are downloaded into us. If we’re lucky the original programs didn’t fully erase but remain stored somewhere in our inner database, ready to be discovered or stumbled upon at a later date.
In my case, as is the case with many children, I happened upon this original database because of traumatic sexual abuse. Abuse became an opportunity for me to access the wise and innocent High Self who had once spoken to me through my infant’s mind, a voice of familiarity, immediately recognizable as someone I could fully trust. And so when I returned again to her during my recapitulation, I once again found that I could trust her, that indeed she had been eagerly awaiting my return.
With her along, my journey of recapitulation began to unfold in detail and all that I had kept at bay was relived until none of it bothered me anymore, until it was totally resolved and done with. This time I put it away for good. It stays in the recesses of my database, clicked on only when I want to go there. When Chuck asked me that question—How did your innocence survive?—I zipped into that database and recalled just what it was that had not only kept me alive but also optimistically certain of survival and new life.
Certainly, as a child, I never gave up, though there were some pretty tough times and, as I returned to recapitulate, I would have to say the same, I never gave up, though there were some pretty tough memories to relive and issues to figure out and get through. It’s just who I am. A strong, wise and innocent spirit who never gives up, my High Self, lives at my core. For me the cup is always half full. I don’t think I inherited this trait, nor was it instilled in me, it’s just who I’ve always been. As I said above, everyone has this optimistic High Self, a similar spirit too. Why do some people have easier access to it, while others seem to struggle so deeply with even acknowledging its presence? Why are some people naturally optimists and others pessimists?
Viktor Frankl asked the same questions when writing about the survivors of Hitler’s concentration camps in Man’s Search for Meaning. Those who survived had a certain sense of self, access to a higher self, an awareness of spirit that kept them going, a certain optimism that things would change, that new life would one day come, that ultimately there was meaning in everything, even a worst case scenario.
When spirit is actively brought into participation in life there is a strong sense of never giving up, no matter how low one gets. No matter how ready one may be to die, there is a part of the self that will not surrender, that wakes up, sometimes at the last minute and says, “Stop! Wait!”
In the 2006 film Bridge people who survived suicide by jumping off the Golden Gate Bridge related that on the way down they instantly regretted the decision to jump. Does that mean that all suicides regret their decision? I don’t know, but the spirit inside all of us does a heck of job trying to get our attention. It works in mysterious ways, in uniquely personal and poignant ways. It pays to be alert, to learn how to look and listen for the clues to spirit. Not everyone will hear it as a voice. Not everyone will get a clear sign. Optimist or pessimist, however, we are all being prodded to find it. This is certain.
It’s the whole purpose of life, as I see it, to find and connect with our High Self at some time during our many lives and take everything to a new level. If not in this lifetime, at least know that each life is a step in the process. But can we elect to voluntarily move up to that High Self? I believe we can. It takes a little work, perhaps a recapitulation is in store, but first reaching out and paying attention may be enough of an awakening to begin the process.
The first step in the search for spirit and meaning in life might be as simple as putting out a call. Spirit guides are unanimous on this one, they are ready and waiting to be of assistance, but we must ask. Become a trusting child in the asking, become innocent, vulnerable and open. It’s really okay. Let go of self, of ego, of feeling silly and just do it. No one is watching you. You can relax and ask your spirit to come to you, just as you might have asked as a child. Did you believe in a guardian angel as a child, like I did? Ask your guardian angel to come to you if that feels right, or Jesus, or God, or the universe, or ask for Jeanne, the being that Chuck and I channel in our various ways, his first wife. Do whatever feels right.
Learn to sit quietly, as Chuck suggests in his blog this week, Finding the True Heart. Learn to listen to the heart, in the deeper heart chamber where spirit resides. A few breaths may be all it takes. A few minutes of calmness with attention placed on the heart chakra, with mind still, doubt recedes and things can happen.
Get out into nature. Sit on the ground by a tree, a plant, a bush and commune with the living organism before you. Sit calmly and begin to understand it, to feel it’s energy. In calmness communication opens up and you might just find yourself conversing quietly with your selected tree or bush or plant. Plant life can tell us a lot of things we’ve forgotten.
Commune likewise with an animal, a pet, a deer, a bird, a spider, a fly. See what happens as you send your heart chakra energy out to another living creature, as you silently commune from your innocent spirit self.
Lie under the night sky and feel yourself being drawn out into the universe, into infinity. Join the stars for a ride and see where they take you and what they tell you. The vastness of space lies above us every night. It’s mysteries might not be that mysterious once you open up to them, it’s emptiness not so empty, it’s vastness not so vast.
