Individuation, Rejecting Our Prior Paths, and Chasing Purity

Notes from the open road...

I had this great uncle who was a good man, from the “greatest generation”. Quiet, simple, hardworking, esteemed in the community.

He was a State Supreme Court justice. And at the end of his life, he died after collapsing in his shower where he stayed for two days before someone found him and then died in hospital a day later.

It was then that I realized it just doesn’t matter.

It doesn't matter who you think you are, how good you look, your money, your accomplishments.

In the end you will be a hunk of flesh that you lose control over and everything you thought you were will dissolve and disappear in a flash.

You will cease to breath and fluids will seep from your orifices.

And yet, people try to control almost everything that doesn’t matter.

I know so many “spiritual” people obsessed with every little detail.

A very masculine orientation.

Seemingly about being precise and attentive, but that is just the mask for a different form of "spiritualized" control.

Spiritual practice that is about purity as opposed to true integrity.

The integrity that it is all us on some level and that in the end none of it matters and it all matters, but we have a very limited amount of time here as this person.

Spiritual integrity as it’s presented in many circles is actually just another form of puritanical perfectionism, anorexia and restriction under the illusion of righteous goodness.

What I find so interesting about the archetype of people who carry this is that they are always talking about oneness yet doing so with this air of superiority.

I find it so amusing. And then I imagine them taking a shit.

Different souls have different missions.

It is possible that one soul’s mission is to never miss a detail as it may be their path to practice that skill in this lifetime.

It is true each soul path is to cultivate different things.

Some souls are here to focus on bigger things where mundane minutia does not matter.

And some souls are here to impact the space around them in a simple way.

Sometimes these people project their shoulds onto others because they don't have the range to appreciate the beauty of Chaos.

For instance. If your soul decides when you die and that has already been predetermined then why would you obsess over everything you eat or drink or do?

Why would you not just enjoy yourself? What part of you is judging?

It is one thing to be guided. It’s another thing to think your way into this box through beliefs.

"I stopped talking to you because you believe X and I can't be associated with that" is not exactly espousing oneness.

If you want to practice oneness it is taking it all in and understanding that ALL of it is a part in you.

But I want to call out this “oneness” piece, because I see it misused constantly.

We are in the realm of duality and part of the journey is relationship, friction, separateness, individuating, creating, dissolving and reforming.

You will return to oneness one day, one way or another.

Oneness is not a goal you have to hold onto.

In practice oneness is absorption and full alchemy, not of judgement.

But we are also here for the lessons of Sovereignty and Discernment which fundamentally is a practice in separateness on the way to wholeness because wholeness requires full ownership.

One thing I’m so proud of myself on my journey is that I’ve never had to outright reject my past or the people who have influenced me.

I’ve taken space or moved on from things of course, but there is no bitterness in my heart. I have not always done things cleanly either, but what is ultimately important is holding gratitude and love for all the players on the path.

There is no superiority of where I sit now to the person I was then or towards bosses, teachers, partners or caregivers. Why?

Because I have come to love myself so deeply that I don’t have to hate who I was that wanted, needed, chose or enjoyed these people along the way.

I used to drink and do all kinds of drugs. I am fully sober now including plants (except coffee).

I am so far from who I was. And i remember her.

The girl who couldn’t imagine not pouring that glass of Sauv Blanc at 5pm.

She could not conceive of the woman I’ve become.

I could judge that one. I could blame plenty of people for all kinds of things I experienced in my wild days.

But mostly I just love the shit out of her.

When we have big ego deaths, sometimes they feel like we were under a spell.

I have had this experience. But it’s not a spell someone put me under that I broke out of.

It was the spell of my own illusion, my own ego.

That is the beauty of a glacial awakening. It feels like poof! What? How did I not SEE this???

But when you look deeper, it is always a shadow part that was driving and making all the decisions.

Their windshield was the lens of what they wanted but didn't have access to.

Everything was centered around that part's hunger.

It took me a minute to see it all, and I did take space from connections, but the deep love in my heart remains.

The gratitude remains. The teachings remain. The relationship simply changed.

I reflect often how it probably occurs to them as a deep and painful betrayal.

I’ve certainly had my fair share of that, but it was simply what was needed for me to expand and really feel myself.

I know what it feels like to be on that side of the fence. It hurts. Even when we don't take it personally.

I believe strongly in individuation. It’s why I mother the way I do.

I really do not put any agenda or expectations on my child.

I teach her so that she can find her way and know herself.

Why is it that so many people abandon themselves on the way to knowing themselves?

Because I’m not sure there is actually any other way.

One of the lessons in this realm is discernment. One of the most powerful (left hand path) ways to find yourself in my experience is to lose yourself.

I lost myself to drugs, alcohol, so many men I can’t count.

I lost myself in jobs and nightclubs, in foreign cities and in beds with foreign men.

I lost myself chasing a feeling I was desperately looking for that was buried inside myself.

And one day, I unknowingly stumbled upon a door that I didn’t know existed and in it was a small tiny burst of gooey light and I was home.

You dear reader were not around when I was broke, had no job, no purpose or direction, living in a foreign country, waking up crying everyday praying for some direction or death.

I would have taken either. I know what it means to be lost and alone in the dark.

I have had more than one dark night of the soul. It's why I am such a skilled guide of these realms.

I stood on the edge of a cliff at 15 in the same place. Show me or let me die.

It takes so much to open in that location.

To let go of the trapeze and say ok G-d show me.

I don’t care what picture or name you project onto G-d.

If you haven’t ever lept into G-d‘s proverbial arms like a long lost lover I highly recommend it.

I recommend you not wait until you need something or you are taken to your knees by force.

Every day open yourself to that kind of connection.

If I had not gotten lost, I would never have found my way home.

I have cultivated a deep love of the dark and the journey and winding paths and crawling on the floor smelling my way.

I also love to turn the engine on and fly. I have built countless lives and worlds and torn them down.

And I do not regret or think less of one of them or the beautiful souls who played their parts for my benefit in my story.

You don’t need to control it all. Do not mistake control for creation.

It doesn’t have to be the ideal thing your mind imagines for it to be perfect and beautiful.

You will never cease to be human, until you are dead.

So stop fucking trying so hard to hide your humanity under a false guise of superiority.

One day this version of you will just be a dead body in a box.

Like every other human who has ever lived no matter the life they lived.

Just live.

Open.

Love.

Forgive.