The Phases of the Spiritual Journey

How exciting to see a spiritual movement in Owensboro! 

When I came home in 2009, this movement was non-existent. Evansville offered a small community of like-minded people into which I was welcomed with open arms.  That involvement allowed me to share my spiritual knowledge, practice and wisdom gained while living this path Colorado.  People seemed hungry for the information, eager even to be a part of whatever I had to offer. Yet, as quickly as they flocked to the opportunity, they quickly disappeared into the background again.  Why?

Before answering this question, you need to understand what being on a spiritual journey means. Unlike what many on this path believe or think, the spiritual journey isn’t an external experience.  The spiritual journey isn’t reading spiritual books by Eckhart Tolle, Wayne Dyer or Deepak Chopra; nor is it watching Youtube videos of Abraham Hicks, Tara Brach or Caroline Myss. It isn’t watching Gaia TV or wearing crystals or stones or meditating now and again when convenient.  The spiritual journey isn’t taking a class here or there or doing yoga a couple times a week or visiting your local metaphysical store. Before you throw your amethyst and black tourmaline stones at me, WAIT!  All these things are WONDERFUL and excellent tools used while on the spiritual journey; but please understand this important distinction:  these things do not constitute one being on a spiritual journey.

There’s a Christian song called “Undergoing the Change” that humorously talks about how wearing the WWJD bracelet and a t-shirt professing what one believes, and placing an image of a fish on your car’s bumper doesn’t make one a Christian; instead, it goes on to say while all that stuff is “well and good”, it’s how one lives one’s life that determines whether s/he is “undergoing the change”, meaning practicing and living their Christianity. Not unlike this example, the spiritual journey is indeed a journey within, not a destination. To practice and live in the spiritual journey, one must also undergo the change – meaning undergo deep inner spiritual healing work.

The spiritual journey is a deepening of one’s consciousness of WHO you are and HOW you live the WHO of who you are. It is an inner experience within which you travel to re-connect and re-member your soul essence, buried under the human experience gunk. The spiritual journey clarifies the vibrational difference between who you are as a spiritual being and who you are in the human experience. What determines the difference? The energetic vibration you emit through your thoughts, conditioned and limited beliefs, actions, words, and choices.  Our vibrations radiate either from ego or spirit. You can read Tolle or Chopra, carry every crystal Earth has to offer, and yoga your way through the week, but when you judge others, harbor resentment against those who’ve hurt you, or wallow in complaints or your story of suffering, or hold yourself in guilt, self judgment or arrogance, you are not being on a spiritual journey, nor living a spiritual life.

We are human, and we will make human mistakes.  The difference in this journey is you are CONSCIOUS of them, OWN them, and DO YOUR INNER WORK to shift that vibration. Every thought, word, opinion, attitude, action and behavior emit energy. What you think or say, quietly or verbally to yourself and/or others in complaint, judgment, criticism, hurtfulness, and intent; what you assume about other people with or without facts; and how your egoic pride lands in all of these examples exudes a vibrational energy from one of two sources: your Egoic Operating System (EOS) and/or your Spiritual Operating System (SOS).  The difference between being on a spiritual journey and being and living the spiritual journey is vast; and that gap reflects how shallow or deep we are willing to go into understanding the spiritual truth of who we are.

As to “why” everyone disappeared, people bail upon realizing that going deep within involves getting messy with their human shit –that “baggage” we tote around in the Egoic Operation System that keeps us safe and comfortable in what we believe about who we are. Mucking around in our Egoic crap doesn’t appeal to anyone because it means owning responsibility for their experiences, their current circumstances or how they are showing up. Many prefer the comfort and safety of the pain and suffering of their EOS.  Those practicing an external experience of a “spiritual journey” wallpaper their Egoic Operating System with the façade of “being spiritual”, (i.e., crystals, yoga, spiritual lingo and talk) without really being on the spiritual journey. They talk the spiritual talk, but don’t walk the spiritual walk.

There is no EASY BUTTON for the spiritual journey. The Spiritual Journey is an INSIDE job at a soul and egoic level.  That INSIDE job means going through your stuff: stories, resentments, and limiting beliefs to clear and heal old wounds, past hurts, and sabotaging patterns rooted in egoic, ancestral and karmic energy. This healing opens one's Light channel in order to live in higher vibrational energy. This work means you must be willing to look at your hard-wired truths about yourself, instilled by key figures in your life and your own Egoic-based personal experiences.

