The road less travelled

Returning from holiday is always a tricky transition but I must admit I did land hard this time. Being on sacred land and around ancient stone sites shifts our consciousness and changes our energy, so returning back to the ‘old’ can be challenging simply because of the dis-resonance that takes place.

Mind you, I have been dipping in and out of depressive dark nights of the soul since, ironically, publishing my book on depression back in October. I hadn’t realised how much that  would affect me, not least in opening to greater vulnerability and the impact this would have on others in my family, but also in the unhelpful patterns it highlighted that still needed healing and also in fulfilling a long held dream of publishing books.  What then?

Difficult as it has been, I am aware that all the dark nights and bouts of depression are simply my soul seeking greater expression and with that the need for healing and letting go of unhelpful conditionings, ways of thinking and behaviour patterning. Yet the process that one has to go through to allow this, is not always easy and I know many of you have also been navigating this especially those of you going through your Reiki cleanses, let alone those who practice traditional yoga regularly.

These spiritual practices by their very nature demand that we expand consciously and this generally requires that we let go of anything that is restricting and limiting us from living our truth. Of course we don’t know what this is until we know what it is! But the practices will help to highlight the unhealthy patterns playing out in our lives and the various ways we buy into false notions of ourselves, identities that we have constructed as a result of our conditioning and the expectations of others and society and the many the ways in which we compromise our authenticity to receive conditional love from caregivers, family and friend etc, let alone the lens through which we view life.

Spiritual practice sets us free as the falsehoods gradually drop away and the perspective shifts. Or they don’t and we stay stuck and depressed and unhappy and miserable, having outgrown a part of ourselves and yet struggling to let go of our identifying with how we see ourselves, even though this is not the true us, just the us that we have created through the life experiences we have had and our reaction to them and the way that we try to keep ourselves safe and make our lives controlled, known and therefore certain.

A path of heart doesn’t care about any of this. The heart is not linear in its approach to life. It offers a path less travelled, one that is not known and certain because it has not been lived previously. It is unique to us and it won’t therefore look like anyone else’s life, it won’t be predictable or mainstream, or in any way bound and contained. It will be flowing and curvy and take us up and down and around and through the labyrinth and the spiral and back up and down again. All it asks is that we put one foot in front of the other and deepen into faith and trust as we walk the path presenting itself to us, moment by moment.

This is not easy as I know only too well and the mind will cling on to what it knows, not wanting to let go of control or it’s idea of how it should be. Generally, the mind has it all figured out, it knows the path it wants us to take, generally one that has been lived previously, if not by us than by someone else. It is conditioned to see life a certain way, to view success from a capitalist perspective that has been drilled into us since we were old enough to walk, of material gain and being someone, of recognition and external validation of worth be that through academic qualification, job title, salary or the kind of house we live in or the car we drive.

The heart absolutely doesn’t care about any of this, it doesn’t use the language of the mind, it doesn’t care about money or material gain, it doesn’t care about being known, about winning awards for the best business or being the best influencer, or yoga teacher or writer or any of the other many ways we distract ourselves from what is important in our lives. It cares only whether we love and whether we love the life we are living and the people who we share it with, let alone this beautiful planet upon which we live.

Furthermore, the heart doesn’t care about the creative outcome, it cares only about the creative process, about what this brings up in us. It is the ego that attaches itself to outcome. Writing my last book really made me come face to face with the demands of my ego and my mind versus the gentle voice of my heart and soul.

While I had been gradually chipping away at the need for external validation of my worth there was still an element of this lurking in the background that required my attention. In looking at this I realised how much I was still feeding old patterns laid down in childhood around the expectation of others and the compromise between authenticity and love and attention. I also noticed the ways that I cared too much about what others think of me, and how this influences my behaviour and then my stress levels because I might behave in a way that is not entirely natural to me.

There were other patterns too, around the mind having an idea of how my life should be lived, still buying into the old conditioning about what it means to be a success and again feeding too much into the caring what others think, especially those closest to me and being super sensitive to any form of criticism and rejection, which is just an interpretation of my mind and is not real, because actually who really cares what others think, because thoughts come and go and opinions change like the wind depending on our life experiences and the challenges we face. 