Ask your dreaming self to introduce you to who your spirit self really is, to take you to meet him or her, to teach you how to connect all the time in both waking and dreaming life. Intend to dream an answer to a question and see what happens.
Read some books that inspire you. Sometimes opening a book to a single paragraph might just be the thing to shift out of misery and into the mystical. If you don’t know where to begin, our Store offers a variety of selections.
After asking doubt may come, but that’s par for the course. The next step is to trust. Learn to trust as a child trusts. The innocent infant trusts that it will be taken care of. We must learn to trust that we are here for a reason, that there is meaning in our life and that we will find our way. As Chuck mentioned in his blog this week, once we open up to our spirit, our soul, we discover an expanded consciousness of which we are indeed a part.
We are physical beings, but the greater part of us is spirit, non-tangible and untethered to anything in this world, except what we choose to attach to. Connecting with spirit is the refusal to give attachment the final say.
Staying connected,
Jan
My ego makes an appearance in dreaming. It wants to be selected to participate in a cross-country ski race, sure it will win. It is not even considered, though it makes itself known, insisting that it be picked. Someone else, however, is selected for the team. The selection committee does not even notice my ego, in fact seems to be ignoring it on purpose despite its loud and obnoxious attempt to be seen and heard. My dreaming observer self is aware of how ludicrous the ego’s insistence is because I am totally out of shape for such a feat, have not skied in years, and I don’t even own a pair of skis. None of this matters to my ego. It inflates and inflates, totally ignoring all the obvious truths.
My ego, which keeps a pretty low profile in waking life, must have needed an outlet, for it surely came to life in my dream. I have to laugh at how big it was, how insistent in spite of the truth! Perhaps far better to let it play out its issues of inflation in a bardo dream, especially designed for its drama, allowing waking life to be relieved of its struggles.
About 14 years ago, when I was doing my recapitulation, I had a sadly deflated ego. It was all I could do to wake it up and make my way in the world. A little too deflated, it rarely stood up for me, rarely was so insistent as in my dream. I worked on it and got it into alignment with the life I was building, a post-divorce, post-recapitulation life where I needed a well-rounded ego and a good sense of self-worth. Since then I have discovered that the ego comes in many colors, wears many costumes, and makes many appearances.
A couple of weeks ago in my blog entitled Gazing, I wrote about being guided to understand that if one is to reach a true place of love, compassion, kindness and to experience the oneness of everything, one of the most important things is to shed the ego’s self interest. It’s a constant process because, as my guidance explained, everything is egocentric. Even my writing this blog and hoping that someone will find it helpful—a good intention—is egocentric. But this is what I do, it’s part of who I am, so I will continue to write this blog, but then I will let it go and move on, no attachment to outcome. That is one way to deal with ego. Do the job before you, do it impeccably, and then move on. There is rarely a need to turn back if the job is done right the first time. This is our ego serving the needs of the higher self.
Often my ego is sluggish. It refuses to do certain things, only wants to do what it wants. It’s pretty annoying then. Such a time is not a time for shedding, but instead a time to pry it out of the mud and get it moving. Only after missions are accomplished, fully, is it appropriate to retire the ego. We could not function in the world if we did not keep our ego in good shape.
So, how does an ego in good shape act and feel? Well, an ego in good shape is in alignment with our spirit’s intent to live an ever-evolving life. It isn’t too inflated or too deflated. It resides in alignment with our spirit, inside and outside, within the natural ebb and flow of our life. It’s pliable, eager to learn, and yet also sometimes recalcitrant as all heck. Whatever the ego presents is probably a true picture of where we are in our lives, what our key issues are, and what we must work on. It’s a pretty good barometer of how we are really feeling from day to day too.
An ego in alignment and balance knows when to act, when to react, and when to back down. It reads the energy of a situation and makes a decision about whether or not its worth a fight and why. Often the ego may jump ahead and do something before thoughtful contemplation has a chance to intercede and that might cause issues. Other times it’s not quick enough and that will also cause issues. All of this takes time and attention before the ego is naturally in balance with spirit all the time, which might take most of a lifetime, or many lifetimes. I know, I’m still working on it! These are just some of the instances that might arise as the ego navigates the outer world. The ego in the inner world is another creature altogether.
