Heaven on earth search. Some ideas

The key to that heaven is within us all. It is up to us to unlock our own unique way of relating to life in what would feel blissful to us. It will be different for everyone depending on how one relates to all, processes information and what senses and functions dominate in one on an intellectual, emotional, psychical and metaphysical levels. It will also depend where you are at currently in life. Self-reflecting, e.g., as one of the most popular tools in recent psychological history, can actually create hooks, triggers and mental pitfalls that will drag us down further into a place where we eventually would become it. What if we tried to drop reflections, at least for a while. This is a new way of doing things that hopefully can create a strong enough anomaly that would allow you evolve in a new way. 

What if we emptied instead of consolidate; cleared ourselves ready not to receive but to learn to just be before we do decide to let things in again. This will apply to all aspects of the emotional spectrum, negative and positive, but before we learn how we discern individually, as it will be different, we need to learn to empty or in other words ‘detach’ from it all. 

Think of it as air, a space of light where there’s no density of any kind. It is see-through and intangible. Energy. With practice aligning with the energy of nothingness, so to speak, can produce a highly pleasable sensations to all forms within us – mental, emotional and physical. You might refer to those moments as blissful and heavenly. 

As we work ‘backwards’ from emptying to learning to receive rather than react to everything and everyone, as we are used to doing, we create a completely different way of being. 

If you are a feeling type, sensitive to all energies and also an intellectual/academic type this might work. Shutting down thoughts in a way of non-engagement, as thoughts create feelings and then behaviours, will create that sense of being light and empty. This is what I have engaged with naturally over the last few weeks post a very heavy period of overwhelm and thinking. 

Another aspect I found useful that I think might help going forward, and a part of an ‘emptying’ process is focusing on one thing at a time and doing that for some time, for up to a year. Not engaging in more than one goal, one intention, one task. You need to stick with it too and see if it somewhat aligns things in a positive way long-term. Experiment and play with it. Playfulness and freedom are important factors in this way of engagement.

For example, you might decide to focus on just your family, or just one goal or ambition without letting anything else interfere. You might decide to do this for a week, a month or a year, like I am doing. Make your world small in other words. When in nature, for example, try focusing on the detail rather than on the overall surroundings/whole environment. It does something on the inside that feels cosy and grounding and, therefore, safe. We can all do with feeling more safe. Condense and consolidate in ways that will feel protective and self-contained rather than overwhelming.

Most things that do overwhelm us are actually out of our control and when we focus in that way and essentially disperse ourselves and lose all boundaries it creates a lack of meaning and a feeling of being lost as a result.

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Lessons from the mountain

Kinder Scout – The Peak District National Park, UK

In May this year I went on a solo road trip leaving home and all that anchors me into the responsibility side of life behind. I decided to experiment, as I had been feeling cooped up and stuck for some time, like so many during the last year.

I find after a time of still-standing not only I need to move physically, I also need to explore and rediscover myself psychologically and spiritually, otherwise I begin to feel weighed down by life. I need a change and a challenge.

The trip turned out to be very insightful, for which I am very grateful, as it fulfilled my desire for diving deeper into understanding some of the things I had been going through internally for many yearly cycles now. It was important for me to see if this time I could attempt to break those cycles again and unleash myself from being stuck in a place that became emptied of a sense of personal freedom and joy.

One of the main things I found out was that I liked being ‘by myself’, but not ‘with myself’. Two different things. It exposed a side to self-exploration that sometimes can become toxic and overbearing. I suspected this might have been the case for many years and consciously moved away from inner work during certain points and when it started to impact on everything negatively. Yes, that can happen. Too much of one thing at the wrong time can have the opposite effect to what one might be wanting to do. It got me thinking in terms of long-term healing and short-term solution/action-based types of personal therapy, as my point of reference. Is a long-term exploration good for us, or is it better undertaken in manageable/digestible chunks? I suspect the later is true, for me anyway.

So, I wanted to define for myself the difference between being ‘by yourself’ and being ‘with yourself’? Those two differ, and here is my definition and understanding of each.

Being ‘by yourself’ means being solitary, in solitude. It is not being lonely, isolated, or abandoned. I really enjoy being by myself; being quiet and alone in a way that nothing and no one can interfere or interrupt my chosen flow and I am in control of what happens in each moment. It is being removed from burdens and responsibilities of day-to-day life. This type of solitude is intentional and conscious. To me it is something I can not be without. It is the ultimate manifestation of my personal freedom, which I value above all.