At the end of the day there is no rule book, only the rules that are imposed on us by our culture and society, by educators and care givers, by parents and friends and religion and philosophers and the medical model that still places doctors and science in a God-like capacity, and a media that moulds our minds into seeing the world a certain way depending on their bias and the billionaires who control how we think through the social media and entertainment and procurement platforms that we subject ourselves too if we spend our life online and the many other ways that we allow ourselves to be influenced by those in our lives. 

It’s never easy letting go of this though, of a mind-set that sees the world and our place in it in a certain way. We have a vested interest in maintaining the status quo, of holding onto what we believe to be true. We have invested time and energy into creating the life that we find ourselves living and it’s not always easy to let this go. Sometimes we may question the path we have taken, considering that maybe we failed or got it wrong. It wasn’t wrong and we didn’t fail. That’s just more of the old conditioning about there being a right way or a wrong way. There is just the way.

At some point it felt aligned, but then we change and what our heart needs changes too and our soul demands greater expression, it wants to know more of itself in this world, in this reality.

Then it is up to us to find the courage to let go of everything we have created to allow more of the new to come in, and usually we won’t know what that is, until we’ve let go into the void of not knowing and created space. Some will play around with this, dipping in and out and then get scared and contract back to their old ways. But often the change is forced upon us, through illness, accident, a stress, a despair, a niggle that just won’t go away, a little voice saying “change, time to change”…

Often the only thing we need to do is go deeper within and surrender to life as it unfolds moment to moment.

Initially we might fight against it. Our mind is powerful. It plans and organises our life into neat boxes. If we do this, we get that. If we do this, it keeps us safe. If we do this, it means we’re worth something. If we do this, people will appreciate us. If we do this, we’ll be happy.

No. The heart and soul cannot be organised or planned.

Plans often have to change. We get to the point - as I have done - where we throw our hands up in teh air and say, “well let’s just see”…we require flexibility….

The mind is being encouraged to a place of greater flexibility. To let go of its fixed ways, it’s rigidity, it’s, “I know best”. It doesn’t.

We don’t need to read a zillion books or go on a million courses, albeit sometimes we might pick up a book or attend a course that tips us gently over the edge, whispers of another way, gives us the courage to make start looking at things differently, to reach out for help, to be deeply honest with ourselves as we keep chipping away at our falsehoods and mis-identifications, and listen, really listen, to the soft whisperings of our heart beyond the noise of our mind.

The mind needs security, it wants certainty, it’s attached to outcome, it often wants to be recognised for being someone, it requires validation of worth from outside ourselves, it relishes the opinions and feedback from others, it wants to be absolutely sure before it makes a decision.

The heart couldn’t care less about any of that.

So we’re up against ourselves as I know only too well.

We push and will things to happen.

We come at it back to front.

My bike accident was my awakening. The earth disappeared beneath me and the shock fed an old pattern that Marie’s death also triggered. There was no way I could ignore it. My heart chakra was cracked right open and the pain in my left shoulder demanded healing.

And this took me on an inner journey. I turned deeper into practice, going for weekly Reiki with a fellow Reiki practitioner, mixing up my yoga practice to ensure I wasn’t creating or getting stuck in old patterns, spending as much time as I could in nature and slowly making changes.

“If we always do what we’ve always done, then we’ll always get what we’ve always got”.

The process was messy.

We have to shed the old, we have to let go of people pleasing and caring what other think, of conforming and doing what is expected of us, of judging ourselves and others, of saying yes when we mean no, of valuing others more than we value ourselves, of thinking that there is a right and a wrong, a  good and a bad, a black and a white and appreciating that there are many different ways to look at and view the same experience, to appreciate that being centred in ourselves is a positive thing, to look honestly at the reason we do what we do, is it from a place of heart or from duty, guilt, shame, financial gain and/or regret? We have to learn to love ourselves over and over again. 

It’s not easy. The changes can be difficult for others in our lives unless they too are doing the work on themselves and then they understand. We care less about the mainstream and about convention. We are not motivated by the same things that motivate others, we don’t care so much about material gain or external validation of worth, we are turned off by anything which tries to box us, constrain us, cage us or in any way limit us in our lives.

We see life differently. We turn off and turn in. We can’t tolerate superficial chatter or noise. Artificial light is too bright. We need fresh air and open space. We appreciate that nature is sentient and divine. We don’t want to harm other living things. We talk to our crystals and our plants as friends. We question the media bias and turn off the TV. We avoid pharmaceuticals, appreciating that they don’t always have our best interests at heart, and we find alternative ways to heal ourselves, at the root, not just easing symptoms.

