Illness, especially one that is connected with a potential for death, has a way of triggering existential fears. Fears as old as our ancestral lineages, fears embedded in every cell of the body, fears arising from a lack of knowing and trust in true nature. One of these fears is fear of death, the fear that still holds the majority of humanity in its stranglehold. Another fear is the fear of mutilation and/or disability. Both fears are worthy challenges to the mind as it faces its extinction or diminishment in them. 

To a mystic or conscious person who has walked a spiritual path to some depth death no longer has a paralyzing or irrationalizing effect as my perception of it has transformed. In my experience death has been illumined by the light of consciousness to reveal its true nature of a liberator and gracious energetic gateway that transports us to the next dimension of this journey. Due to that I do not fear but actually welcome death, whenever it may come. I love life and the experiences I have in this current embodied form but have no desire to resist my Soul’s call to move on. I deeply trust and know that whatever happens is for my benefit, even if that benefit cannot be fathomed initially it has always revealed itself in time.

The challenge I faced was to dance with the fear of disability and mutilation. To observe compassionately how deeply ingrained it is in the body, to listen to the body and discern its voice of wisdom from its voice of fear. To hold the fearful part with love while using knowledge and conscious knowing to entrain trust and surrender to life. And do all that while navigating everyday life, decisions about next steps that are true to my being, and other people’s opinions, mindsets, and energies externally.

A rewarding challenge, which once again left me in awe as to the strength that is available to me when I meet life head on and anchored in present awareness. Something of a milestone as I observed myself interweaving seriousness and clarity with playful awareness of a larger picture to life, which made it all feel lighter and at times even magical.

Towards the end of my journey, along the standardized path doctors prefer, I heard the call arising from my body and knowing to veer back onto a purely Self directed path. Which meant making choices that the doctors would not like or understand. And I felt genuine compassion for them, trying to make it easy on them to accept my choices by underlining that I take full responsibility for my life and choices and free them from any responsibility of their consequences. On the other hand I offered to keep them in the loop with a view to upcoming test results and developments.

And this is where I realized that the path of the Self I am called to walk is a high stake gamble to those who live from a cosmology of separation consciousness and total identification with the body. My choices induce fear in them while they feel empowering and aligned to me. In my cosmology of oneness and centering true nature beyond the body, what I am called to do feels like sidestepping the pull of distortion and inner dissonance to step back into the slip-stream of consciousness and the ease of its harmonious flow.

It is an invitation to understand health as consisting of two seemingly contradictory realities, who are one nonetheless. Like the seeming contraction of Quantum Physics and Newtonian Physics, there are different rules and systems at work in our body and *all* have to be honored where they apply.

My body and intuition have been in alignment with the first recommended treatments, which surprised and intrigued me. And which is why I wholeheartedly embraced these treatments and immersed myself in receptivity to the goodness that came with it. 

Then my body and intuition signaled that we are done walking this path and another is needed to integrate and heal fully. 

The inner guidance system has been leading me to delve into more research on current medical knowledge, insights, and research and concurrently synchronistically lead me towards the path that is mine to walk. I have opened myself to feel as fully as I can, to allow all voices within me to speak and know they will be heard, to take a lot of alone time to contemplate and digest it all, and lastly keep asking my intuition for guidance and clarity.

In hindsight the contours of a subtle lesson begin to take a fascinating form. What I have been guided to do was moving between two dimensions of consciousness on all dimensions of experience (mental, emotional, physical, spiritual) and to know their oneness in the process. Knowing them as one heals any rifts, or resistances, that arise from separation consciousness which lies at the core of dis-ease of the body and loss of wellbeing.

Now I am focused on Self healing, which to me means letting the Self heal all that disrupts the health of the body and bring it back into balance wherever it has been out of balance. Addressing all layers ( trauma, metabolic, genetic) with an energetic, nutritional, lifestyle, and consciousness approach beyond words. 

I know that fasting, be it in the form of intermittent fasting or 3 day water fasts will be part of the next step as is the focus on creating a state of hyper nutrition for the body. Though usually meant in a nutritional sense, I got the nudge that it applies to all layers of experience, which need to be intentionally curated to be extra nurturing and abundant in goodness. This is how my body wants to be supported in healing itself and that is what I shall do to the best of my abilities. 

And of course I will be making sure to be seen and tested by my doctors. Thankfully I have doctors who support this journey and will keep an eye on my health and provide helpful nudges and recommendations where necessary. It is a privilege, and the result of a lot of self work, that I get to be supported on all dimensions of health and healing.

Not many will understand, nor concur with, what I am pointing to in my reflections. As what I am pointing to is hard to verbalize and be understood purely rationally but easy to be known, sensed, and felt. I trust those who are ready or need to will resonate with it and be led inwards towards new insights and clarity on their experiences and perceptions of health.

Life is more complex than our current human knowledge, as expansive as it is, can quite grasp nor explain. We do our best with what we have, and sometimes our knowledge holders forget to be mindful of the not-knowing that parallels each knowledge they have gained. And from that forgetfulness of the gatekeepers of knowledge many of us derive misperceptions of reality, or assume limits to our possibilities that are born of fear and a lack of knowledge and understanding. It is human and understandable, but we no longer need to be beholden to such ignorance. 

When we shine the light of consciousness on current knowledge we allow consciousness to gift us knowing, knowing beyond human horizons and in service of life. There are more ways of knowing existence than our reductionist western conditioning acknowledges or values, nonetheless they are as valuable and trustworthy when used discerningly and applied where they are most useful. Just like a hammer cannot do a screw-drivers work ,nor vice versa, forms of knowledge and knowing have their time and space where they shine or fail.

Keep inquiring into your guidance systems, keep feeding your mind knowledge from all sources, dare to hold contradicting theories and ideas, and let that wise inner voice direct you to what is true to your path.

Let us never cease praising the treasures we are gifted by the great Beloved as we surrender to life.

Blessed be fellow journeyers of the mystical path.

