Reflections Upon The Year That Has Been – 2015

As the New Year marches on filled with challenges and surprises it is probably a good time to reflect upon the year that was – 2015.

As I sit in quiet contemplation I find myself not wanting to see so many truths that God has been gently guiding me to open my soul to for such a long time.  And I can’t help but wonder what it would be like to have such patience, such compassion, such understanding and such love, as God has, for everything and everyone despite our flaws and weaknesses.

How different would my life have been if truth and real love had been the governing factors throughout my life and not just in the past six years? Sure, I have attempted to live my life from a place of acceptance, tolerance and love – at least since I was old enough to make conscious and meaningful choices for myself.  But in all this time the real driving force has been a desire to be loved; a desire to be understood; a desire to be accepted.  And in coming from this place of addiction I have automatically been out of harmony with love.  It has taken some very hard lessons to begin to crack open the tough exterior shell around my soul.  And looking back now I am grateful for those hard lessons.  But there is still so much work to be done.

Upon reflection I can see now how much of my life and the choices I have made have been driven by fear of rejection.  Until I am able to really get to the heart of the cause of these addictions it will be very difficult for me to feel truly accepted, truly loved and truly valued.

What would life be like if we learnt to live from a place of acceptance and tolerance; acceptance of ourselves as we truly are in this moment, and tolerance for our faults, hurts and injuries?

What would life be like if we truly learnt to love as God loves – unconditionally and totally, with respect for our free will and compassion for the injuries that drive our unloving choices?

What does real love actually mean? What would real love actually do?

The clue is in the above statements about how God loves – unconditionally, totally, with respect for the free will of every person regardless of their injures, and tolerance for their/our unloving choices whilst having compassion for the hurt child locked deep within and wanting to find his/her voice.  If we look around at our natural environment in its pristine state we can see little clues everywhere.

God does not give us everything we want.  God sees beyond the here and now.  He sees deep into our souls to the very core of our being and He understands what drives our thoughts and actions – those in harmony with love and truth and those driven by fear.  He knows WHY we say or do the things we do and He has total compassion for our brokenness. He also knows what would happen if He gave in to our demands and unloving addictive behaviour.

Since the beginning of time God has been observing the rise and fall of the human soul.  Watching our journey with compassion and understanding as we grapple with being mind-dominance and compete for power and control, trying to avoid our deeply buried hurt and pain, and setting up a chain reaction which continues to reverberate down the ancestral lines. He has consistently sent us many teachers and messengers who have had more courage and more understanding of Love than most to show us the way over this time – the great prophets, Jesus, Mohamad, Budda, Ghandi, Mandella, Mother Theresa and many others have been shining a guiding light upon earth for many millennia. Sometimes we recognize these great teachers and sometimes we don’t.

The problem of course is that Love and Truth will always confront error and addiction and this results in pain.  We have a tendency to run away from pain.  We have in-built pain receptors in our body which act as beacons sending warning signals and when these are triggered we mostly learn to avoid the painful stimuli – like sharp knives, hot saucepans, fire and a host of other painful stimuli.

But what do we do with the painful emotional stimuli, the ones which tell us what is going on in the soul? 

Mostly we ignore them.  We want to avoid feeling our sadness, our despair, our hopelessness, our fear, our grief and especially (for me anyway) our rage.  We have been so conditioned to believe that in order to be a ‘good’ person we must sacrifice ourselves in order to please others and keep the peace.

But what about me? Surely in God’s eyes I am just as important as anyone else?

Why then has this false concept of self-sacrifice taken hold and spread throughout humanity like an uncontrollable wildfire? 

The only logical answer can be that in response to sacrificing ourselves in order to gain ‘love’ and ‘approval’ we perpetuate the error by unconsciously demanding that others meet our addictions to help us avoid our fears and make us feel better about ourselves.

As children we rely on adults for our survival and it is easy to understand why we quickly learn to sacrifice ourselves in order to feel safe, protected and loved.  Some children never feel safe, protected and loved.  And so, without even thinking, as adults we naturally begin to demand from others that which was taken from us as children.  We become selfish without even realizing it.  Most of us wander through life in this half-dream state. Gradually shutting down to our hurt and pain while at the same time ramping up our demands that others help us avoid the hurt and pain within.  We are seeing more and more of this in society with increasing incidences of dementia, Alzheimer’s, suicide and mental illness.  What we do not yet seem to realize is that it is the soul which drives our lives – not the mind.  The soul – not the mind, is the powerhouse of the real me.  When I honour my soul, the sensory apparatus which houses my passions, desires, longings, emotions, memories, humility, love, intentions, personality, free will, instinct, energy, and more, I am honouring my real self – my half of the soul.

In order to grow in love I must first grow a desire for truth. Facing truth exposes the errors in my soul – the hurt, grief, fear, shame, anger, rage and so on which must be felt and released in order for Love to flow in.