Being ‘with yourself’ means being aware of your internal processes and for me that is not necessarily good all the time especially when I choose to be by myself. One can be deeply unconscious and one is chosen. When that happens a conflict can arise. Being ‘with yourself’ can involve thoughts going round and round and you are able to hear them, engage with, act upon, or become overwhelmed. It can be feeling more, as there is no external noise or distractions that require your attention. Overall, it means you are more present with yourself and everything that you carry within you. This is something that I find difficult, as my mind becomes very loud and my thoughts can take me places I do not want to go especially when I am being consciously and wanting to be ‘by myself’. My purpose of choosing to be by myself is, in fact, the opposite. I do it to quieten everything to a soft pace or at the very least gain clarity. Having said that this only relates to my ‘head’, my thinking. I would never aim to quieten my feelings and instincts. Those, to me, are the essence of being and mechanisms that keep me in touch with myself in a positive, useful way, not disruptive and overwhelming. Those ‘feeling’ functions of myself are my creativity, my soothing tools and something that makes me flourish be it bringing ideas into being or directing me towards where I need to go. I tell you intuition in the mountains, I called it ‘follow your nose and gut’, is a very useful tool. Something I experimented with, as I use intuition in all areas of my life.

What I realised again is that the way for me not to be with myself in a negative way I need to do something. There is a time and a place for ‘being with myself’, I found, and it really does depend on what I do with my time ‘being by myself’ whether ‘being with myself’ would impact me negatively.

In this case my trip was planned and intentional and hiking is an activity that always works for the benefit of my mind. For that to work I do need a plan, a route, in this case, a goal, a destination, some focus that benefits my physical, mental, and spiritual selves. It has to be something physical, something that will use your body. When I walk, I am aware of just walking, taking in the scenery and being aware of my feet making progress reflected in the distance I have done around me and on the map route. There is something reassuring about putting one foot in front of the other and the metaphor for getting through something really comes alive in this activity. If thoughts come in on a hike, they are easier to discern, i.e. not getting tangled up, they are less threatening or deep somehow. I find they clarify and disperse quicker and answers come more naturally.

I thought many might relate to this hiking/thinking pattern scenario and seeking relief in nature, as well as, looking at healing from your own perspective and what works for you as an individual. These days I am into analysing less and being more. One of the way to bring that into being is for me to write blogs again rather than processing things using my journal, which has become one of those suffocating tools that can really take me places I never intended to go. Something to do with concise nature and being in the present/external rather than internal, which links back again to a long-term/short-term way of healing.

I hope you found this interesting and might relate to some of the things I discuss.

My book Intuitive Magic Practice discusses the subject of intuition in life in general and in a spiritual practice, if you wish to delve further into it.

Reframing the world one word at a time

above-adventure-aerial-air

In the last few weeks one of the things that’s gotten clear is the need to upgrade the old technology with the new. Our navigational system of feeling is our technology that is pure heart intelligence that is allowing us to not only see things what they are but to step into a new reality. If you can feel you can see I say and what I mean by seeing is knowing through your inner feeling field what is what. In this way there’s nothing right or wrong it is instead a multitude of truths that all have a place but most importantly we can choose or remain in observance.

Our technology maintenance, therefore, is done with the tools of the heart, intuition, feeling, sensations and a different way of looking and seeing.

I am being shown another way of naming things, for example. Just to describe a vibration to you; it is not forced or slammed in your face as the only new alternative and suggesting we throw everything away. History is history, we don’t need to berate it for ever existing. This call is neutral, if you like, take it or leave it, there’s no agenda only a suggestion of changing a frame around words, language, concepts. This is something I have thought for a while about I just couldn’t conceptualise it until now.

I use the work of the psyche or mental health as an example. Let’s take the word ‘mood’. Often it has a negative connotation attached to it in the context of mental health, for example. Moods are not welcomed especially when they change quickly and drastically. Moods are looked upon as something temperamental and unpredictable and we must stay in control at all times – that’s the goal. We either aim to control a mood, suppress it or cover it up, i.e. pretend we are not feeling what we are feeling. We have become very good at that as a human race. I have explored this moon manipulation and navigation with myself and discovered a lot of valuable material. If we deny a mood we automatically deny an experience and a quality within us or even a part of ourselves. Do you see? Instead of doing all that old mind-led technology stuff I choose to care take my moods. The reason is I need to be able to experience myself fully, just as I am and I call a mood a resonance, which changes according to our experiences in any given moment.

MOOD – VIBRATION

The same goes for a diagnosis. What is diagnosis if not a name for a person’s experience but is it? Is it not empty of that exact thing? It is a label, something to pin it down yet how can all the multitude of experiences of so many can be pinned down under one word? Diagnosis to me is a unique expression of an individual. Everyone expresses various symptoms differently, uniquely. What is it with generalising in this society? Seeps deep into collective of belonging to a race, an army of ‘robots’, an operation, a machine, which operates better when everyone is the same.

