“Soul work is not a high road. It’s a free fall into an unforgiving darkness that won’t let you go until you find the song that sings you home” – anon.
Many a journey has resonated with this. The intensity in which life can show up and make us question everything we once held as truth can caused so much unease, all we want to do is hide from ourself, to take the mirror of self-reflection and bury it.
We doubt the path, over analysed past events and contemplate the end game. Amidst sorting and sifting through the mind chatter, I’ve come to realise this. None of the small self-details really matter.
What I’m learning is that leaning into this uncomfortable place – without buying into the minds made up story, is where the magic lies.
It takes tremendous courage to show up and do the work, to honour who you are instead of numbing it. It’s from that place, love and self-acceptance of the purest form reveal itself. It’s where unlimited potential and freedom live.
But here’s the thing, everyone’s journey is different. Some people experience massive shifts in their consciousness in short sharp bursts of time, while others experience small increments of light bulb moments over years or even decades.
Regardless of how the process looks for each of us, it’s important to make the distinction about what the spiritual journey is not.
It’s not contortionist yoga poses perfectly captured on ocean shores.
It’s not green juices in trendy glass jars and immaculately coordinated active wear.
It’s not passive aggressive shaming about who has their emotional, physical or spiritual sh*t together on any given day.
It’s not righteously ticking off the indoctrinated ‘norms’, convinced they will bring us fulfilment, (Insert: successful businesses, high flying careers, money, marriage, children, houses, cars, exotic holidays) and which we can naively link to our journey to somehow make it more tangible, and therefore legitimate.
While these external things will never substitute for doing the work, perpetuating this unrealistic idealism masked as spiritual achievement on social media has become somewhat the norm.
Some would propose that social media can play a positive role in connecting and inspiring us. On the flip side it can also allure us into the nirvana fallacy to the extent we spend years benchmarking our life trying to emulate an unrealistic show reel.
Personally, the spiritual path is about grounding myself, it’s meeting my imperfections with compassion and love and recognising that life – if i gracefully surrender to it, presents flow and guidance far beyond what I could dream for myself. It’s about relinquishing ‘the plan’ and trusting ‘the process’.
It’s also about consciously making the decision to connect in. Every. Single. Day. It’s about breathing in my truth, showing up and owning it humbly and without reservation. It’s about exhaling my authenticity, regardless of how messy that can sometimes look.
Hierarchy, comparisons, and putting people on unnecessary pedestals always leads to suffering.
It’s my intention that we don’t allow our own spiritual journey to fall victim to this illusion.