We notice the moon. We appreciate the signs that nature brings to help us navigate our lives from a higher perspective. We let go of energy vampires from our lives. We appreciate that we can only be responsible for ourselves not for anyone else. We cultivate discernment. We stop feeding our addictions. We crave wholesome food. We try to live lightly, reducing our negative impact on the environment. We start standing up for what we believe in. We find our voice and are not scared to use it. We might become activists. We care about our fellow man. We care about the planet. We care about the world we are leaving for our children.

We find a new inner strength, a deeper connection with self, we won’t accept the crap that people have been throwing at us, we value ourselves in a way we never have, we recognise our worth and don’t need anyone to validate this to us, we don’t need medals or awards or a great big pat on the back, because we just know, and in that way we naturally create better boundaries, we protect ourselves from negative influences and energies, we relish solitude, we re-prioritise our life, let go of the stuff, clear out, reduce our possessions, we wear clothes that feel comfortable, that we choose for ourselves, not for anyone else, we attract new friends into our lives, we thrive on deeper conversation, we see life differently and are more selective about who we share this with.

We might start praying, not because we’re religious, but because we recognise that there is a higher power which is always trying to support us, we live in a universe that is alive, that loves to say yes, that loves to love, if only we open up to it. Some might call us weird, eccentric, wonder if we’re OK, gone too far, and some will drop away simply because we become too much, too different, too challenging to their belief system, some might even confront us, try to change us, make us more like them. But we know who we are and we don’t need to prove it to anyone.

When we pop through the other side of this often messy process that the path ope heart takes us on, into a more aligned life, we may feel deeper peace and contentment, a sense of belonging that wasn’t there previously and a deeper joy in our connection to self, there is greater authenticity and truth. We know then that it is worth all the turmoil, this path of heart, this road less travelled. There is potential where there wasn’t previously, the world seems brighter, lighter and with more space for us to play in.

Our outer life changes simply because the way we relate to ourselves has changed. Our stress levels reduce because we’re unifying our inner and outer environments, rather than causing tea to pull apart - we feel stress when our organism isn’t able to cope with its environment. We get anxious when we fear for our safety, when we don’t trust the earth to support us and hold us and nourish us and sustain us, and we forget about spirit and our spirit guides who are always supporting us and trying to communicate with us if only we can listen beyond the mental chatter of fear and uncertainty and this being ‘the way’ come what may. Ha!

Maybe others notice, maybe they don’t. The tightening of our boundaries, the deeper awareness of what makes us tick, of our passions, of the love in our life, of our dreams, this can all re-orientate us. So too our deeper connection to spirit and to the essence that holds us and nourishes us, certainly my relationship with Goddess, with Mother Earth has deepened.

But so too can our awareness of self. My boys have helped enormously with this as I watch them being themselves, one super sensitive and autistic, the other hypertastic who needs to be constantly entertained, whose energy levels challenge even mine. I shouldn’t be surprised, they’ve highlighted my own sensitivity and inability to sit still, and helped me to make greater sense of myself and allow for it, rather than deny it or ignore it or somehow have to defend it or change it. Who cares! We are who we are.

My dreams have changed, I crave more fun and playful time with the boys, of simplicity and peace, of being outside as much as we can, in nature, growing and living in greater harmony with the land and the natural world, of travels that fill us up and respect the planet, of visiting stones and ancient landscapes, of sharing my passions for yoga, Reiki and Ayurveda where I can, from the heart, of kindness and compassion. There is greater discernment. Less planning. More present moment. No doubt it won’t last long. We have to relish the alignment when it is there…and remember to surrender over and over again, following the road ahead…wherever it may take us…

One of my clients sent me this beautiful poem, which is timely to share…

The Road not Taken by Robert Frost

Two roads diverged in a yellow wood,
And sorry I could not travel both
And be one traveler, long I stood
And looked down one as far as I could
To where it bent in the undergrowth;

Then took the other, as just as fair,
And having perhaps the better claim,
Because it was grassy and wanted wear;
Though as for that the passing there
Had worn them really about the same,

And both that morning equally lay
In leaves no step had trodden black.
Oh, I kept the first for another day!
Yet knowing how way leads on to way,
I doubted if I should ever come back.

I shall be telling this with a sigh
Somewhere ages and ages hence:
Two roads diverged in a wood, and I—
I took the one less traveled by,
And that has made all the difference.

 Love Emma x