From a very young age we are taught to ‘behave’ ourselves, to not feel what is often perceived as negative emotions – hurt, fear, sadness and so on. Often we have been punished (emotionally through ridicule, condemnation, judgement and / or physically through violent ‘correction’) for expressing our real selves.  Boys have too often been bullied into being strong and ‘manly’ as they helplessly learn to be tough, hard and ‘unemotional’. Girls have too often been coaxed into being subservient, passive and compliant. And woe betide anyone who dares to try to break free of these moulds and unloving expectations! And thank God that there have been people throughout history who have had the courage to show us a different way forward.  People like Jesus, Ghandi, Mandela, Mallala, Patch Adams, Steven Jobs, the Suffragettes and many, many more.

In every community, in every corner of the world there are people with the courage to question society’s expectations and push the boundaries of the ‘accepted’. You probably know many in your own local community.  We need more of them.

How different would our world be if from birth children learn that they are God’s child, created perfect in every natural way, and that the soul is the real you?

What if in school we are taught that it is not only OK, but it is encouraged to express the real you; and the means is provided for the safe and loving expression of all emotions – especially emotions of anger, rage, fear and grief.

What sort of society would we live in if children were taught from a very young age that it is not only OK, but it is encouraged, to feel and release their fear and unloving emotions in a loving way which does not harm any other living thing; and that when they do they will feel lighter, happier, more self-confident and loving. They will then soon see that love and laughter are infectious. But in order for children to learn this we need adults to show them the way.

Over the past six years I have slowly been opening my soul to Love and Truth.  This past year, 2015, has been the most confronting year yet as I begin to challenge addictions – physically, emotionally and in relationships.  It has been hard.  I often feel like a fish swimming against the current, but unlike the salmon, I have not yet learnt to jump waterfalls in order to get to the calm safe pool beyond.  Well, maybe baby waterfalls or rapids which lead to shallow rocky pools.  As I slowly gain the courage to challenge addictions and honour my soul above all others I am being shown little cracks in the prison that I have constructed for myself and more light and love begin to trickle in.

My challenge for this year, 2016, is to confront fear and let go of judgement – especially judgement of myself. If I can face the truth about WHY I judge myself and anger so harshly I have a hope of making some progress towards Love.

Judgement of anger is a HUGE emotion for me and I don’t understand it. I have HUGE amounts of resistance to feeling the rage that remains deeply buried within my soul and this rage is keeping me fat and in constant pain.  This has to change. It is time. It is time to let go of false beliefs and finally learn to step into God-reliance and trust that God knows exactly what I need to learn. When I finally learn to see the blocks that I have to trusting that God knows and understands the pain in my soul, and that She wants to nurse me through this pain then, and only then, will I be able to step into God-reliance and move through the painful emotions and errors in my soul.  And when I do learn this, true and permanent healing will begin.  All I have to do is to soften to the pain (without judgement), open to humility and Trust that God loves me and wants to help me through this pain. 

As I learn to pay attention to what the Law of Attraction is telling me, both positive and negative, I will learn to read God’s signs and let go of any pre-conceived notions I may have about what is right and what is loving.

My prayer for 2016 is that I may grow in humility so that I might open my heart and soul more fully to God’s Truth and God’s Love.  This is my prayer not only for me but for each and every one of my brothers and sisters, both here on earth and in the spirit world.

I wish you an enlightening and rewarding year ahead.

An interview with Jim Morrison by Lizzie James

The end of 2015 is fast approaching and it brings with it an opportunity to reflect upon the year that was and set new direction and purpose for the year ahead.

As I was trolling through files today I came across this interview with Jim Morrison which is a perfect reflection of how I am now choosing to live my life by feeling my way through each day.  Some days I am successful, some days I allow the pressures of the fears of others and my own fears to overcome me and I dismiss opportunities to feel my true self.  this is something that I am working on every day. Every day I pray for the humility to be my real self - the me that God created.  In order to find this pristine self I must first wade through all the crap that has been dumped upon me as a child and added to by myself as an adult.  It is a slow and painful process but one which I believe is absolutely necessary if I am ever to reveal the real me that God created.

My prayer for 2016 is that I will have the courage to open more fully to humility and allow myself to feel more fully the broken and hidden parts of myself.

I hope you too can resonate with these very wise words from Jim Morrison.

Interview with Jim Morrison - http://www.cinetropic.com/morrison/james.html 

Lizzie James: I think fans of The Doors see you as a saviour, the leader who'll set them all free. How do you feel about that? It's kind of a heavy burden, isn't it?

Jim Morrison: It's absurd. How can I set free anyone who doesn't have the guts to stand up alone and declare his own freedom? I think it's a lie--people claim they want to be free--everybody insists that freedom is what they want the most, the most sacred and precious thing a man can possess. But that's bullshit! People are terrified to be set free-they hold on to their chains. They fight anyone who tries to break those chains. It's their security....How can they expect me or anyone to set them free if they don't really want to be free?

Lizzie: Why do you think people fear freedom?

Jim: I think people resist freedom because they're afraid of the unknown. But it's ironic ... That unknown was once very well known. It's where our souls belong ... The only solution is to confront them -- confront yourself -- with the greatest fear imaginable. Expose yourself to yourself to your deepest fear. After that, fear has no power, and fear of freedom shrinks and vanishes. You are free.