Photography by Unknown

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And yet the internal experience and quality of life and aliveness is very different to what I once experienced at earlier points of this lifetime. Life has dramatically shifted from something to be lived and shaped out there in the experiential or ‘material’ world to something that is wholly internal and energetic. In my experience all of life is ‘internal’ and not reliant on what the mind deems as ‘external’ and all is One, interconnected, interdependent, cocreative.

Even when engaging from the conditioned personality the observer in me knows that I am not just that. Any Identifications with body, personality, and mind have profoundly weakened which allows for a different kind of engagement with life. An engagement liberated from the fetters of attachments to narratives, concepts, opinions, preferences, and what is key: free from enslavement to separation consciousness and duality. Creating a more peaceful flow of experience, and more sustainable presence.

Being less identified with the personality/self liberates me from futile strivings for status, validation, and other vacuous ego fodder. It fades the need to consume, distract, avoid, or assert the will in other ways on external realities that seem unacceptable or inconvenient.
Normalized obsessions with cultural conditioned values (fame, wealth, looks, success, etc.) are transparent in their futility and emptiness while the desires and delights of my soul are illuminated in their value and nourishing quality (community, kindness, cooperation, creative play, love for knowledge and knowing, etc.). Knowing that I am an expression of the Self – unborn, undying, all-encompassing and yet empty – releases any need to prove my/self, be special or different from ‘others’ as they are equally part of the One/Self.

And from these shifts in experience and knowing new questions and quests beg to be explored and lived:

Which role and path is given to this expression of Self?
How do I best balance receptivity with creative participation?
How do I participate in life in a way that turns my knowing and abilities into a service to All That Is?
Which residues of conditioning and misperception are holding me back from harmoniously and joyously flowing with life? And how do I release them?
Which mysteries of existence are waiting to reveal themselves through my experience?

I still experience triggers that regress me into states of forgetfulness and blind identification with the conditioned personality and her narratives about life. Experiencing my/self as struggling to find my way out of these immersive dream states, yet I thankfully remain a lucid dreamer, equanimous in the knowing of the true nature of being and the impermanence of experience.
Years of self work and shifts in consciousness allow for more trust, patience, and compassion in engaging with aspects of trauma and shadow expressing through this body-mind and other body-minds in my experience.

I can see and laugh at the absurdities the conditioned self creates and shadow boxes, while being compassionate and loving of all being and experience. Which in turn cultivates deeper and more encompassing compassion, kindness and understanding for others.

Being a mystic to me means being a student of existence and life, observing the human state with all its psychological dynamics and limitations, living in awe of the mysteries of life, in the joys of moving between consciousness levels, having a playful and creative approach to life, and delighting in the magic unique to embodiment.

Art by Unknown

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These are some of my reflections at the end of this adventure in humaning.

Men of my age and older

Having been surrounded for more than a decade by very aware, caring and spiritual people has upped all my baselines for communicating and relating. And engaging with mainstream ‘normal’ men gained a surreal retro feel thanks to the evolution and growth shared in various communities. I caught myself over and over in surprised and speechless moments of “People are still doing this and not aware enough to see it for what it is and change or grow?”

Habituated to fellow growth-minded people the slow pace of progression and learning in others, coupled with an unadulterated and unapologetic rigidity in holding on to dysfunction felt not only alien but put me off, even if the man had other good qualities.

A history of immersion in psychology, communication sciences and being part of the polyamory community has taught me early on about communication, consideration and respect for another’s needs and feelings. So much so that it has become second nature and my world is primarily populated with people who are eloquent practitioners of it. Therefore the disjointed communication styles, absence of consideration of my needs and feelings, unabashed egocentricity, unconscious mind games, ego tantrums and other manipulative attempts felt jarring and alienating. And I realized these block communicating and relating so much that even the most basic levels of these are repeatedly or permanently unavailable with these men. Though the reasons for said blockages are amalgamated by individual unaddressed patterning and wounding the general dynamic was quite repetitive.

Overall I observed the immensity of emotional and spiritual poverty rampant in men of my age, the ways they try to compensate or flee it (sex, status, money, etc.) and the suffering, fragility and loneliness underneath all their striving or posturing as they have achieved enough of their goals to be confronted with their fecklessness in the face of the hole within they tried to fill with them.
I am saddened by how few of them are courageous and willing enough to face their shadow and integrate it now. Too many messages and conversations had men acknowledge that they probably should address this or that and then giving me rationalizations and excuses why they won’t just now or ever. Of course change and healing is impossible, shouldn’t I know?

With men who are spiritual and have their own self work journey the fault lines lie along similar lines though in a more tempered and less obvious way. They also strive and posture by displaying their spiritual practices, jobs, achievements – the more integrated have a humorous awareness of it when pointed to it while others will react with the same fragility to be found in other men. I cannot help but see a lack of decisive actions and investment in things of value due to the ease of being distracted or too sluggish to leave the (spiritual) comfort zone. A lack of ability to slay the Buddha on the path and progress beyond on the one hand and the inability or unwillingness to marry spirituality with the mundane on the other.

Conditioning is truly strong and finds ways to operate in new ways along old lines, the spiritualized ego is just one of the more visible ways this shows itself. If we do not keep alert, sharpening our awareness and consciousness our human affinity for comfort and consistency will limit our progress and insert unhealthy stagnation and calcification. A valuable reminder to be honored.

Power differentials

The most fascinating experience I made for the first time in this intensity and across all encounters is a dynamic power differential which put me in the stronger position without any intent or effort on my side.
All the disappointments, heartbreaks, and subsequent ongoing self work that emotional unfulfilment has brought into my experience has blossomed and is bearing a magical fruit. Said fruit is twofold as it manifests as the ability to fill my own cup by having a variety of ways and flexibility to fulfill my needs independent of a singular other. Sitting alone and dropping inside already washes away all burdens, worries, and needs in the luminosity of presence and equanimity. Taking full responsibility for my experience has grown and transcended me beyond the strangling grip of trauma and conditioning into a state of compassionate self love that allows me to navigate life with awareness, trust, playfulness and inner strength.
The second manifestation is the curated life I have been slowly building from the inside out, rich in connections and relationships that can nurture me more than *enough* and which evolve and grow steadily and healthily. When filling my cup internally or from Spirit doesn’t quite hit the point there are cherished friends and acquaintances who will do it. And often it takes only a word or sentence here, a hug, moments of shared laughter or commiseration. Even little things are superfoods to my heart and Soul in this web of love that lights up around and in me.