This ego, made up of thoughts, ideas, voices, is often connected to the child self, the unfulfilled self, the negative or positive self, the happy-go-lucky self, the unstoppable self, the fearful self, the demeaning self, or any number of alter egos. This ego is the judge, the one who makes decisions and keeps a running commentary going, who criticizes and gets angry. This is the ego that speaks volumes as well, who notices every little thing that’s right, that’s wrong, that’s gone unnoticed, unappreciated, or is perfect and should not change at all. It is not shy about pointing all these things out either. This ego can get us into as much trouble as the outer ego because it contains all the same parts, known and unknown, freed and held back, expressed and unexpressed. As the guidance in Gazing told me, everything is ego attachment, and thus eventually everything needs to be shed.
Such advice needs to be taken with a grain of salt. Far better to have ego imbalance than to shed too much too fast. When we are ready the shedding happens naturally. When I was twenty-one I sure needed an ego. That age is a time of ego-building in the world, as one sets out to find out what life has in store, as one learns about the world and how to live in it and survive.
Everyone experiences life at their own pace, equipped with whatever they have when they start out. Some people are gifted with healthy egos right from the start, others less so, but all of us must strive to get them in balance. As I learned, a deflated ego was as detrimental as an overly inflated one. I was always quick to notice a big ego in someone else, but did I feel any more superior because of not having such an inflated ego? Not in the least, my self-esteem was in the pits and it never afforded me much compensatory feeling. I was still who I was, no matter who someone else turned out to be.
And so, as we build our egos we also learn how they tend to be approached, treated, admired, defeated and even trampled on. If we are aware of the work to be done, determined to get that ego into alignment so that it does not always feel so bruised, we are open and ready to take everything as a learning ground. We pick ourselves up and go out again and again into the world, even if we don’t want to, because we know we have to. We know we are on a journey that serves a higher purpose.
We all have to grow up, and part of that growing up is presenting our egos to the world. It’s in the outer ego’s trials and tribulations that we temper and tame the inner ego’s judgments, criticisms, and outlandish ideas. Between the two, we have everything we need to succeed at getting into alignment with what our spirit has in store for us, to eventually evolve into beings of love, kindness, and compassion.
If we are to become such evolved beings then, yes, we must constantly attend to and relativize our egos. It is the role of the ego, as an independent entity, to serve the spirit. And so, aspirations independent of spirit need to constantly be shed.
In other words: just as ego is the parent of the child self, so is ego the child of the spirit self. And just as the child self must merge with the ego, so ego’s will must be merged with spirit. This is true shedding of the ego. Once that occurs we become the gentle, nonjudgmental, kind and compassionate beings that we all really are, spirit beings, who are not only believers of love but are love, loving beings all the time, to everyone and to everything.
This emergence of spirit self is, in the end, the true shedding of the ego self. And then, when we shed the body, when we are ready to meet the infinite, we will glide right on into the oneness of everything, for there will be no ego stopping us, arguing with us, afraid or concerned. We will be in total alignment with spirit, with all of life, with the natural easing out of one form and into another.
Always shedding,
Jan
When we are born into this world, our energy body self joins with a physical body self as an entwined unit for the duration of our physical lifespan. Though partners in this life, these two bodies are distinct entities that separate daily in the out-of-body explorations of dreaming, or under willed or inadvertent traumatic jolts that cause these two bodies to separate.
The physical body is constructed of the elements of this Earth and has a finite lifespan. The energy body is constructed of finer elements, distinct from earth’s elements, and houses our spirit, that which separates and ascends at the moment of physical death. This spirit self is the home of consciousness and awareness in our human personality, and though it partners with the human brain in human life, consciousness is separate and distinct from the dense hard drive of the physical brain. This consciousness lives on when the physical body dies, returning to the higher realms from whence it came.
We are indeed beings in this world, but ultimately we are not of this world. We come into this world through the host of a physical body, which we shed upon the death of that body—ashes to ashes, dust to dust—and consciousness, or spirit, lives on. And so, why do we come here?
It is said by the ancients that planet Earth is an “unsacred planet.” (This is not a moral judgment; it’s simply a description of a planet of very dark, dense energy that is engaged in its own process of evolution, so keep in mind that Earth is also a living being, ripe for change.) Evolution is a process of growth that slowly moves toward consciousness as its guiding force. Nature, as depicted by the Garden of Eden, is life devoid of consciousness and choice. For nature to evolve, its consciousness must emerge. We are the light beings, the spirit beings of consciousness, come to partner with the dense energy of earth, charged with advancing its evolution. We are the beings prompted by the kundalini energy, the powerful life-force in us all, to eat from the tree of knowledge and advance the consciousness of earth’s own spiritual development. If you are in this world, you are indeed an advanced spiritual being.