Lizzie: What do mean when you say "freedom"?

Jim: There are different kinds of freedom -- there's a lot of misunderstanding ... The most important kind of freedom is to be what you really are. You trade in your reality for a role. You trade in your senses for an act. You give up your ability to feel and in exchange, put on a mask. There can't be any large-scale revolution until there's a personal revolution, on an individual level. It's got to happen inside first.

You can take away a man's political freedom and you won't hurt him -- unless you take away his freedom to feel. That can destroy him.

Lizzie: But how can anyone else have the power to take away from your freedom to feel?

Jim: Some people surrender their freedom willingly--but others are forced to surrender it. Imprisonment begins with birth. Society, parents; they refuse to allow you to keep the freedom you are born with. There are subtle ways to punish a person for daring to feel. You see that everyone around you has destroyed his true feeling nature. You imitate what you see.

Lizzie: Are you saying that we are, in effect, brought up to defend and perpetuate a society that deprives people of the freedom to feel?

Jim: Sure ... teachers, religious leaders-even friends, or so-called friends -- take over where the parents leave off. They demand that we feel the only feelings they want and expect from us. They demand all the time that we preform feelings for them. We're like actors-turned loose in this world to wander in search of a phantom ... endlessly searching for a half-forgotten shadow of our lost reality. When others demand that we become the people they want us to be, they force us to destroy the person we really are. It's a subtle kind of murder ... the most loving parents and relatives commit this murder with smiles on their faces.

Lizzie: Do you think it's possible for an individual to free himself from these repressive forces on his own -- all alone?

Jim: That kind of freedom can't be granted. Nobody can win it for you. You have to do it on your own. If you look to somebody else to do it for you -- somebody outside yourself -- you're still depending on others. You're still vulnerable to those repressive, evil outside forces, too.

Lizzie: But isn't it possible for people who want that freedom to unite -- to combine their strength, maybe just to strengthen each other? It must be possible.

Jim: Friends can help each other. A true friend is someone who lets you have total freedom to be yourself-and especially to feel. Or not feel. Whatever you happen to be feeling at the moment is fine with them. That's what real love amounts to -- letting a person be what he really is ... Most people love you for who you pretend to be ... To keep their love, you keep pretending -- preforming. You get to love your pretence ... It's true, we're locked in an image, an act -- and the sad thing is, people get so used to their image -- they grow attached to their masks. They love their chains. They forgot all about who they really are. And if you try to remind them, they hate you for it -- they feel like you're trying to steal their most precious possession.

Lizzie: It's ironic -- it's sad. Can't they see that what you're trying to show them is the way to freedom?

Jim: Most people have no idea what they're missing. Or society places a supreme value on control -- hiding what you feel. Our culture mocks "primitive cultures" and prides itself on suppression of natural instincts and impulses.

Lizze: In some of your poetry, you openly admire and praise primitive people -- Indians, for instance. Do you mean that it's not human beings in general but our particular society that's flawed and destructive?

Jim: Look at how other cultures live --peacefully, in harmony with the earth, the forest -- animals. They don't build war machines and invest millions of dollars in attacking other countries whose political ideals don't happen to agree with their own.

Lizze: We live in a sick society.

Jim: It's true ... and part of the disease is not being aware that we're diseased ... Our society has too much to hold on to, and value -- freedom ends up at the bottom of the list.

Lizze: But isn't there something an artist con do? If you didn't feel you, as an artist, could accomplish something, how could you go on?

Jim: I offer images -- I conjure memories of freedom that can still be reached -- like The Doors, right? But we can only open the doors -- we can't drag people through. I can't free them unless they want to be free -- more than anything else ... Maybe primitive people have less bullshit to let go of, to give up. A person has to be willing to give up everything -- not just wealth. All the bullshit he's been taught -- all society brainwashing. You have to let go of all that to get to the other side. Most people aren't willing to do that.

Authenticity

It is interesting isn't how the same messages are often relevant time and time again.  Take this message on Authenticity from my guide Peter - I received this in November 2014, almost a year ago and yet its potency still resonates with my soul.

I am still struggling to grasp what that truly means but I feel that I am getting stronger and braver in stepping into my own authenticity regardless of the perceived cost.  I am slowly finding the courage to use my voice and stand firm for truth and love.  It is not easy.

Recently I have been having a conversation with my family that has been difficult for us all, but I am learning to remain true to my authentic self and not modify myself in order to please.

Oh how I wish I could just go back to pleasing everyone - but I can't - the price is too high.  It is time to start loving my authentic self.

Challenging the status quo is difficult, challenging, confronting and triggering. But I am ever so grateful for these reminders from my guides and others who have walked this path before me that true happiness comes through Authenticity. It has been my willingness to sacrifice my authentic self that has resulted in dis-ease within my body.  Now it is time to reclaim my authenticity and learn to love me in the process.

I hope you find this message helpful.

