Okay, the holidays are behind us, and now even the time for resolutions and anticipation of a better year is fading quickly. Help!!
I had it all figured out: I had that peacefulness and serenity thing balanced and in place; I was back on track with eating cleaner food; clients were calling for sessions, the dawning of Spring, though officially a couple months away, was bringing the anticipation of the coming of more light during the day.
So why do I feel bad, sad and mad? Where am I glad that I anticipated this new year?
As I’ve grown myself into a greater capacity for peace and wellbeing, I still fall into the trap of believing that those heights of enlightened living are sustainable long term. It is so dang seductive!
To experience the delights of all that is within those transcendent moments, and then to plummet back into the abyssness of my fears and my beliefs that I am lacking, is not an event I take much pleasure in. And although this is a reoccurring event that happens over and over again, I never get used to it.
It isn’t uncommon for people to feel what is commonly called “depressed” in the months of Winter. Sometimes it’s related to the lack of sunshine. And, it is often related to the unrelenting pitter-patter of one day after another – one year after another – with no true sense of life getting better. It can feel like a big sinkhole! I know!! I’ve been there. And, here I am again! I’m sure this is exactly what you want to hear, eh?
One of the things I value regarding aging and being alive is that as long as I’m here I have the opportunity to see things differently, to watch my patterns of operating, and figure out what it is I keep doing that I need to stop doing, so that instead of feeling mad, bad and sad, I can experience glad more often. It’s like the movie Groundhog Day, but better. Because even though I’m feeling bad, I have a greater understanding of what’s involved in me feeling bad. I’m not a victim to that state of being when I understand the dynamics at play. And, I’ve gone through this so many times that I know the routine and am far more resilient than ever before.
Resilient how, you might ask? Well, I’m better able to:
1. To hit bottom without believing that is the end of life as I know it to be.
2. To not just believe, but know in my bones that the moment I hit bottom, the process of ascending from that bottom automatically occurs.
3. To know that, although the cycle of personal and spiritual growth feels overwhelmingly scary, as long as I stay true to myself and to my highest knowing, I’ll come back to ME – feeling grateful for the understanding that what goes up must come down. And what goes down must come up! Ah! The practice of living with Transcendence! Wa-hooo for me!!!
Out With the Old, In With the New
Those dynamics at play? Well, there is the uncertainty that is ever present, which has me either living in fear or faith! Every time I step up on the the next higher rung towards faith, there is a detoxing and a disintegrating of the fear-based reality which resides within every cell of my being. OW!!!
Anyone who has put themselves through a cleanse or detox knows how uncomfortable it can be as their body releases and rids itself of the yucky stuff. So it is when we think cleaner thoughts, choose to engage in healthier activities, and perhaps hang out with kinder, more loving people. The mind need to detox and rid itself of yucky stuff, and it can be as uncomfortable as any other detoxing process. Sometimes, in this process, it just sucks to be you. However, you will inevitably begin to rise — like the Phoenix from the ashes. All you have to do is stay true to your highest knowing of the truth of who you are.
I realize over and over again that the experience of transcendence, which I believe nearly every person on the planet has experienced or will experience, is something that happens to us. We can’t actually make transcendence happen to us. We can only be open to its presence. That means that we don’t have to work so hard to be who we already are, or to access what we already have access to. We just have to think differently about all of it, and suddenly, you’re not struggling anymore.
