The world’s religions have brought us to where we are, and they have emerged into a beautiful mosaic that is mixing in our globally integrated and interconnected world.
Our mission, our task, requires one incredible challenge that will open the door to everything we must do, and that challenge is openness. We must be open, and flexible and ready to learn something new, to see things in a different way.
We need a new theology, we need a new story, we need new myths and beliefs and stories to tell ourselves about how to go forward, that are different than the ones that have brought us to where we are now.
An abundance of tools have been given to us in the past century that will contribute to our next spiritual journey, including quantum physics, a new awakening to consciousness, and the blending of religious traditions from the East and the West.
Within these areas are beautiful concepts and frameworks that will serve us greatly as we move into the 21st century, and stand on the shoulders of those who have gone before. As we inherit the traditions, the problems, and the world that previous generations have given us, we also inherit the blessings, the gifts, the fruit of our collective evolution and awakening up to this point.
In my book, Becoming Spiritual, I wrote about 10 fundamental shifts we can make spiritually, mentally and emotionally, that will bring us closer to peace and empowerment.
After we make these mental shifts, there is a next level. This is where we take it deeper, and allow ourselves to explore all the ideas that are the logical result of these fundamental shifts.
As we get into the more tangible results of these new beliefs, we will experience resistance on a new level, and this is ok, it’s part of the process.
The spiritual journey is a gentle tug of war between your resistance and acceptance as you stretch yourself and adapt to new ideas. This is the process of growth. This is why you are here.
Energy and Chakras
If everything is energy, and the world is more multi-faceted and complex and marvelous than we knew, then it is time to discover a whole new spiritual and energetic world of ideas, concepts and beings.
We have energy, and there is a framework for understanding the interface of spirit and matter, within our body, and this framework has been mapped a long time ago, it is the system of chakras from the Indian tradition. Anodea Judith and others are helping us integrate western psychology with the wisdom of the chakra system. Judith’s book Eastern Body, Western Mind introduced me to the chakras and in this book she provides an incredible framework for understanding the spirit and energetic side of our bodies.
Myths
Our religions are made up of spiritual stories. Our myths have real life in how they affect our thoughts and emotions, which are made of energy. Our stories matter.
As we build on top of the foundation we’ve created with the 10 shifts in my book, we are able to adopt new myths and stories that serve where we are headed with our beliefs. I’m starting on Myths to Live By, by Joseph Campbell, as I’m seeking to understand better how we can relate to myth in a useful way, especially as we live in modern times and come from a variety of religious traditions.
One myth that will serve us is Plato’s about the soul. James Hillman unpacks this in The Soul’s Code and helps us form a new story about where we were before we came here, and about assistance in the form of a daimon that remembers the intentionality of why we are here, and can assist us in growing into that energetic blueprint that we came here with.
Any negative thoughts or emotions are illusions that are propped up by fear and the ego. But a new the story has the power to free us from that reality and deliver us to a new, empowering perspective on our lives.
Soul and Personality
Gary Zukav explains in The Seat of the Soul how our soul and our personality interact in this life, but one is immortal and the other mortal. Our personality will die with our body, but our soul will live on. Our personality exists to serve the purpose of our soul in living this lifetime. When we align with our soul instead of our ego, we shift with our identity, and then when we accept the integration and purpose of our soul and personality, we find wholeness. Our purpose is to align our personality with our soul. This is the journey of our awakening and it will lead us to authentic power. For more on this listen to my latest podcast episode.
Sacred Soul Contracts
When we carry this further, we find ourselves understanding what Caroline Myss says when she talks about sacred contracts. Our soul makes agreements with itself and other souls before it comes into physical being in this life. There is a whole network of intention and purpose underlying our lives, that we are unaware of to varying degrees, that pull us toward different circumstances or people, depending on what in our soul’s mission remains unhealed.
All of our gripes and complaints about any supposed bad-hand that life has dealt us, is based on an illusion. The truth is the underlying energetic framework of purpose that is made up of sacred contracts between souls that are living out an energetic mission of love and healing.
When you begin to truly awaken spiritually, you see that if everything is spirit and all that truly exists is love, then you see that this physical world is a playground, a classroom for spirit, and all of the challenges and suffering in your life was positioned purposefully for the growth of your soul.
This viewpoint is so challenging to our ego, but as we learn to let go of that finite, materially-focused viewpoint, we release ourselves to see a much larger picture, the spiritual ecosystem of souls and sacred contracts, of divine mission and purpose, and of a new way of being, and of seeing.
Archetypes
Since we are all One, since we are connected, and share the same essence, there is a profound truth embedded in the universality of our experience – we repeat patterns, and those patterns have energy. Caroline Myss and others have explained the role and use of archetypes in understanding our lives. These are patterns that exist in the collective human psyche, and each of us draw from a selection of them, and with these we then live out the stories that shape our lives. You can think of your archetypes as a set of story lines and characters that you feel connected to and that you stay aligned with as you live out your life.
Where Do We Go From Here
The concepts above are all beautiful and useful tools for the journey ahead of us. They may seem foreign and uncomfortable to many of us at first, as they were to me. But as I’ve begun to find the answers I was seeking to the age-old question of how to do life, one truth is abundantly apparent to me: it’s time to be open.
We need to be more open and flexible and teachable and curious than ever before.
We need to be less settled, exclusive, rigid and unyielding; we’ve got to be less stubborn, and willing to lose our sense of superiority.
It’s time for us to acknowledge the goodness and grace offered to us from other traditions. It’s time to come together and find balance in revealing each other’s strengths and weaknesses.
There is a world of spiritual wealth outside of the Bible and it has now become imperative that we open ourselves up to it.
God is still moving. Spirit is still speaking. The word of God is not a finite, limited occurence that stopped being given 2,000 years ago. The spirit of God has continued to move and speak and breathe, in us and through us throughout time.
As we come together in this new global economy, our stubborness, our rigidness, our doctrinal formulas, our exclusivity and our sense of superiority is leading us to mistreat and ultimately destroy each other.
We have become married to politics and economics rather than the values of love and compassion. This unholy union must be broken. The current pattern of religious culture in America must be broken and rebuilt.
In light of all of this, what is a new story that we could tell ourselves about covid19, social distancing and this phenomenon being brought about by the coronavirus epidemic?
What if some greater horror has been averted and prevented by this epidemic? What if this is meant to be the catalyst for a breaking down and rebuilding that reminds us of our common ground, and that exposes both our hypocrisy and our innate goodness?
What if our souls have chosen this? What if this is exactly what we needed?
For a personalized discussion on this, talk to me about my coaching services.
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