Blessings

Linda

                                                         ...............................................

4^th November 2014

Authenticity

True freedom comes through authenticity. If you cannot be your authentic self at all times then you are not free.  You are tied to the constraints of wanting/needing to please others in order to gain their approval and love. And in that space you are not being true to yourself, and your soul cries.  Your soul, your true self, craves authenticity and will do anything in its power to bring you back to authenticity.

When you sacrifice your authenticity you create a fertile ground for dis-ease and pain, and suffering WILL result.  There is no escaping this. It is a universal Law. God wants us to be our authentic selves.  There is power and beauty in authenticity but it is a subtle kind of power, a gentle beauty that the world does not yet understand.  In fact, the world is afraid of authenticity and the power and beauty that goes with it; because to embrace authenticity is to embrace difference and the world has been fighting for conformity and predictability for millenia.

The world is afraid of difference because difference means uncertainty.  Difference means that there is potential for chaos and chaos incites fear. But we are afraid of chaos only because we have not yet learnt to embrace authenticity.  Being your authentic self requires courage and commitment but brings freedom and joy.  The world does not yet understand this and so it clings to conformity and predictability out of fear.

There is a small but growing number of people on the planet who are awakening to the importance and potentiality of authenticity.  Being your authentic self requires commitment and the courage to swim against the current in the stream of life.  Once you begin to experience the freedom of authenticity you stop struggling and embrace the potentiality of a life much greater than you had previously experienced or even imagined, because true freedom comes through authenticity. And being authentic means recognizing every aspect of yourself no matter how ugly, dark or painful that might be.  Being authentic means being able to freely express yourself regardless of what you are feeling in any given moment.

Authenticity requires us to face the truth of our existence and to own up to the faults and flaws in our souls.  In a world that values conformity and predictability, authenticity is challenging because authenticity means having the courage to question everything and to feel the Truth for yourself.  Authenticity does not seek approval or guidance.  Authenticity seeks Truth, Love, Joy and Humility.

True freedom can only be achieved through authenticity.

Peter

Learning to Let Love in.

I have been struggling with loving myself most of my life.  It is as if there is a deep self-loathing that I don’t yet fully understand and I am finding it difficult to work my way through this emotionally.  I received a clue to this recently when I re-listened to the Divine Truth Talk on Emotions and the Mother Taboo (www.divinetruth.com - June 26^th 2010 – also on the Divine Truth YouTube channel http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=G8VzVIYHpOE&list=PLF04C988375DCDF23&index=47 ). At around 51mins into the talk AJ shared this statement When you suppress anger what finishes up happening is called resentment … if you are a woman suppressing anger towards mother you’re going to end up resenting yourself as a woman as well as resenting your mother.  It is the same if you are a man suppressing your anger towards your father.

I know I have a lot of repressed anger in my soul.  My body has been telling me this for years – acne, thrush, tinea – these are all ‘angry’ conditions in the body characterized by inflammation and I have had them all.  But it is difficult to access or work through anger fully when you have a deep fear of anger.  It is not so much the underlying fear that I am afraid of (although it could be) but more a fear of the anger itself that I need to access in order to get to the deeper cause of the dis-ease in my soul. 

I hate anger! 

I hate receiving it. 

I hate expressing it! 

Anger terrifies me and I have a lot of judgements about it all of which are born from my childhood (as are most of the errors in our souls).  But if I am ever to heal the errors in my soul, and therefore my body, I need to let go of the judgements that I have about anger and allow my soul to express all of the anger which has been pent up for most of my life.  This is a huge challenge for me and is blocking me from accessing the deeper grief within my soul which is preventing my connection with God from growing.  I have been praying about this a lot lately.

Recently when I was working through some emotions I had a bit of a revelation.

God loves me.

God loves me despite my faults and errors. 

God loves ME despite my unloving thoughts, feelings and actions. 

God loves ME despite my imperfection. 

God loves me even though I am fat and often feel stupid and inadequate. 

God has always loved me.

And God does not make mistakes.  Ever.  So if God loves me and I have felt this love and know it is real, and if God does not make mistakes; that means that I must be loveable. This is God’s Truth.  I am supremely loveable as I currently am.  I do not need to be slim, fit, young, smart and beautiful to be loveable.  God loves me as I currently am.  I am one of the greatest of God’s creation, the most wonderful of His handiworks and the object of Her great love and tenderest care.

God loves me as I currently am therefore I must be loveable as I currently am.  I don’t need to be anyone other than myself to be loveable. I have repeated this a lot here because I still don’t get this emotionally – at a soul level.  I understand this intellectually but I struggle to ‘get it’ at the soul level. 

I have spent much of my life modifying myself in order to please others.  Searching for love any way I can.  What I didn’t understand was that God loves me exactly as I am.  God created me as a perfect human being, a perfect half of a soul and I don’t need to be anything other than myself. 