But hold on! Our Egoic Operation System doesn’t want to lose its job! Attached to keeping us safe, it DEMANDS control in the human experience, and the spiritual journey of inner healing work threatens the Ego: what we believe about ourselves; the willingness to be open and vulnerable; the idea of asking and needing help, and more importantly; surrendering the stories we’ve come to identify and wrap around ourselves like cozy blankets. Like a caterpillar morphing into a butterfly, breaking through the EOS to the SOS side isn’t easy. And we cannot travel this journey alone. We must be supported by a teacher, mentor or coach who has successfully traveled this thorny path to the other side. We need loving support to guide us safely through the initial phases of Egoic vulnerability as it yells, “Danger, Danger, Will Robinson!” We need someone to hold our hand when our Ego begs us to jump ship or leads us to the nearest exit ramp off the spiritual journey.  The Ego strives for control through self-preservation.

Taking your spiritual journey to the next level and its work takes great courage, trust and faith in yourself, your Spiritual Operating System, your spiritual guides, your spiritual teacher/mentor, and spiritual tribe as you go deep into the inner work. This support lovingly calls BULLSHIT when Ego attempts to throw you off course. Few people are willing to go the distance deep within themselves to clear their sub- and unconscious stuff to become conscious to the spiritual truth of who they are. Egoic fear pushes back against their attempts to recognize their Spiritual Operating System's offer of a higher vibrational way of living consciously and competently in the spiritual journey.  The superficiality of spirituality is an EOS strategy rooted in lower vibrational energy. To walk the spiritual walk requires a Light Chaser who has an inner knowing, a willingness and the courage to walk through to the other side of Darkness. Unconscious living is painful, but I’d choose the spiritual journey through Unconsciousness to become Conscious all over again, because it liberates us from holding ourselves prisoner in the Egoic Cocoon.

Consider talking your spiritual awakening to the next vibrational level and be willing to recognize, reveal and radiate Spiritual Light in this world being and living the spiritual journey!

Carolyn is offering Owensboro's first spiritual development program, 

the Empath and Intuitive Mentoring Program that supports those new to the spiritual path to go deeper on the spiritual journey of conscious practice and living. 

For more information and an application, please contact Carolyn at journeywisdomcoaching@gmail.com.  Program applications due April 27th. First class is May 4th.  

Sans Facebook

After much consideration, I decided to go off Facebook after the first of the year. I love posting pictures of my beagles and kitten, watching and sharing other cute animal videos. I enjoy knowing what other people are up to, significant news and life changes they are experiencing.  

But I don’t care for the negativity, the political and social ignorance, and at times, the inhumanity that shows up on the social media wall. More importantly, I didn’t like how much time I spent on my iPhone watching how others live their lives while I let my own life slip away. In monitoring my screen time the past month or so, I’ve found myself spending HOURS on my phone! (Do you know how much time you are on your phone?  There’s a setting to find out if you’re interested.) I became too involved in other peoples’ lives and less so in my own. Facebook is addictive. If nothing was of interest on my wall, I’d go to strangers’ postings to see what was going on. I felt like the neighbor Alice from the old sitcom Bewitched. Showing my age here, but that means I was being nosy, which Facebook makes easy to do.

Facebook also became much like Linus’s blanket for me – a security crutch to feeling better about myself. That’s what Facebook is really – and a small part of why Mark Zuckerburg created it after being jilted by a girl, and he wanted to feel popular and connected. Oh, and the cash!  It’s a genius program but it comes with pros and cons. I realized I use it as a source of validation, a boost of my self-worth so I feel valued and less alone.  We get attached to how many likes or comments we have on our posts, feeding that Egoic craving for security and "love". Personally, I used Facebook to feel good about myself, and less alone. Rather than validate myself for accomplishments, new hairdos or random clever thoughts, I posted them on Facebook for my online friends to do the task with a like or comment. The reason? For most of my life, I’ve looked to external validation from others  (starting with my dad) to feel good about myself. That’s a whole book’s worth of discussion but essentially, I needed others to make me feel worthy of being on this planet. Many of us are unconscious of this need for external validation. Only after the recent collapse of life as I have known it these past few years, and despite being intellectually aware of this about myself, I’m finally accepting that love and acceptance of who I am starts with me and God within.  God created me, so I must be worthy of existing, right?  Yet I have struggled to accept that truth at a deep emotional and spiritual level. I realize now that I honor God’s love by loving myself through kinder words, self-compassion, gentle thoughts, self-care, self-respect, and putting to use the gifts God gave me as an empath.