Having worked on my childhood trauma and with my sexual desires and energy has shifted my relationship with sex in ways I haven’t had a chance of being so acutely aware of in the absence of viable sex partners. I realized that the past years had taught me to transform the dense, sharp, burning imminence of sexual desire into other forms of energy in service of my spiritual practice or into a gentle, encompassing, warm, expansive erotic energy that is more akin to a wide flowing river than the intensity of burning fiery sexual need. My urges no longer hijack or control my being, I can feel, sense and take pleasure in them without having to act on them right here and now, frustration, or loss of the energy. There is no enslavement nor opposition to sexual desires, just an allowing, awareness and loving intentional engagement. Which is very different to the way it dominated and drove the decisions and action of the men I encountered, even the spiritual with a few exceptions (true tantric practitioners). This dominating drive was often the reason why connection was impossible as their system had concept of relating and connecting outside of sex. Not only a mental poverty but also a terrible pattern of starving the emotional body.

I enter every encounter as a whole being open to new experiences, cognizant of the goodness and abundance of life, while these men act from mindsets built on scarcity, competition, domination and neediness. A power differential asserts itself as I am less driven than them, moving at the pace of my awareness and intuition, my desires for the encounter being for it to be respectful, kind, and interesting/expansive. While on the other side they are under pressure to fulfill their burning needs and desires for ‘the one,’ sex, admiration, alleviation of loneliness, filling the emptiness in their life, etc. The exception being that spiritual guys have less of a pressure and more of a desire and the best of them meeting me in a similar openness to mine.

This calls for extra mindfulness and compassion in my words and actions in order not to enter into the dysfunctional patterns this power difference might invite and to be kind and caring towards the tender aspects of the man. Gifts always come with new responsibilities to keep relating balanced and fair.

Take away for me

All the work to disempower and dismantle romantic conditioning and be more spacious about relating and loving has changed how I perceive relationships, my visions and needs in relating with an intimate partner or friend, and lastly me. I can smile at my inner romantic when she starts going off creating Hollywood movies in her future projections, and still stay anchored in awareness and act from my higher senses and mind.
No longer a slave to these narratives by blindly following them nor by rebelling against them, I have learned to allow life to write an authentic and healthier narrative into every encounter with potential while practicing detachment from outcomes and surrender to the way life unfolds.

And so here I am in a state of awe of the wholeness this path has gifted me. Grateful for the expansion of my awareness, the learning of skills that help me navigate challenging feelings and pains of the past with tender compassion and firmness in service of the wellbeing of all. Grateful for the lessoning of the selfishness and self absorption of the ego which used to blind me to the needs, wants, desires, and feelings of others in the pursuit of my emotional fulfillment. Thankful for leaning into interdependence, allowing vulnerability, honesty and tenderness to strip me to my essential nature and truths in the face of worthy beloveds, learning and practicing how to keep filling another’s cup while keeping mine full *enough*.

I bow in gratitude for my teachers in the past months for the insights and learning they co-created with me. Grateful for them helping me realize that companionship and friendship are fundamental to me and my vision of an evolutionary and fulfilling relationship and that many fail to meet the basic skills and awareness needed for that starting point, let alone the evolutionary trajectory I see as intrinsic to my life and loving. Grateful for making me realize how unique and special a man has to be to co-create a relationship and life with me that would be worthwhile to surrender my aloneness for. Laying the foundation for the proper appreciation and gratitude for the one that will take this role in times to come. Grateful for making me more committed to my path and consciousness work to avoid the pitfalls of conditioning, rigidity, and stagnation which render us lifeless.
Hoping from the bottom of my heart that our encounter was in some little way enriching and nourishing to them and that their Soul flourishes and delights along the path she choose.

Last but not least I bow in gratitude and awe to Life/Self/Source for the playfulness, love, creativity, care, and challenges they pepper my life experience with. And for the blessed and indomitable knowing that what is mine will never pass me by!

Photography Karen Williams by Paul Innis

The post Online Dating appeared first on Venuskind.

When communicating with people who lack an aligned spiritual background, or who have not delved into it as far, my mind starts translating, explaining, and becoming more detailed in conveying its meaning. Realizing the difference in cosmologies and how these influence the conception and perception of my words and their meaning, and understanding beyond the mind that some of the meaning of my words lies in the invisible which necessitates a listener to have an intuitive or conscious access to the invisible to fully grasp what I am sharing or pointing to.

I catch myself attempting to make that meaning tangible and perceptible for those without access to the non-physical through words, which necessitates more words and a higher level of complexity or communication of interconnected aspects.

Someone called it my ‘branched’ thinking, which amused me at first because that has a different meaning to me, as I conceptualize that as taking an essential or fundamental idea and following it into branches of its meaning and manifestation. Which I do at times but had not in conversations with them.

In my morning reflections today I became aware what they were trying to verbalize by talking about my ‘branched’ thinking. They were pointing to something I had not been mindful of, though I was conscious of in my higher mind: my wish to verbalize my multidimensional perceptions and thoughts.

That was an interesting moment of realizing how the higher mind acts without the ‘human mind’ being aware of it, even if consciousness is utilizing the ‘human mind.’ What I refer to as the higher mind is not located in the brain, and may include what we usually think of as the mind (human mind), yet it exceeds it by accessing the field of consciousness in more subtle or higher layers depending on how you picture it. It is through this aspect that access to the higher realms and dimensions is possible to us. Some people perceive it and conceptualize it as the heart-mind.
A term I intentionally side-step as it subtly affirms to too many their dualistic perception of heart and mind and the rejection of the mind (mental, intellectual), which to me is something I don’t want to feed into. One could argue that ‘higher mind’ might be misperceived as a disregard of the heart but that is easier to address than the other perceptive distortion because it is an effect of mainstream thinking.