The problem is that for most of my childhood being myself didn’t seem to be acceptable.  I was taught ‘to be a good girl’; ‘to behave myself’; ‘to not do this or that’.  It seemed that I was never good enough, smart enough, pretty enough.  I was moulded to ‘fit’ the accepted norm at the time.  And I didn’t understand this connection that God wants with all of Her children; that God craves from all of His children. The Catholic Church doesn’t teach about a personal relationship with God.  It taught me that I need a priest in order to have a relationship with God.  That I must obey its laws – most of which are not in harmony with God’s Laws and are manipulative, controlling and driven by fear, power and control.  This is what I grew up with.

Now I am learning that I do not need anyone else to have a relationship with God; that my relationship with God is personal and unique. And it feels right. My challenge is now to accept the gift of God’s Love and come to believe what God already knows – that as Her daughter I am supremely loveable.  I am a prefect creation of God’s and She does not make mistakes – EVER!  I AM loveable just as I am in this moment.

While a tiny flicker of a light is going on in my soul as this truth begins to take hold the demon I am really struggling with right now is to learn to love myself, to learn to forgive myself for all of the unloving actions I have taken in the past (and there have been many).  Until I can learn to do that – to forgive myself – it will be very difficult to learn to love myself or others.  I need to remind myself of this truth every day.

God loves me exactly as I am in this moment.  She has never stopped loving me.

I have felt God’s Love and I know it is real.  God loves me therefore I am loveable.

This needs to become my daily mantra.  My daily prayer needs to be “Please God, help me to overcome the barriers that prevent me from accepting Your Truth – that I am loveable exactly as I am.”

I still struggle with this but with God’s help and Grace I will eventually allow this truth to sink deep into my soul and become a knowing, a reality.  When I can do this I will be able to love others more freely and without expectation.  I will be able to give more of myself.

There is a lot of grief that I need to feel still as to why this is not already a truth in my soul.

Resistance and Rebellion

Resistance serves no useful purpose.  Resistance is avoidance.  Resistance is very unloving, both to yourself and to the universe.  I am coming to understand this after having been in resistance to my emotions and God’s Truth for the past couple of weeks.  This past week I have been feeling awful!  Lifeless.  Achy. Unmotivated. And cycling through phases of intense heat and at times cold – in other words I have been avoiding large amounts of anger, rage and fear and I have been paying the price for it. 

Why? 

The only answer I can come up with right now is to realize just how little love I have for myself.  Perhaps this even borders on self-loathing! Again I have to ask - Why?  And I am afraid to find out the answers.  I must be, otherwise I would succumb to the emotions, trusting in God’s Love and allow the emotions to show me the truth.  But I have not been doing that.  Fear! Fear of the truth.  Fear of the anger and rage that is within my soul. Fear of other people’s judgement and condemnation because I choose to be different, I choose to make some sort of effort to uncover the real me.  Fear of my own judgement and condemnation – ‘this feels ridiculous’; ‘I hate anger’; ‘anger serves no useful purpose’. None of this is helpful.  In fact it is all down right harmful – both to my soul and to the environment and those around me. 

How little I know about love.  How little I choose to engage in the process of love and discovering the healing power of love.

So I wanted to understand more fully this thing called Resistance. Dictionary.com describes resistance as the act or power of resisting, opposing, or withstanding or in Psychiatry it is the opposition to an attempt to bring repressed thoughts or feelings into consciousness. This is exactly what I have been doing. Opposing any attempts to bring repressed thoughts or feelings into consciousness – opposing God’s Love and laws and withstanding any attempts on my part to uncover my hidden self.  The question is WHY?

Oxford dictionary describes resistance as the refusal to accept or comply with something: So I can only assume that when I am in resistance to God’s Truth and Love I am refusing to accept God’s Truth and refusing to comply with God’s Laws. And this is what is causing me this pain and discomfort and draining me of energy. It has taken a bit to recognize this and to acknowledge to myself that I still have a HUGE resistance to authority. In recognizing this I have begun to challenge this resistance very simply by attempting to obey ALL road rules.  It has been an interesting experiment as I drive along in 60km zones which could quite safely be 70km or even 80km zones or in a 40km zone where it feels painful to be going that slow and feel the anger rising within me (most often as subtly as mild frustration) and the projections of anger from those behind me.

Resistance is also a form of rebellion the action or process of resisting authority, control, or convention: also opposition to authority; being unwilling to obey rules or accept normal standards of behaviour, dress, etc. So when I am in resistance I am also rebelling against God’s authority just as the first parents did.  I am beginning to understand this now but still there is a resistance in me to changing this.  I don’t want to be different.  I want to fit in.  I have wanted this all of my life and this is why I have created such an elaborate façade self.  A false sense of who I really am, created in order to avoid the pain I feel at being rejected for my real self. 

Finding my way back there is difficult, especially as I continue to hold on to resistance and act rebelliously.  I want to blame spirits with me for this rebellion and resistance but the truth is that while spirits may influence my behaviour they do so only because I allow it.  I am totally responsible for the effects of the resistance that I am feeling and I need to allow myself to feel what it is that I am gaining through this interaction with spirits and be willing to let that go and allow God in.  I’m not sure if I really want to do that.  Not yet anyway. Why is this? 