Earth is an extremely dense planet, pure nature and, as previously mentioned, devoid of consciousness, unaware of even itself. As we humans continue to live upon this planet we awaken it to its beauty and bestial qualities alike, to its majesty and its destructive powers, giving it conscious awareness of itself. Imagine how many people have stood high upon a dense mountaintop and marveled at the beauty spread out below, exclaiming “How beautiful! How exquisite! How stunning!” Earth hears and awareness of Earth’s natural beauty expands.
Imagine how many times people have exclaimed over the devastation of volcanoes, earthquakes, tornadoes, the power of nature unleashed. “How frightening! How terrible! How destructive!” Earth hears and awareness of Earth’s natural power expands. These are simple examples of how Earth, a living entity, receives consciousness and awareness through our presence. We are all part of a vast interconnected energy, and whether conscious or unconscious, aware or not, we all impact each other and everything else by our thoughts, our ideas, our agreements and our disagreements.
Of course, as it now stands, we have made a mess of things! Perhaps Earth questions its decision to partner with such spirit beings as us! Well, the truth is that consciousness or spirit energy does not guarantee loving compassion and right action. Consciousness can settle in the lower chakras of “me, me, me,” power, domination and exploitation. This is the dark side of the force of consciousness.
The ancient sorcerers and modern power manipulators—spirit beings of the dark side of consciousness—take their journeys in infinity for their own pleasure and power trips. Spirit beings must contend with their own challenges with these tendencies within themselves, as well as with spirit beings outside themselves who seek to dominate this dense energy planet for their own selfish goals. We are all in this together, conscious beings of the light and dark side of the force. We are all also the embodiment of both light and dark energy, both sides of consciousness. It is up to us to determine the path we will take during our lifetime. A path of heart is consciousness seeking what is right.
Ultimately, our energy body selves utilize planet Earth as our own divine playing field, for our own awakening, clarification, and advancement. Eventually, we must all encounter and reconcile with the dark side of our own spiritual nature, and Earth’s energy field offers the perfect density in which to do that. In turn, Earth benefits from this cosmic drama, as our forays into the dense energy of Earth in our physical bodies awakens and enriches Earth with consciousness through the lives we live while we are here. Simply put, the materials we leave behind when we leave contain an awakened consciousness that serves Earth’s evolutionary imperative. The consciousness we take with us serves our own spiritual advancement.
Reincarnation is our continual working project toward spiritual enlightenment, embodying many Earth lifetimes, while also enriching the consciousness of the planet. This joint venture is the ultimate symbiotic partnership, until it consummates in our final separation, in enlightenment, representing the end of our reincarnation cycles: no more compulsory lives in physical form.
Upon enlightenment, our spirit selves choose whether to return to Earth as teachers, to guide Earth from a higher plane, or to move on to new worlds and adventures in infinity, to ever-expanding journeys of consciousness.
We are eternally indebted to planet Earth for offering us the playing field of her physical form for our spiritual advancement. May we pay our debt royally by helping her advance beyond the destructive tendency of the dark side that currently holds her in its grip. May we advance her to the fourth chakra of love and compassion, to the level of the heart, before we fully leave and go on to our own next adventures.
From a path of heart,
Chuck
It’s raining and foggy today. I could be depressed, but my spirit is not depressed and so the weather outside is not having the effect on me that it might once have had, when I was clinically depressed. Back then the weather would have made me feel even more lifeless and given me a good excuse to stay in, vegetate, and feel sorry for myself. Today I take it in stride, knowing that the outside weather will nurture me in some necessary way, perhaps not clearly revealed until later in the day. I am certain that my spirit and my own nature will find the appropriate alignment that will lead to this nurturance.
Why is it raining? Nature says it’s time for rain. The conditions outside—cloud cover, temperature, humidity, etc.—produce fog, everything working together to produce this grey and rainy morning. We might look outside and wish for some sun perhaps. What we get, however, is nature saying, “no, I need the rain and everything is set up for rain to happen so this is what you are getting today.” This is the spirit of nature, nature and spirit as one, creating appropriate conditions for the planet.
Sometimes nature produces extreme weather conditions, fires, volcanic eruptions, melting ice caps, flooding rivers. Sometimes nature produces aberrant behaviors in human beings, rapists, murderers, terrorists. I can only surmise that nature knows what it is doing, that all of these extreme and seemingly destructive elements and events are actually necessary correctives. I trust nature. I know I cannot control it, but I can study the lessons it seeks to teach me.