Back to my adaptations in communication when speaking with people who are not familiar with relationship dynamics, energetic dynamics, and spiritual cosmologies pointing to the oneness of all that is or the field of consciousness. As my perceptions and reflections of life are based on these knowings they often feel alien, weird, or outright nonsensical to those who perceive life through the lens of mainstream conditionings, which deem the physical and quantifiable the only reality.

Therefore while sharing of myself and my perceptions I am aware of a need to make the invisible and intangibles, which are real aspects of life to me, shine through and become more visible and tangible to the human mind.

It feels like changing languages, and coming up against the limitations of my language skill and vocabulary in the other language, and having to accept my falling short of truly conveying my meaning and releasing the hope for their full understanding. At best 50% or 60% of it is accessible to the open minded but closed bodied/hearted. With people whose intuition is more intact and integrated it can go up to 70% or 75%, which is not too bad.

And how does my being know or guesstimate the percentage of what has been transferred? The feedback is mostly clear and loud in the non-physical, non-linear, and non-verbal. This is also where cues to rephrase, explain, or drop a subject come from even if the other doesn’t communicate their confusion.

Don’t get me wrong I get the same ‘lost in translation’ feedback when communicating with some spiritual people, whenever what I share is from my current growth edge and ‘too far out’ for their cosmology or current grasp. The difference there is a different kind of openness to the unknown, a part of them hearing me and opening to what may lay out of their ken… allowing the meaning to come to them in time, if welcomed.
In a sense a listening happens with with others too, but the part that hears and opens is not as integrated into their waking experience or awareness. Which makes it unclear if that knowing will ever be theirs in this lifetime, depending on their life’s trajectory. It is like a seed that doesn’t fall on fertile welcoming soil, but on a hardened soil in a dry and hot climate, making it a matter of alignment of many factors if the seed will ever get a chance to root and grow.

Becoming aware of my unconscious attempts at and challenges of translating the mystical into the mundane is quite entertaining. On the one hand I cannot help feel a deeper appreciation for the dynamics of communication and its complexities, and on the other hand I cannot stop laughing at this human experience and its countless futile toils.

Making it conscious allows me to stop wasting my energy in attempts which are not going to be fruitful and only end up confounding and mesmerizing another in ways that are not conducive to a meeting of equal beings.

Once again I wonder how subtly my path keeps changing and transforming my expressions and how I live in the meeting point of two worlds. What a gift that I am surrounded with beloveds, who not only understand my mystic’s experience, heart, and mind but also inspire her to travel and explore further.

Who would have thought that a mundane thing like dating could be the source of reaping sweet fruits of insight? But then isn’t all made of consciousness and awaits our attunement and ability to commune with it in playfulness?

What magic this life holds for all…

Art by Robert Cook

The post Lost in Translation appeared first on Venuskind.

I am in a newfound and visceral awe of this archaic and arcane instinctual wisdom, its no nonsense attitude, and the sense of uninterrupted connection with all of life and experiences on this planet it opened up to me. What magical gifts we carry encoded in our genes without ever fully appreciating or hope of knowing them until they choose to open themselves to us?

It is a special kind of magic when this old one deems me deserving of more direct and interactive exchanges. Opening my mind to a dimension of consciousness which was not available to my awareness, though it strongly affected and formed my everyday life since I incarnated into this form. 

This novel opening of the primal is helping me understand the relationships and power differentials between the primal (instinctive, animal), vital (emotional), mental (intellectual, cognitive), and higher mind (consciousness). 

I am aware this is possible only thanks to the higher mind having all mindbody systems focusing for years on dispersing illusions and releasing blockages to oneness and wholeness. There is grace in this as well as a reward for commitment to the path, work done, and surrender to higher consciousness through all the twists and turns of my path.

Using a recent experience I was shown that my primal mind dispelled a sticky enchantment of the vital (emotional), which was vulnerable to it owing to old wounds, said disruption ushering in more clarity of perception and realignment of my being. Allowing me to gain a deeper understanding and appreciation of the primal, its strong medicine/wisdom, and dispel my misperception that what obstructs knowing and alignment with greater mysteries of life lies mostly in the primal. I stand corrected and bow in humble gratitude for the gift of knowing and liberation from distortion.

Art: ‘Safia’ by Marcel van Luit

The post The Primal appeared first on Venuskind.

At my core I hold a hypersensitive, loving, gentle and guileless little girl believing firmly in the goodness of humanity. These very qualities singled me out and attracted many forms of subtle, overt and pathologically cruel abuse and heaped shame on all of these traits beyond anything I could bear. To the hurt and confused younger versions of my self it felt at as if life was teaching me to drop these aspects of self and so I developed a seemingly powerful outer persona that numbed the sensitive in me to a degree my mind could handle, learning and expressing the ways of unlove like a new language I had to gain fluency in, practicing delighting in harshness and derision of others, cultivating a cold unfeeling capacity for ruthlessness and hyper-vigilant distrust.

In my healing journey of reclaiming said little girl a new layer of shame began to be heaped on all the traits and behaviors I adopted in my survival and moving on from the fear-inducing past. As I reclaimed what lay at my beginning, external voices, once again, shamed the parts of me who helped me survive. Another layer of burden and drama to work through thanks to the ‘good girl’ and ‘love and light’ bias I surrounded myself with in this phase of my life. A growing unease and restlessness kept me looking for the next step of my journey because this felt equally unhealthy and unbalanced as the phase of survival did before.

Enter shadow work and mystical studies to blow dualities and more importantly preferences to smithereens in my mind, then in my emotions and now successively in my body. Nothing about this chapter of healing was and is exactly easy or painless, and yet the pain was ‘just’ the pain of having to let go of lies and misperceptions that had endeared themselves to me and to welcome the unknown in their place. 