As I struggle to come to terms with my injured self I find myself looking for reassurance – a hand to hold – a smile – an encouraging word and I do not yet know how to get that directly from God.  I wish I could understand why this is so and how to change this.  For now all I can do is pray for God’s guidance but in my resistance and rebellion I don’t even feel worthy of that. I feel that as long as I hold on to resistance and rebellion I have no right to ask for God’s help and so I find myself in somewhat of a quandary.  What do I do now?  But if I have faith in a God who is all holy, loving, giving and merciful I have to believe that God will assist me through this rebellious phase as long as I am willing to face the truth and have the courage to accept full responsibility for this situation I now find myself in.  I have to trust that God is on my side and not push Him away as I have been doing.  I need to learn to be truly humble.  I need to learn to trust God completely or I will never become at one with Her (I use the feminine aspect of God here because I feel that it is the feminine that I am resisting the most and have the most difficulty connecting with at this point).

Please God, help me to let go of resistance and control.  Teach me to be truly humble.  Teach me to love myself so that I may be able to love others.

 ...............................

I wrote this a couple of weeks ago and still find myself oscillating between resistance and passion and desire.  there is much here for me to learn still.  I hope it is of some assistance to you.

Love

Linda

20.01.13 

Reflections on Futility

This is part two of the challenge that Karen presented members of the Community team with. 

“Reflect upon futility.  There’s a whole world full of fences and not many people are wanting to take them down – metaphorically and literally.”

Reflections

What fences do I still have around my heart and what is preventing me from pulling these down?

When I reflected upon this I immediately saw a picture of a twisted, tangled mess of barbed wire around my heart – some old and rusty strands tangled in with others which were relatively new.  Some barbs I have been holding onto since childhood while others have recently been tangled into the mess of twisted confusion, fear and doubt.  First I must cut away the newer fences in order to access the older more painful barbs some of which dig into my heart causing it to bleed.  But true healing can only begin when I have the courage to grab the pliars and gently cut away and untangle the barbs one layer at a time, allowing the scratches and deeper wounds to heal slowly and completely.  If I were to pull fiercely at the tangled mess I would in all likelihood create great pain and distress.  The more loving approach is to remove the barbs slowly and completely, one at a time.  It is a slow process which requires patience, compassion and self-love without judgement.  Sometimes it will all seem too much for me and I will, and have, backed away in fear; but fear prevents me from moving forward so I must learn to trust and step into the fear having faith that God is guiding me in this process and helping me as much as I will allow Him to do so.  If I can apply this same process to the fences of the world I will come to understand that true change at a soul level is governed by love and truth and happens in stages – one step at a time.  I must be patient and be willing to remove my own fences, the barriers that I have to being more loving in my life.  I must learn to BE the change I want to see in the world as Ghandi taught and operate quietly in the background seeking neither approval nor recognition, but merely desiring to serve my brothers and sisters in love and truth and humility. I must remember that we are all on a unique journey and that God waits patiently for us to come to Him and never imposes His will upon us.  I must strive to become more God-like, anything else now seem futile.

Am I fully engaged in my passions and desires?

The short answer is NO and I can justify this until the cows come home but the truth is that I am not fully engaging my passions and desires because of fear – fear of making a mistake, fear of judgement, fear of condemnation, fear of being different.  But I am slowly allowing these passions and desires to gestate within my soul and feel that many are now preparing to be birthed in all of their glory and passion and in a way that will allow me to lovingly serve others and God using the gifts that He has given me.  I am now tentatively taking the first steps of desire, exploring my own soul, making mistakes and learning from these and then trying again in a more loving way.  I am finally beginning to learn what it means to allow God to teach me, and desiring to learn and uncover and grow these gifts that God has given me.

Do I want to develop my passions and desires in harmony with God’s Laws, Love and Truth and open my soul to learning from God?

Absolutely!  I have tried the other way – the path of self-reliance – the path of arrogance, wanting approval and recognition and it does not work – it is not sustainable because it is not loving either to myself or to others so now I find myself turning to God and wanting to learn to live God’s way, wanting to learn to love – myself and others.

Reflections on some Bible passage

1 John 2:15-17 …if any man love the world the love of the Father is not in him …

If I place greater priority upon the creation rather than the Creator I automatically limit myself.  This has been my path in the past – a path of self-reliance, not involving God much in the process and not trusting that God is a God if love and it has been a very limiting and debilitating path.  I am now choosing the path of God-reliance which being much harder is infinitely more rewarding.

