Healing Rites of Passage

It is slowly all at once, Life after the Dark.

Like the sun, rising on an overcast day, is imperceptible until you suddenly realize it has indeed cleared the horizon and your world once again illuminated…even if through a dull ceiling of clouds.

Yeah, that’s about it.

When I resided in the darkness within the darkness, I had no faith left. That was the scary part. If you are interested, my dark night https://willowsongmedicine.wordpress.com/2019/02/19/dark-night-of-the-soul/

Just as the Light has returned so has my faith, but it is not the same.

It has morphed and transformed into something more solid than before (and it was pretty solid before.) I find myself taking inventory of things “I still believe” and things that no longer seem valid with a whole bunch of things in between.

The first thing to show up in the newly risen sun is that the “Universe is always conspiring on our behalf.” What that meant to me before was that the Universe always took care of me. At the last second everything would fall into place and I could see clearly how I was loved and protected because things ‘worked out’. I had believed that so much that I rarely, if ever, worried about anything. Just trusting that the Universe would take care of it as long as I did everything right.

I no longer see it that way.

Now I understand it as “the Universe is always conspiring on behalf of our development“. ‘Development’ might mean a huge loss, or challenge, or disappointment just as easily as it might mean a crisis averted, amazing opportunity or wish fulfilled. It is my development that is the focal point, not the desired outcome.

“The Universe is always conspiring on behalf of our development”, that doesn’t mean it will conspire for things to work out like you think they should.

The Universe is neutral. It is neither positive nor negative. It just is. It has it’s cogs and wheels and churns out experiences based on it’s Algorithm. Efforts to raise your vibe, use positive thinking, repeat affirmations, etc. in order to bring about desired results are actually efforts to manipulate. You cannot manipulate the Universe. There is an underlying driving belief that ‘if I do it right, then everything will turn out in ways I like.” The Universe cannot be manipulated.

The Universe fills what is empty and empties what is full. This is something I knew before, but it was way back in my consciousness. I believe now that this needs to be brought to my forefront.

There is simply the process of evolution which requires ebb and flow, receiving and giving, highs and lows, back and forth…empty and fill. It has nothing to do with us at all. Things will be emptied even if we maintain the highest of vibes. Things will be filled even if we maintain low vibes. This is part of the formula of the Universe.

There is evidence of this everywhere. The sun comes up and goes down, as the moon goes down and comes up. This is not affected by anything anyone on Earth does or does not do. Does it make sense that this would be unique to the sun and moon? Doesn’t it make more sense that we would see this pattern in every aspect of life?

There is no good or bad. It’s easy to label rewards as ‘good’ and consequences as ‘bad’, but that is inaccurate. Who is to say what is bad? Yes, there are things that bring pain and most would agree those are bad, but what if something good comes of it? Does that change the value at all? How do you adjust accordingly?

If we toss the labels of good and bad then we are forced to look beyond feels good = good, feels bad = bad, to find a new way to define our experiences. If something doesn’t work out the way we intend, the way we dreamed, the way we hoped, but it works out in a different way that brings different rewards is that good because it brought rewards or is it bad because it didn’t bring what was wanted?

The Universal Laws for me now also have a different tone.

• 

I still believe and understand that we are all one. Like the fingers on my hand are part of the One that is me, so too am I (and you) a part of the One that is the Universe. There have been no alterations to this one for me.

Everything is/has a vibration. Each one of us vibrates at our own special frequency. From that I have never wavered. Every thing has a vibration. Every thing. Not just people, plants and animals, but food, thoughts, words, choices and relationships as well.

When something feels comfortable/uncomfortable it is resonating with our vibration. “Comfortable” is not the same as “familiar”. When something feels comfortable it may not be familiar, but it intuitively feels right. We experience excitement, anticipation and maybe a little bit of nervousness. When something feels uncomfortable it is stretching us outside our comfort zone and challenging us. It is unfamiliar but still intuitively feels right…scary maybe, but right. When something brings discomfort it does not resonate with our vibration. When something brings discomfort it feels intuitively wrong, for reasons we may not even be able to verbalize.

Raising our vibration does not mean we magically attract/manifest all the things we want, but I think it does magically bring us the things we need. The things we want, may not be of high vibration. Or the things we want may be contraindicated to what we need. Or this thing we want now and this thing we want long term may be mutually exclusive. Also, things that are of higher vibration than we, can feel quite uncomfortable. So, how can we ever be sure that ‘this’, whatever ‘this’ is, isn’t actually high vibe after all? What we need may not feel good to us in the moment, but feel very good as events unfold. Raising our vibe does not mean that we will never be uncomfortable again; indeed it may mean that we will experience great uncomfortableness at times.

But raising our vibe is important in creating our experience of whatever comes our way. What happens, happens but how we experience that happening depends on our vibration and our vibration depends on our beliefs. So while raising our vibration does not mean our bank account magically rises, it does mean that we will feel more abundant with the amount that is currently in there.

I believe even more strongly after the Dark Night that it is not what happens to us but who we become through those experiences that matters. The events of our lives can be influenced by a myriad of variables.

They can be pre-destined, by us; orchestrated core events intended to give us the experiences we planned to explore before incarnated. They can be created by us in the moment by our choices and vibrations; a result of our thoughts, beliefs and actions that draw to us vibrations of the same frequency. They can be the result of someone else’s pre-destiny or choices and vibrations. Or possibly something called coincidence (which I don’t believe in.) Or something else entirely, I can’t even fathom right now.

And lastly, maybe even most importantly, I believe ‘reality’ is not validation of our Truth. I used to look at what was in my current reality as a reflection of my truth. After all, how many times have you heard ‘your outer world is a reflection of your inner world’? I believed that with my whole heart and so I would put great energy into adjusting my inner world according to what I was experiencing in my outer reality.

But based on the previous belief I outlined, that just isn’t so. This required a lot of recalibration on my part. I didn’t realize how deeply this belief went. That if I do all the right things, I will be rewarded. That things will come out right…and I had a very clear picture of what ‘right’ looked like and what it didn’t.

This caused me great suffering. Then I realized this was very much the same suffering I experienced when I believed in an all-powerful chess-playing God. The God that had a Plan, a Reason, a Will. I tried to appease Him, just as I had been trying to appease the Universe. It is all just manipulation. It has no merit in the System that We As The Creator have developed.

What does have merit is maintaining your Light when all about you is Dark.

Yes, that is the basis of my Faith now. The belief that no matter what comes to me, I maintain my Light. The belief that no matter what leaves me, I maintain my Light. It is not to bring to me all sorts of manifestations. Not to bring to me good jobs, wealth, health and opportunities. No. But to bring me Peace. Peace that is not dependent on circumstances. Peace that is not dependent on relationships. Peace that is not dependent on any thing of this world.

Peace that is reliant on only my Self.

That Peace will never again be contingent upon my external circumstances, but rather my internal experience to those circumstances, only. Only. ONLY. ONLY.

Therein lies power. The power to overcome any Dark Night of the Soul. Any, trying circumstance. In the movie Miracle On 34th Street, Doris Walker says, “Faith is believing in things when common sense tells you not to.” Never have these words had more meaning for me than they do now. Common sense is an earthly attempt to navigate earthly events. Faith is an unearthly attempt to navigate earthly events.

There is Light after the Dark, my friends.

And like my friend, Glenda the Good Witch says, “You’ve always had the power my dear, you just had to learn it for yourself.” I did…and I’m sure I will again.

I love you.

~Jade