New Age of Enlightenment
When we think of enlightenment we often picture a monk or some guru in a temple meditating. A person that’s forgone the material world and has embraced the simplicities of life. This is fine for those that embark on this journey, but for those that do not wish to forego life’s pleasures the path to enlightenment still exists. The primary purpose of limiting one’s material world is to be left with nothing to distract oneself from finding themselves. It also helps remove temptations and connections that we believe we must have in order to live happily.
Instead, the old adage that one must lose themself to then find themself plays a much more significant role in the journey to enlightenment. The people who live in temples and attempt to release their connection to the material are working on, or have accomplished, letting go of the desire and connection to material gain. There are many layers that can distract us or prevent us from finding ourselves based on how we view the material. Maybe you’re attached to material wealth, because you believe it gives you status, comfort, or safety. By disconnecting from the material, one is offered a chance to feel and alchemize the loss. If someone goes up into the mountains and loses everything, but still maintains their beliefs about material desires, then they haven’t changed much at all and will come back down the mountain to the same world they left. The loss, the change in energy, the change in scenery forces a person to look at themselves and take stock of what they believe to be true. They’re losing a part of themself they believed mattered greatly in order to learn what they truly value.
“The best way to find yourself is to lose yourself in the service of others.” - Mahatma Gandhi
This isn’t to say that material wealth and prosperity is good or bad - remember that dualities and black and white thinking can lead to more divisiveness and blockages in healing. We can have material wealth and abundance. If anything, that’s our birthright. Abundance is there for us all to have and appreciate. What blocks us from abundance are the parts of ourselves that limit the belief that we can have whatever we want; which is what we must lose in order to find what it is we truly desire in life.
The same goes for answering the question “Who am I?” Deep beneath the depths of our patterning, defense mechanisms, and trauma exists who we truly are. Today, I had the pleasure of once again seeing the “me” that’s beneath the mask. The story of Lindsey. The person that came to this world and has lived experiences that have shaped me. Many would call this my ego, my story, the part of me that’s shaped by my lineage and upbringing. We often confuse the ego for another tool that exists as a part of our existence. I call these our masks.
I’m sure many have heard of “masking” or masks that we wear in public to conform to social settings. Many of you might have heard the term used for people that are autistic. They learn to mask in order to fit in to social paradigms that they don’t fully understand, but have been trained to manage and navigate those situations. These masks actually exist within all of us and operate on very deep levels. We often confuse some of the masks, or culminations of beliefs and defense mechanisms, as the ego itself. We blame the ego for bringing us down from our high-vibe state. We look at the ego as this part of ourselves to blame for continuous negative thought patterns. But in reality, the ego is us. The ego is who we are as a collection of experiences and desires. The masks are there to keep us safe and protect the ego. The soul is the greater part of us that exists within; and to be frank, we are immense.
*Honestly, words are just labels, and I’m trying to simplify what I’ve experienced into simple terms that we already have understandings for. If what I say doesn’t fit, then don’t use it and move on.*
By immense, I mean limitless. By limitless, I mean, truly, we are The All that exists. We hold multitudes within us. Pieces of ourselves that we can lean on to create, understand, or even learn from. I’m not even talking about the greater awareness that is the collective consciousness we are all a part of. I simply mean that within us exists our own universe. This is what people mean when they say we are the microcosm to the macrocosm. A universe exists within each of us, and we also exist within a universe. This is how we are each individually God and creators of our own realities. As within, so without. We build and construct our own understanding of the world we live in and project it outwards. It’s all based on our perceptions and beliefs.
When we can alchemize away a lot of the learned behaviors and reactions to things that trigger us, we can focus on intentionally creating what it is we want in life. To reiterate, in order to find ourselves, we must lose ourselves first. We must alchemize away all the parts of us that we think we are in order to find who it is we truly are. All parts of us. They say time does not exist. It is a construct used in this reality to make sense and flow between experiences. Otherwise, we would experience this world like a dream. There is no relativity and we exist from one experience to the next without structure. Time gives us structure to learn much more about ourselves. We have a past and a future that offers us a unique perspective on how we would like to exist and what we can prioritize.
It’s often said that “I didn’t have enough time,” or that “time went by so fast.” But that’s because we are always living in the now moment. Living moment to moment. The last 60 years of your life seemed to have gone by so fast, because you’re living now. Always now. The perception of the past is what gives us a sense of movement and advancement, but because we always live in the now moment the past feels so close, like it was just yesterday. We look up and can’t believe time has gone by so quickly. But when you were living in those difficult times it seemed to have drug on forever.
But I digress. What I really want to emphasis is that by letting go of what we perceive to be who we are by alchemizing away the hurts and the old beliefs, we are capable of truly existing as our authentic selves. The possibilities of what we create are limitless, because we are limitless beings. What I also find very important and valuable is the pain and the journey of healing that pain. There is so much learning and growth that we can all bring to one another. There is SO much inherent value in every life lived, because they’re all unique in their own experiences. I have no idea what it’s like to grow up in Brooklyn during the 1960’s, or to live during the AIDS pandemic, or being straight. I have no concept of what it means to grow up in Indonesia, Thailand, Russia or any country other than my own. All of your experiences matter. All of them hold value. Your pain holds value and many people would love to understand and learn from you. I know I would.
You don’t have to carry your pain like a badge of honor. Retire it, and share it with the world. Tell us how you escaped poverty. Tell us how you overcame addiction. Tell us how you grew from the pain you experienced from your parents. Tell us what there is to know about surviving something that you never thought you could survive. This way, we all grow. This way, we can finally understand one another. We can come together instead of dividing ourselves up. We can grow together and help one another along the way. That is the service to others that I believe Gandhi was talking about.
It’s important to grow, but for some it’s not. There is no need to force yourself to do something that you don’t want to do, but there are benefits. By living authentically we can access who we truly are to fulfill our greatest desires. By leaving the pain in the past we can create from a clean slate. Maybe, now, you have the capabilities to create those childhood dreams that have long since been forgotten. I have always deeply desired to be loved fully, for who I am, by a special person. I know that after all this work that I’ve done, it’s finally the divine time.