And the deeper and more visceral pain of facing the accumulated shame, the pain of titrating in and out of it until I could hold more of it and for longer periods without giving in to the habit of fleeing it, read compensatory avoidant behavior. It took some time to make my peace with a reality in which I can feel shame, around certain things, and can be lovable and beloved to myself and others. To not judge shame or only perceive its corrosive effects and to see equally its natural and helpful manifestations and functions. To end dualities held in the depth of my subconscious, non-verbal conditionings and belief systems.

The Unknown – the ultimate fear fed by the orthodoxy of beliefs, the illusion of knowing what I haven’t experienced, researched, explored or deeply contemplated myself and the fear of ego death. Who would have thought that the unknown has always been my best friend, a space of blissfulness veiled by the nonsensical lies of my conditioning?

I like to think of the Unknown as another word for the Field – the Dark Mother of all that is in form, sound, geometry and light. The first step of the One becoming the many and the last in going from the illusion of separation back into oneness. I like to gender the Unknown as a HER: mystical, nurturing, creative, playful, surprising and loving from a non-dual perception and manifesting vantage point. 

When I allowed my mind to explore many a rabbit hole or alternative narrative about reality (which some like to label as conspiracy theory in their varying levels of cognitive dissonance), she sat by my side and watched me get drawn into dark and light narratives, snagging here getting entangled there, struggling to grasp the reality of multidimensional concurrent realities feeling my human captivated by some and their strange effects on my biology. When it got intense she would tap on my shoulder and let me gaze deep into her luminous darkness as she smiled at my slow disentanglement and transformation. 

I owe her my freedom from energy sucking entanglements and the clarity that arose with blinding light from the depth of her darkness and I delight in the laughter we shared about my slowness and blindness to fact that fear of the unknown was what allowed for entanglement and entrapment in limiting narratives about life. 

She taught me to dance through and across narratives, to dip my feet, to swim and dive deep into them without losing my perspective or anchored vantage point of not knowing. To entertain ideas which align or contradict with no attachment but with all the more joy and creative playfulness. To be free from the egoic need for certainty, absolute truisms and setting myself apart from others by virtue of illusions of absolute knowing. 

She reminded me to enjoy this ‘soul playground’ and helped me develop new skills of engaging and interacting with it from spaciousness and with bliss.

I bow to the plentiful gifts of embracing the unknown, of letting the dark mother hold me and inspire me through changes and evolutions, to her gifts of expansion to my consciousness and to her mysteries that shall remain untouched by me in this timeline. 

In gratitude to all that is unfolding as I dance with my fellow travelers across timelines, dimensions, incarnations, narratives, system and cultures with lightness, ease and grace!

Art: “Ms. Universe” by Jessi Jumanji

The post Hello from the Other Side appeared first on Venuskind.

When I look at it closely and feel into my response, I hear the voice of the wounded child that wants to be nurtured and taken care of resonate with my pull to accommodate this narrative. I see the aspect of self that is lazy and wants things handed to it instead of creating and working for them resonate with this. I sense the appeal to my masculine to take its “rightful” position of leadership, the promise of empowerment reverberating in it. The validation of “I know best” that the ego holds, the illusory promise and feel of “right order of things” hailing from millennia of conditioned gender roles and narratives. I see residual and persistent thought forms, emotive responses and beliefs arising from patriarchal romantic conditionings resonate with it.

And so I sit in silence and let the narrative of the leading masculine and surrendered feminine hover in space as my awareness illuminates it to know its nature, level of truthfulness and distortion. Drawing on eclectic spiritual teachings, knowing, insights, sensed and felt experiences with both energies my observations are combined and recombined with these to illumine and distill more of the underlying patterns, energies and archetypal forces at play in this narrative and in the seeding, enforcing and amplification of this new agey subgroup of patriarchal gender narratives.

I sense the overlay and undercurrent of history and the affinity of the ego to recreate the past in its mistaken idea of safety. I recognize the blindness towards the nature and quality of both energy signatures arising from matrix conditioning, incapable of perceiving the reality of the energy while the mind keeps projecting and overlaying it with subconsciously held narratives of masculinity and femininity. I see how entrancing and actively resistant these narratives are to the perception of existence beyond the concepts of the matrix or even imagination beyond the entrenched narratives which are heavily protected by weaponized cognitive dissonances.

From the detachment of a higher vantage point of perception, i.e. beyond self-identification and its limiting factors, this is quite amusing to observe. A highly intelligent and deceptive virus (patriarchy) adept at adapting to and defeating his hosts immune system strategies by making the immune system believe it is part of its defense and serving the wellbeing of the host. It is fascinating and entertaining, I can see why consciousness chooses to play at this in so many variations, layers and dimensions.

From my blended perception, i.e. from a union of human and higher Self perception, I lean towards wanting to engage with more reality and leave the games of egoic illusions, archetypal storylines, wars over layers of the matrix artifice behind me. These games feel exhausting, futile, senseless, destructive, stale and repetitive. I want more, I want different, something new.

I now operate more and more from the knowing of my essential conscious/divine/energetic nature. My practice of making more time for being in that nature and experiencing life from that state is shedding layers upon layers of conditioning, ancestral and karmic burdens of distortions and allows me to clear my eyes, heart and mind to perceive life anew. To dream of bringing into being new and more joyful ways of perceiving, making sense, relating, creating and being on this planet and with all that is.

Rehashing old games of duality, gender oppositions, disempowering relational dynamics, pigeonholing ourselves in ever more fragmented identities, beliefs, opinions and groups is a slow and painful path to walk from where I perceive things. Nonetheless, I respect people’s choices to experience life in that way. We came here to experience life in individual ways which serve and grow our soul’s journey and ultimately the evolution and self-exploration of divine consciousness and I wouldn’t want to stand in the way of that. 