We have similar goings on inside ourselves all the time, our nature and spirit work as one too, producing exactly the conditions that we need at this time in our lives. Sometimes the conditions within our bodies are extreme too, such as catastrophic illness, accident, or unexpected deeply emotional situations that send us spinning. Perhaps we also have a terrorist inside us, seeking to rout out some aspect of ourselves that we have not acknowledged or cared to deal with.
How we react to what is going on, both outside and inside ourselves, will tell us a lot about how in alignment we are with our own nature and spirit. Do we ignore the real reasons behind our challenges? Do we pull up our usual defenses, shift right into our ingrained habits and behaviors, the things we normally latch onto when we don’t want to face what is actually happening in our lives? On the other hand, we can turn inward and ask our own spirit and our own nature to come forth and communicate, to tell us the truth, to show us what is really going on.
We can take a scientific approach as well as a psychological approach to any situation we find ourselves in. In fact, viewing a situation from all sides is pragmatic, so that we have all the information we need to make a good, healthy decision for ourselves. Facts might be presented that explain what we are dealing with, alternative approaches to healing suggested, imperatives presented, but then it is up to us to go deeper into what is happening to us, if at all possible to invite our own nature and our own spirit to weigh in. Often, if we are to not only alleviate but fully resolve our inner conditions, we have to go beyond the facts and venture into feelings and emotions, and confront the deeper issues and circumstances of our inner psychological and spiritual makeup that produce our outer symptoms.
For instance, if I’m depressed, my nature and spirit are telling me there is a reason, that it’s time perhaps to go deeper into old feelings about myself that need to be attended to. I take the view that my physical body is my personal planet, and in knowing that my spirit resides in my body I understand that they are one unit. This body unit is my personal “Nature.” Just like the nature of the planet outside of me they are always in agreement, constantly working together to alert me to my deeper issues, offering me the guidance I need to heal my mind and body so that I may take my place in a new and brighter world.
It’s sometimes easier to look outside of us and see how other people are in conflict with their own nature and spirit, but much harder to see it in ourselves. It’s much easier to look to the earth and see how we humans have been, for centuries, slowly destroying the planet we live on, but much harder to realize that what is outside is only a reflection of what is going on inside and that we personally are as responsible as anyone. It’s so easy to blame others, to rant about what they have done to us. It’s so easy to point out how others are so greedy and feel so entitled to take and to destroy. We are above it all, we say, but the world around us is telling us that we are all responsible for the state the world and the planet are in now, just as we are responsible for our own bodies and spirits.
As the rain pattered outside this morning, Chuck and I sat and spoke about our dreams and what we had been reading. The conversation came around to how to begin a process of healing that is practical, offering the most basic of principles: Change our thoughts; change our personal world. Yes, thoughts do have power, a lot of power. Negative thoughts powerfully effect us negatively. Positive thoughts have powerfully positive effect upon us.
Our thoughts set up our natural environment. They bring us rain and fog, or they bring us sunshine. If we say that we are sick, then we will be sick and we must take full responsibility for feeling sick. If we say that we feel great, we must take full responsibility for feeling great too. No one else, outside of us, has the responsibility or the ability to fix us or heal us. Just as we are all on our own journeys—responsible for all the decisions we make in our lives, offered the opportunity to take what happens to us to new levels of growth and understanding—so are we responsible for our own thoughts. And beyond that we are equally responsible for our own healing.
If we have negative thoughts running through our head we should pay attention to them. They are there for a good reason. They are our spirit alerting us to them, asking us to question if they are really true, hounding us to let them go. We will not be left alone until we do. We will suffer depression and inadequacies until we feed our nature and our spirit some healthier alternatives. This is how our nature and our spirit are in alignment.
Are we polluting ourselves the same way we pollute the earth? Are we taking too much, giving too much, overdoing, thinking negatively? How are we using our power? Where are we out of balance in our own lives and what can we do to correct the imbalances?
It’s not really that hard to take the first steps in a healthy direction. But it takes a commitment to really taking up the challenges that are imposed upon us as we face what we need for healing. To bring our own personal planet into alignment we must let our own nature, our spirit and our body, drive us to the necessary balance.
The world outside of us is the perfect environment for our inner process to grow and evolve; as within, so without. In gaining inner balance, outer balance will also be achieved and our lives will advance. A rainy day will not be depressing, but the perfectly necessary environment that it truly is.
Enjoying the fog,
Jan