Imagine if we put ‘depression with a hint of genius expressed in music or anxiety that helps others predict the weather, etc.’ this is somewhat more specific and valuing of an experience of an individual.

DIAGNOSIS – UNIQUE INDIVIDUAL EXPRESSION

I am sure there will be many more phrases, words, energies that will naturally change towards some alternative that will offer a wider view on choices we can make.

Landscapes and emotions

The first thing to do when we are overwhelmed is to recognise and acknowledge it’s there. Stop being brave and seek to suppress or control, just step into the chaos. It can be a scary concept and counterintuitive but what if we tried, as fighting it is futile.

We must admit something or someone overwhelms us in a way we are no longer in control. We are being swallowed whole by this force larger than ourselves.

I experience it with nature more and more and with particular landscapes. It has been a useful realisation as I continue on my journey of relationship with nature. Overwhelm in particular places reflect parts of myself that are extremely wild and raw, out of control, even damaging. Very damaging. Like an untameable beast it awakens ready to devour when I am in contact with places remote, derelict and moody. I always fear I won’t come back from it yet unable to stay away until this time I looked it straight in the face and admitted defeat, so to speak.

If some landscapes evoke that energy within me that don’t feel safe, sustainable or ‘in life’, there has to be other lands that tap into a gentler, softer parts that are also there. This is what I’d like to explore for the rest of this year and next. As we approach the end of the year I can already see a particular signature emerging for the collective to explore. Kindness, gentle way of being, softer voice and touch and compassion towards everything around us.

In terms of elements I am craving more earth, more sustainability, connection, rational, solid and secure. Leaving the fire season behind feels soothing to my body and soul and I realise the tiredness of fight and anxiety the wild beast awakens in me. I almost wish to be covered up, all cosy and warm in the Earth under leaves, amidst twigs and moisture of its body. I will go on a search of places that will help me connect with other sides through the body rather than a spiritual understanding of particular landscapes. I need to go in and down rather than up and outwards. In this exploration I would like to find further deeper connections with seasons and elements and what it all means in the overall relationship I continue to cultivate with nature.

Winter, anxiety, death…

It has all been rather grey and moody this month as if life stopped at this place of no particular interest, a downward mood yet not particularly depressive. Confusion, uncertainty and anxiety have been at the centre of the feeling of it all although with a clear awareness of everything actually being all right. There has been motion yet it felt dragging. There has been laughter and warmth with odd moments of grief flying in from nowhere. Most peculiar presentation of the season I’d say, however thinking about it there is nothing really surprising about it. Winter and grief go hand and hand and death and anxiety are good old friends.

I have experienced it all it seems in just one month and something in me can’t help but wonder what the next month could possibly bring.

My body has thrown up another mysterious ailment. Usually these happen in spring for me, but this time it came in winter and I believe it is linked to both grief and anxiety. Those two human issues have been present in my life always and I have come to take it for granted and somewhat my body, the wise old vessel that it is, decided to remind me or rather slap me in the face with asking me to revisit what both of those mean to me. Is it actually good for me to be exposed to it all the time or is it time to admit it is not always the best? I realised that I abandon myself over and over again when faced with grief and anxiety and not only that both signatures go right through my body and always manifest in curious things. I am completely disarmed by them, it seems.

This time I was faced with not being able to breathe. That tapped into my death anxiety and having to face that and look underneath of what that presentation meant, not to mention lung being directly linked to grief and death. How vulnerable I am to it all and how clever my body is to jolt me into considering the consequences.

I don’t want to die gasping to air and I don’t want to live my life waiting for the moment when I can’t take another breath and die. I can’t placate my anxiety or avoid it with doing the exact thing that takes my breath away in a sense of killing me. There is so much connection and meaning to it all. All quite sad, dark and paralysing.

What I am trying to say here and learn from is that our body is so wise and knowing if only we listened to it and for sure there will be consequences if we don’t. That much is clear. I know my body for being friendly and always on my side despite a life-long abuse thrown at it. How much it had to put up with yet never left me and when the ultimate function of air in my lungs became compromised suddenly death stepped in with a possibility of taking me. Truly awakening.

What a month it has been so far. Scary, up and down and everything in between yet nothing at all. In the stillness of winter, indeed, we are often faced with the darkest faces of existence. It is stark in my mind the true meaning of the season this year. There’s a certain old and murky wisdom taste to it this year. Perhaps this will only amplify with myself getting old, who knows, but one just never knows what awaits us.