I am all for exploring and playing with power dynamics in life, relating and creating. I don’t mind being in a submissive role or a dominant role. But that is all it can be for me: a role I choose to play with awareness, not who I am. I AM so much more than the narrow definition of the feminine or masculine in the new age mindset or current narrative spin. I AM all, I can embody all traits, roles, expressions and play with all. As can everyone else. Why limit myself to a stale overplayed repertoire when I came here to drink experience to my fill? 

There is so much the new age propagandists don’t seem to understand about the way the feminine and masculine energies work together or what the hieros gamos feels like when embodied. The idea that “one leads and the other follows” is painfully colored by patriarchal dominator thinking and cannot even come close to fathom the beauty of how the union of masculine and feminine expresses, feels, senses and vibrates. There is no leadership in union. Who is there to be lead and who can lead in oneness? What is this foolish nonsense we are being served up if not the regurgitation of old paradigm thinking?

 If you have experienced and felt the union of masculine & feminine within, you will know the numinous nature of the union and how it creates and acts, which defy words and explanations as we lack proper concepts and words to hope to express it even in the vaguest terms. Similar observations can be made in the experience of union between self and higher Self. There is still so much we have to EXPERIENCE for ourselves to truly KNOW about reality. Higher experiences defy the limitations of our current perceptions, thinking, culture, norms, languages and modes of communication.

The invitation I extend to those who are willing to read, listen and reflect upon this is to explore new paths and pioneer novel, playful, expansive explorations beyond the pitiful and limited archetypal narratives humanity has been handing their power over to for millennia. 

Join us in owning our quantum consciousness nature and let us play outside the limiting normativity and prescriptivity that some try to lord over our minds, hearts and bodies. Let us strip off the narratives, identifications and labels that make us susceptible to the allure of their cat’s gold of matrix fueled illusions and let us alchemize real gold of consciousness with Spirit. 

There is so much more to explore, be, learn, create, experience, share, give, receive and become one with. Let us not settle for less than our soul’s and consciousness are capable and hungry for! 

With love and blessings to all ways of dancing the dance of consciousness.

Art: Yin and Yang by Wuukasch

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The sly power of dysfunctional romantic conditioning and the repetitive nature of ego, shadow and subconsciousness is truly fascinating and at times daunting.

At least this time around it wasn’t spent in confusion, delusion or unconsciousness but under the guidance of my Self and in high awareness and observer mode. The idea being that if I do this with full awareness and and full allowing it would be a last experience to close out the pattern and cycle equally. I am so grateful for the humorous way my Self teaches me about the patterns of my small self and the enchanting way I am called home to be loved on and showered with gifts from Spirit once the lessons are learned. 

Every disappointing relationship, betrayal, manipulation, abuse, injustice, denigration or selfish behavioral pattern I have been confronted with has helped me to unlearn the “good girl” programming and to prioritize my relationships with Self and Source before ALL else. 

I am grateful to my teachers, catalysts and mirrors who have led me home to the place which fills my being with love, bliss, wellbeing and balances what needs balance. Please understand, though, if I choose to no longer engage with you or keep you in my experience when you cannot meet me on the levels of relating I prefer. I trust you will find countless others who will avail themselves for the continuation of the ego games we played or who will help you awaken and reach for more or better ways of relating.

I am grateful for the relationships and soul kin who relate with me on dimensions of reciprocity, compassion, generosity, integrity, creativity, ease, bliss, love and most of all on the dimension of Spirit. Without you I could have never survived and thrived through the karmic load of the old cycle. Thank you for being in my life and making me laugh! 

I am ready to leave these experiences, patterns, beliefs, karma, dynamics and people behind me and to welcome more of the balanced and holistically fulfilling relationships into my life which mirror my expanding relationship with Self. Thank you Source for always teaching and loving me through all my experiences.

May we collectively transcend the darkness of the old scripts and rise into the light of loving, equal, sovereign and generous relating!

Photography: Tony Thornburg by Unknown

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When pure awareness shines the light of perception on something it knows it down to the multi-dimensional nature and creative potentiality of consciousness it is made of. It is the power of this kind of perception that awakens flow and transformative potentiality in the observed if it is in a stagnant state. 

This, and only this, level of awareness beyond the mind of the small self creates true change and freedom. Not the awareness of the human mind, not to acknowledgment by the small self but the presence and awareness of the Self and its higher dimensional frequency.

Whenever the small self observes something it re-affirms and recreates the observed from history, collective agreements, conditionings, concepts and ideas embedded in language which perpetuates the dysfunctional patterns of the matrix. Yet when we operate from a union of self and Self, and as the Self observes from a zero-point consciousness the observed is recreated and affirmed in a new form with a new potential for expression.

I immensely enjoy my lessons on the workings and mechanics of consciousness and the technologies of creatively and positively engaging with the quantum field. 

Art: The Bridge by Patrick Tilp

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My heart whispered:

“If someone, whom your conditioning, culture, religion or society has labeled as “less than,” enters your experience pause and expand into full presence. Know viscerally that the differences your mind seems to perceive are mere illusions in the greater context of existence, know the lies and hidden self-aggrandizements embedded in the labels you learned, know the violence of denigration in the labels and narratives handed down to you, perceive and know the being-ness of the other and you shall know awe. 

Observe thoughts or narratives of charity or pity, see their dark and disempowering nature, release them from your mental body and replace them with knowing of sovereignty, compassion and service from the oneness of Self and Source. 

Can you see their presence opening countless doorways of wisdom to hearts and minds willing to be receptive to the wisdom on offer?

Can you see the magnificence of the soul that chose to explore an incarnation that was sure to be met with many obstacles, exclusion, resistance and pain? 

Can you see them being another you?

Can you be at the zero point, anchored in wholeness and oneness, being alert, open, receptive, giving and ready to co-create?

Now that you dropped the baggage of the old paradigm, you are ready for them to teach you a whole lot of new dance moves, you have never known to exist nor been capable of executing in your former mind state.”

Every time I look at this picture I feel a humbling gratitude for the intricate magnificence of life and the consciousness and love embedded in all our experiences. Both patiently waiting for our senses and awareness to awaken to them and delight in their abundant gifts and revel in joy. 