1 Corinthians 9:19-23 … I entered their world and tried to experience things from their point of view … I didn’t just want to talk about it, I wanted to be in on it …

When I let go of judgement and allow myself to experience things from a different perspective it will open my soul to new experiences and new truths.  I am only just beginning to understand this.  There have been so many times in my past when God has provided me with opportunities to enter the world of another and experience things from their point of view but my own arrogance and fear has prevented me from doing this – I chose self-reliance and self-justification over the opportunities that God was giving me and in so doing I have limited my growth and created more pain in my soul and the souls of others, the full force of which I must now feel and be repentant about if I am to truly heal my own soul and help to open the souls of others whom I have harmed to the potential of healing as well. Why then do I now expect that now that I have got it – at least intellectually – that others should get it as well.  This is the height of arrogance and exposes in me great errors uncovering the fears that I have been trying to avoid for most of my life – the fear of being different, fear of rejection, fear of condemnation, fear of judgement, fear of ridicule.  I want to hide and go unnoticed.  But hiding in fear does not allow me to enter a different world and consider a different perspective; it limits my growth and my potential and prevents God from teaching me in a loving way.

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There is still so much that I need to learn and chief amongst these is Humility.  I am still very much wanting to control everything about my life and still not trusting that God actually knows everything about me already and if I let go of my arrogance and pride then God will be able to teach me.  Arrogance and pride are such futile emotions and achieve nothing positive, so why then do I still guard them so closely?

Thank you Karen for givine me this opportunity to reflect more deeply upon the fences of my soul and the futile nature of the life I have been living for I realize now that anything other than true God-reliance is futile and limiting and I want to learn to be my true self, to be all that God created me to be - whatever that might be.  Please God, teach me to be truly Humble.

with love

Linda 

Addictions, personal responsibility and getting to know the real me

From my journal

I am struggling to allow myself to feel into the cause of my shoulder pain and I pray for God’s continued guidance and assistance, but right now I am feeling a bit numb.   

This morning I find myself alone again and I am feeling lost.  I am beginning to open up my soul to the truth of my relationship with John, my soulmate, and I don’t like what I see!  So many addictions have been at play on both parts.  For my part I know that I am addicted to the security that this relationship offers; to the idea of John, my soulmate and to the desire, the hope of one day having a real soul to soul relationship, if I can only hang on long enough!  I want him to change and I have projected a LOT if demand upon him; I want him to make my life better and I have projected a LOT of neediness upon him; I want things to be done my way and I project anger when they are not; I feel helpless, powerless and overwhelmed most of the time and I need him to reassure and support me; I want to avoid the hard stuff, I want to run and hide when things get difficult! 

And now I find myself finally beginning to open up to the responsibility for myself on all levels and I am hugely confronted by the task at hand.  I want to fall back into old patterns of running and hiding.  I hold onto the error of wanting, no needing to please others, especially my mother in the hope that she will finally approve of me; and in this whole process I am sacrificing myself, sacrificing love.  I know this now but the challenge of changing old habits, of letting go of addictions is difficult and for the first time in my life I am beginning to feel some empathy for those who suffer from physical addictions – drugs, alcohol, tobacco, food.  For the first time in my life I am beginning to understand what drives these addictions and why people feel they need to escape from reality. 

We have all been escaping from the reality of our true selves, our soul, for most of our lives.  We have been hiding behind our façade selves, the self we have created in order to survive our environment and hide our pain, the mask we put on in order to make ourselves more presentable, more acceptable to the world.  The trouble is that when we begin to allow ourselves to awaken to this truth, the façade is no longer acceptable to the real self and so begins a process of awakening and it is, at first anyway, a painful process as we begin to allow ourselves to open up to the truth of our reality one little piece at a time.

It feels like I am now constructing this giant jigsaw puzzle and I really have no idea what the pieces look like, but as I find the courage to delve deeper into the truth of my existence, face the damage in my soul and take full responsibility for my soul condition then, bit by bit, God’s Love begins to reveal the hidden pieces of my true self, my soul and a new picture is created.  One based upon love and truth instead of façade, illusion and pretense and these pieces are unlike anything I have seen or experienced before.  And I now find myself in a place where I am unwilling to compromise this process because I am excited by the little bits that are being revealed and the way they now play out in my life and I want to know what the whole picture looks like – I want to know the real me, the me that God created and who She alone sees.  And so I find myself at a crossroads knowing which way I want to go but wondering if I really have the courage to walk a different path, a path supported by God and my Celestial Guides but as yet still at odds with the world in general and my family’s view of how my life should be. 

I have no idea what lies ahead, I can not yet see the big picture for mostly I am still fumbling and stuck on working out this one tiny part that I am currently working on.  I just know that I can not continue in the old patterns and addictions of the past – I want more!  I want to know the real me.  I want to discover what my soul is passionate about, the things that bring me and others joy. I want to live a life of passion and desire in all aspects of my life.  I want to learn how to truly live and laugh and love – every day, not just occasionally but every day. 

Dare I hope that this is possible for me?  Do I really have the courage to confront each and every one of my own addictions and face up to and own the truth of their creation within me? I honestly do not know, but I do know that I have to try and that with God’s help anything is possible, even the transformation of a dark and broken soul. 

My hope, my prayer, is that as I begin to heal my soul and erase the dark corners of my hidden self, my real self, I will begin to grow in love and my soul will begin to shine making it irresistible to the other half of me, my soulmate and that together we will discover our true passions and desires, our true purpose in life, our hidden talents and our uniqueness so that we may serve the world through love and desire and in so doing experience a joy and bliss in every moment that as yet we find difficult to conceive of, yet alone imagine the possibilities of. 