Complicating this further, as an empath I tend to be energetically affected at every level of my being by the vibes of other people’s posts – negative or positive.  I cry at the rescue animal videos – my heart breaks, then celebrates in a matter of two minutes. I cringe with angst reading posts in support of a hateful, narcissistic leader, and/or become angry at the lack of empathy for others or the ignorance in opinions.  I emotionally sink reading news of terrorist attacks and the ugly comments by people who are quick to place blame while simultaneously demonstrating stupidity around the horror, loss of life and tragedy of others.

Facebook is one of the many distractions I’ve been clearing. “Stuff” – material clutter that we collect in the name of status (cars, furniture, knick-knacks, clothes, etc.) are also tools for external validation. Mental clutter of defeatist thinking, self-loathing and judgement of myself and of others is also clutter. I am clearing “stuff” that serves no purpose in my life, thus minimizing all distractions so I focus on what my Higher Power calls me to do on this journey – a spiritual healer and support for others. 

Life is a Box of SHI(f)Ts

It has been a while since my last blog post. I haven't felt the call to write. I haven't felt the space to write. The Universe is opening that space, urging me to open my Third Eye, and challenging me in the latest shift of my Life. Read more below.

You never know what Life has planned for you.  It all seems set, the path determined, and then the God comes in like Emeril and goes BAM! And suddenly you’re on a new path, a detour on which to
travel.

My "determined" path was mapped out as follows:  Move to Owensboro to take care of mom, then after a brief stay in Evansville/Newburgh, return to Owensboro to take care dad. Live in Owensboro until that time comes to pass when Dad himself passes to a better Life, and no longer needs me.

Yet a new path has been assigned and I’m in this weird space of uncertainty.  I really hate that space, don’t you?  It means decisions have to be made, and then doubts come up, the ones repressed by what you thought was your path determined, a life defined. 

• Doubts that beg the questions of what, when, where, how.
• Doubts that command I let go and let God do the figuring out of things.
• Doubts that have to be silenced so I may listen, and clearly hear the intuitive guidance of my Highest self.
• Doubts that stir impatience within, the need to know NOW, the need to know the answers so the waves of anxiety created by the tide of uncertainty can calm, ease the breathlessness, the knots in the stomach.

I have felt an uneasiness since summer. I have sensed major changes and a shift making its way since early fall.  And in that knowing, I have felt myself spiraling downward into an eddy of uncertainty and anxiety.  Everything around me, that which I felt confident and certain began imploding into a mass destruction of complacency.  I really should’ve known not to become complacent, because when you do, it is like Emeril’s frying pan over the head – BAM! You aren’t ready for it, even in the knowing and sensing something was coming.

The whacks upside the head came one at a time.  

BAM! - The overwhelming sense of depression, hopelessness, along with the questions of why bother with life.  

BAM! - A realization that I had not been myself lately at work, and was struggling with how to address it.

BAM! - The blindside confirming my realizations, but through the sense of feeling utterly thrown under the bus of just how awful person I had become in my stress-induced life of hopelessness and depression.

BAM! - Believing I couldn’t feel and go any lower, my sole/soul purpose for returning to Owensboro – my father – must move two hours east where he will be safer, and ultimately happier. 

God had a plan and a hand in each and every one of these unexpected mayhem experiences to ensure I return to the purpose driven path I am meant to travel during this life experience of mine.

Now in Owensboro, I am standing in the intersection of “Well Shit” and “Now What?” God is inviting me to revisit my God-given healing and intuitive gift which I uncovered and discovered while in Colorado; this gift I chose to walk away from and shut down six years ago out of fear. I am being asked to open my Third Eye again for others, wider and more willingly than before; to see beyond what is, and to share this gift with others. I’m gulping as I lean into this uncertainty, trusting and knowing God and my spirit guides shall provide clarity and guidance. I forgot how incredibly exasperating, yet humorous a ride these SHIfTs can be. It’s been a while.