What could be more delightful and majestic than the play of rays of consciousness in innumerable forms, states and embodiments? 

Photography by Unknown

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*

The supramental vision is a global vision. The mind dissects little fragments and opposes them to one another. The overmind connects everything with a single beam, but its beam terminates in a single point, and it sees everything from its own particular point of view; it is unitary and universal either by way of excluding all other perspectives or else by annexing them. The Supramental, or Supermind, sees not only the whole of things and beings within a single vision, connecting all the beams together without opposing anything, but it also sees the point of view of each separate thing, each being, each force; it is an all-encompassing view that does not terminate in a single, central point but in myriads of points.

*

The Supramental is, above all, a power – a stupendous power. It is the direct power of the Spirit in Matter. All consciousness is power, and the higher we ascend, the greater the power, but also the farther away we are from the earth. Thus if we wish to apply our overmental power, say, to the affairs of this world, it must be brought down from one level to another and overcome the determinisms of all the intermediary levels before it can reach the depths, Matter. Finally, there remains only a dulled and weakened overmental reflection, which must then fight against more and more heavy and rebellious determinisms. This is why the spiritualists have never been able to transform life. The Supramental is the supreme Consciousness-Force in the very heart of Matter, without any intermediary. It is the “sun in the darkness” of the Veda, the meeting place of the highest Heights and the deepest Depths. Therefore it can change everything. As the Mother has said, “The true change of consciousness is one that will change the physical conditions in the world and make it into a entirely experience only; it has to go inward in order to change the outward. This aspect of “force” or “power” of consciousness is represented in India by the eternal Mother. Without Consciousness there is no Force, and without Force there is no creation – He and She, two in one, Evolution is new creation.”

*

The supramental consciousness, on the contrary, does not try to know or to decipher what it must do or not do; it is perfectly silent and still, living each second of time spontaneously, unconcerned by the future; then at each second, the exact required knowledge falls like a droplet of light in the silence of the consciousness: “This has to be done, that has to be said, or seen, or understood.”

*

The supramental action does not work wonders with flashes of lightning; it is as quiet as eternity, impelling the world and each thing in the world toward its own perfection through all the masks of imperfection. The true miracle is to do no violence to things, to impel them secretly, almost surreptitiously, toward their own center, so that deep within they may recognize the Face as their own face. There is but one miracle: the instant of recognition that nothing, any longer, is “other.” 

~ Satprem, Sri Aurobindo or the Adventures of Consciousness

Art: The Awakening, 2016, by Mear One

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But what after all, behind appearances, is this seeming mystery? We can see that it is the Consciousness which had lost itself returning again to itself, emerging out of its giant self-forgetfulness, slowly, painfully, as a Life that is, would be sentient, half-sentient, dimly sentient, wholly sentient and finally struggles to be more than sentient, to be again divinely self conscious, free, infinite, immortal. ~ Sri Aurobindo

I often use the word consciousness and in using it I can already sense the ones who will misunderstand it and mistake my sharings to be about their experience of the waking mind. But consciousness lies beyond the physical brain and body-mind, and though accessible with practice, it is not experienced by many. Especially not by those who have internalized and identified with the disregard for everything that is not pure logic or a product of the mental.

In walking our path the expanding of our senses and ascent through higher layers of mind is not easily and correctly tracked or known without context or contrast. It often takes the encounter of contrast and the limitations we feel when sharing what has become normal and accepted to us with someone who listens intently but has not the slightest clue of what we are talking about. I am not talking about people who are intellectually lazy or unimaginative but about intelligent, engaged and open-minded people. And yet they cannot understand or even remotely grasp the realness, form, function and expansive natures of Intuition and aspects of the Overmind. 

Here again intuition will be read as the gut instinct which is not quite what I mean. The gut instinct is a subconscious body-mind response which is informed by previous experiences of this lifetime as well as  ancestral and karmic memories, its fundamental goal is assuring our survival and safety, and this is what most people experience singularly as intuition. Yet I have come to experience another layer or emanation of intuition which is not sourced from the body-mind and whose objectives are based on alignment with higher Self and Source. An intuition that can be accessed in the higher mind/ overmind layers and necessitates a different kind of silence and attunement to receive and know it. This is what I meant by intuition earlier.

As with many things our lower minds will struggle to accept or believe in the existence of the heart mind, higher mind and higher intuition dimensions until we experience and know aspects of mind beyond the mental and physical. To get there takes a disciplined practice of inner vision, self reflection, knowing and silencing the mind and a capacity to receive and be open without judgement or expectation. This takes whatever time our system needs and our souls choose, for some it will be short for others a long journey. 

All progress on our spiritual path is a gift of grace and not a matter of achievement through doing things right or long enough as I was reminded emphatically a while back. There is nothing to feel superior about as we were graced with whatever access and use of our being we have, nor do we need to feel envy over the gifts of others as life unfolds perfectly for our individual soul’s growth and quest.

This year I have been taken further in my learning and being, and was granted the gift of being united with woman whose gifts are more subtle and expansive than mine. Whose being and sharings speak to the path and magic which lie ahead of this journey into divine self consciousness and freedom.

Yet with gifts we also have to accept the “price” they come at as we are changing. I became aware that I take decidedly less pleasure, sustenance and meaning from connecting with someone not on this journey or not advanced enough in it. Such connections though lovely in a lot of other ways I appreciate and value feel like someone drained color, textures and tastes from life. These exchanges lack aliveness and the delicious shared knowing of the magical glitter of consciousness sparkling through all of life. It took me by surprise and saddened me deeply to own and accept this. 

The change I feel internally can be best compared to suddenly realizing that eating apples no longer pleases and nourishes you but to the contrary it makes you feel hungrier and unwell. And necessitates coming to grips with the loss you feel at knowing it still is a beautiful and sweet apple others can fully enjoy, as you did before you changed and lost your ability to metabolize it.

I am surprised that most parts of me take this loss in a stride and that it didn’t incite a woe-is-me-feeling. I guess the past decade of stripping away all that is not true and real to my soul has trained my lower minds to become better at accepting what is than I give them credit for.