With God anything is possible, even the recreation of a lost and broken soul.

Linda

11.04.2012

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I wrote this poem a while ago but it fits well with what I am currently experiencding so I have included it here

Broken

Lost little pieces of my soul

Fractured,

Fragmented,

No longer whole.

Overwhelmed and confused

Doubting God’s loving plan

Wanting to heal

Not sure if I can.

Who am I?  I no longer know

Trying to piece together

The little broken bits of my soul.

Praying for guidance

For the courage to see

How these little broken bits

Come together to form me.

But the pieces are small

Shattered and scattered

Making no sense at all.

How do I mend my broken soul

When pain and anguish have taken their toll?

Who will guide me?

Whom do I trust?

For God’s Mercy and Love

My soul does lust!

But it seems that God is far away

From this confused, lonely child

Who has lost her way.

Dare I ask for help,

For guidance from above?

Will God hear my plea

And fill my soul with love?

Lost little pieces of my broken soul

Gradually being recovered through faith and trust

And tenderly restored with love and truth.

Through anger, fear and grief I find

The lost little pieces of my broken soul

Coming together to make me whole.

Guided by faith and trust and love

I find God’s Grace and Mercy

Gradually healing my broken soul.

How can I thank You

For Your patience and understanding

For Your soft, gently touch,

For never being demanding?

You patiently wait for me

To have the courage and willingness to see

That I alone can find my way

Through the broken pieces

And the foggy haze

To the truth of my broken soul

Before You can begin to make me whole.

Your love is waiting for each of us

To have the courage to learn to trust

To face the secrets of our youth

And find the willingness to face the truth.

Your love does transform my broken soul

Healing my pain, making me whole.

Linda Munster

23.05.11

Resisting emotions

There are times when I feel myself resisting my emotions, not wanting to go into the fear and deep grief that has taken a hold of my soul for fear of what might be revealed about me. I feel overwhelmed. This entry is taken from my journal on Monday 24th and Thursday 27th January 2011. It hilights the constant struggle that this emotional work can be but also the rewards that are received by way of clear memories and most importantly by God's Love flowing into the soul as an error is lifted. I often find it helpful to write my letters to God with my left hand when I am stuck. It helps me to revert to the hurt little girl quickly and I find it easier to connect to God and my emotions this way.

24.01.11

I’m tired and my body aches. Why do I do this to myself? Why do I punish myself so?

I feel terrible and yet I resist going into the grief that I know is just below the surface. My body, heart and soul are aching. I feel empty and powerless – abandoned and stranded!! I know it is all an illusion and yet I seem powerless to shatter the illusion, and that in itself is also an illusion. I feel alone. I miss my soulmate and wish he was on this path with me. I miss my relationship with God. Right now I have very little faith – I feel empty and shallow and drained. I am resisting and I don’t know why. FEAR! But of what? Why? I know that I can survive painful emotions, terror even and yet there is something stronger inside of me preventing me from trusting God. A need, a huge need to be rescued. A fear that I can’t do this on my own, that God will abandon me too, that I am not worth bothering about. The grief is overwhelming and I find it difficult and painful to breathe. I am afraid. I feel sick. Breathe! Keep breathing!. Breathe! Breathe!

Dear God,

Please help me to understand why I do not want to feel my emotions right now?

Please help me to understand why I do not want to love You fully and why I do not want to love myself?

Please help me to have the courage to see the truth?

Please help me God, please don’t abandon me!

Linda Munster
24.01.11



27.01.11

After the last entry I wrote in my left hand to God to ask Him to help me to understand. Almost immediately the emotions came up and I went to my processing room to work through the emotions that were surfacing. I worked through the emotion for an hour or so but did not get through to the completion of the emotion. I was exhausted. The next morning I woke around 8am from a dream with a start. The dream raised so much unworthiness within me. In the dream I was cooking a lamb in the oven, a whole, live lamb. I woke feeling such guilt, terror and deep, deep remorse that I cried and cried for almost three hours. During this time I was taken through several layers of emotion. I had a deep, deep realization of the error of eating meat, deep guilt and remorse for teaching my children this error, a realization that I always knew it was wrong. This is why I have never been able to participate in the killing of any animal. A realization that the Bible does tell us in Genesis that God never intended for us to eat meat, that She created a world where all of Her creatures lived in absolute harmony. A realization that in my heart and soul I knew this to be true but never had the courage to stand up for what I knew to be true for fear of being ridiculed and condemned. A realization of how much fear I have lived my life in – always feeling out of place, as if I did not belong. And then the emotion took me deeper still to the feeling of abandonment when Ada left and a deep fear that God would abandon me also because I do not deserve Her love. A knowing that Ada was with me through this process but I still have more to feel with this emotion and yet I was exhausted, especially as I had had very little sleep the night before. I allowed myself to rest in God’s loving arms before stepping into the business of the day ahead grateful for God's love and support.