I’m buckling my seat belt and hanging on. See ya on the other side.

Excuse The Dust! Spiritual Work in Progress!

Seventeen years ago, my ex-husband and I decided upon a kitchen remodel after buying a new home. Such a project is a major undertaking and disruption to one's life. You scrutinize every inch of the space and surfaces, under the cabinets, in the corners for those things that are inefficient, unproductive to the flow of movement. You see more clearly the scarred and weary wallpaper, and other detractions that blend into the background unnoticed by our everyday point of view. You reevaluate what is working and not working, the effectiveness and ineffectiveness of the use of space, practices, and the overall layout. You discover things outdated and determine what updates need to be made. Next comes the destruction when we tear everything apart, dismantling it so we may create and build anew. The entire process wears on your nerves, but upon its completion, you realize how worth it is truly is.

I have been undergoing a spiritual remodel for the past five years; and 2013 has been the final wrap-up of this process.  While purposeful, the stripping of the old to make room for the new is stressful and exhausting to the Egoic Self. This major task rightfully eliminates any distractions that may impede the remodeling process, ensuring the discipline and perseverance required to see it through to the end. There are days when you do not think it will ever end, and you even wonder why you agreed to take on the task in the first place. Yet, as you move forward through the uncertainty of how it will look in the end, an inner sense, a Knowing Within pushes you on as you lay crumpled on the floor in all your humanness, feeling defeat and anguish. Like the inner drive of a new butterfly, you press on to break free from the cocoon that has served you well for a period of time, but now confines you from expanding your wings even further.

Through this year's process, I made some difficult decisions, despite unpopular opinion, to create more space for this spiritual remodeling project. As I have nurtured this transformation, friends, coworkers, and acquaintances became scarce in my life. The withdrawals are heartbreaking, hurtful even, and a grieving process occurs along with the shifting. People's perceived version of who you are clashes with who you are becoming. Relationships tend to separate as vibrational discordance takes place. People take personally newly-defined boundaries; or experience upset when you do not meet their expectations; or feel rejected when your focus shifts to meeting your own needs of healing rather than attending to their needs. Having been through these spiritual expansions before, these reactions are not uncommon occurrences. To gain anything, space must be created, cleared, for it is the Law of Balance. The Universe has a way of naturally clearing anything that may distract or detract from this spiritual expansion.

We are all One, and we see ourselves in others in many ways, at various levels. During these shifts, people tend to shy away from those undergoing spiritual renovation. A part of themselves sees a part left unaddressed Within, striking an Egoic chord of fear, intimidation, or resistance to the change. I myself have faced difficult mirror reflections in others throughout this past year. The key to spiritual healing and growth is looking those reflections square in the eye. To shy away from it equals Egoic denial.  We are all One, and as such, we all see ourselves in others. Each of us serves as teachers, mirrors for one another. Until we are willing to look at our Truth Within and/or that found in the mirror reflections of others, we cannot gain the insight, understanding, and wisdom guidance for spiritual growth and expansion.

Consciousness is not a one time event, or even a part-time event, but a daily practice of being and living. I have been blessed with many souls serving as my teachers these past five years, and I know many more will appear in the years to come. I give thanks for them all whom I hold in such gratitude and love.  Without them showing up the way they do and have, I cannot learn about myself, my spiritual Truth, nor expand my consciousness within that Truth.

If we are to commit to living this human experience as spiritual beings, we must commit to look deep within ourselves, seeing and admitting the truth about ourselves, about our role in creating our own experiences, and how we relate to others. Without a willingness to do this from an objective place of intuitiveness, healing cannot take place; nor can we evolve into higher consciousness and achieve a greater clarity of our Truth Within.

Look into the mirror reflections of every person in your life. Look for yourself, and accept the invitation to go deeper within. Ignore the Egoic tendency to cover your eyes. Look deeply, and see the truth these soul teachers are inviting you to see.

In doing so, you will be on the path to achieving a higher way of being in the human experience.