And so the journey continues as I choose once again surrendering and opening to the mystery of consciousness.

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“Manifestation can only be satisfying and truly effective when it arises out of the Being state of consciousness”
~ Eckhart Tolle

I have been contemplating for the past couple of days how manifestation techniques change with the expansion of our access of consciousness and self-integration work.

As we progress less and less of our willfulness and physical doing is called for in the earlier stages of manifesting, and in the later stages the mental and physical effort needed is much smaller than when we set out on our journey while new skills and efforts are called for.

And in our progression we are called to exert effort in new ways and skills. We are called to expand in patience, in trust and to cultivate our ability to sustain consistent BEing in our everyday life.
It takes effort to train ourselves to be present and gently pull our minds back from dissociating, catastrophizing or escaping the reality and fullness of the moment in other avoidant ways.
It takes effort to face whatever emotions and sensations arise and to feel and emote them in healthy ways that allow us to BE lighter and hold less obstructions to the flow of life energy through our being.
It takes discipline, gentleness and self love to find and sustain stillness and open-hearted listening to the guidance of consciousness at our core.

It is in this silent communion with Spirit in our higher heart-mind where our most potent manifesting capacity resides. And it is also here where our discernment is crystal clear on how little we truly need to manifest as all we need is already here.

Photography: La Danse by Alyz Photographies

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It is temptingly easy to walk the path of the ego and uphold narratives of victimhood and helplessness while giving away our power by blaming life or others for the pain and challenges we face. Our cultures have conditioned our responses and thinking to fall into these self harming habits and they sure can be overpowering. Yet at some point in our life, evolution, maturing and growth we have to cultivate the ability to check our ego and keep it from lashing out at others and diminishing ourselves with thought patterns of blame/ guilt/ shame and denial of our co-creative responsibility for our lives.

We cannot change our experience, communities and world if we keep going back to the dysfunctionalities we were raised in. We need to learn to cultivate self leadership, to support each other in this shift. Therefore I will not silently accept when I see actions that lack integrity and wisdom play out in harmful ways. With fierce compassion and kindness I will remind you when you have fallen out of alignment and offer you my hand in finding your way back. And I hope you will reciprocate in kind when my darkness gets the better of me.

Let us learn to tell our stories and experiences without blaming, guilting and character assassinating others while keeping our eyes fixed on ourselves and the power we hold to change and create. I know it is hard and challenging but also very empowering and holds the gift of freeing us from the addiction to unconscious perpetuation of the pain we experienced. 

We can choose to transmute our pain into inspiration and become more loving and kind with ourselves and others or we can let it fester into suffering which we (passive) aggressively take out on others.

I do not wish for a council, no external authority to create a corrective in our communities because I trust you and I to work it out without giving away our power and shrinking from our responsibility and accountability for our actions and words. Accountability not only in a larger karmic sense but in a very real everyday life sense.

The conscious/ spiritual/ self work communities have to awaken from the trance of their infatuation with “love and light” to hold everyone accountable and not keep bypassing the wiles of spiritualized egoic patterns. It is a truly lacking facsimile of love that allows the other to remain stuck in blind ego pain. Love doesn’t coddle, it gently reminds us of the grandness and strength at the core of our being, it leads us back home and calls our deeds by their real name: without blame and also without acceptance of our bullshit rationalizations.

We are capable of so much more! 

Please let us not remain in the illusions of our egoic comfort zones but keep waking each other up to deeper truths and higher wisdoms we can access through our hearts and spirits! 

Photography: Embrace #47, 1970 by Eikoh Hosoe

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Fascinating how our healing paths are perfectly individual, giving us lessons and insights that open up doors to resources within us, which later on turn out to be much needed for more challenging lessons and revelations down the road. I see with clarity that I am always cared for on this path of self realization and always, always guided via all kinds of signs, prompts, helpful messages, thoughtful friends giving me much needed wisdom, validation or clarification of vague intuitions.

I have learned that the habits of the mind are harder to change than emotional habits. Even if it may seem to be the other way around on the surface, on a cursory glance or brush with them. 

Emotional habits even if they resort to knee-jerk responses can be eventually managed or even controlled by a disciplined mind. 

Yet who will manage an uncooperative or unhealthy mind?

Consciousness of course. Yet consciousness does not operate with strictness or harshness and often utilizes the mind in engaging with us and this dimension. It also speaks and acts through the heart – but again the feelings and emotions permeating us from consciousness are not the forceful, flooding kind our subconscious creates.

Which makes for a slower pace and more challenges in finding pathways to bring our minds back on track and free them from their bad habits and conditioning.

It has been a relief to find ways of detaching myself or moving out of spaces where my own mind bullied or tortured me. To know that I have the power to rid myself from this experiences of internal oppression has been freeing and a shining tether to wellbeing whenever I lost myself in the artificial realities my thoughts conjured.

My main tools and resources in dealing with repetitive patterns of thinking which would take me into states of stagnation, unhappiness or depression are such that need cultivation and nourishment even in times of ease but also serve me in countless other ways:

Having a strong connection with Source

Being anchored in the felt sense, experience, knowing and feeling of the oneness of all, the love and beauty of existence at my core. To have that inner space of calmness, clarity and love no matter what chaos, storms or darkness might be raging in my mind and emotions is a gift I am grateful for on a daily basis. It is the protector of my sanity, my respite and succor.

Humor – not taking myself and life too seriously

It has taken a couple of years to learn and practice this. Looking for the humor or absurdity in any given situation, no matter how “serious” we are told it is or believe it to be. Allowing myself some ‘comical relief’ is such an important break from my cult conditioning and brings spaciousness to moments! Being serious has often a constricting effect on our mind, body and energy. Humor allows us to breathe deeper, take more space and find our way back to the bigger picture of life and connect with the vast possibilities life holds as it operates outside of the limitations of linear thinking and perception.

Having an actively engaged Healer

Looking back I have always had a part in me that pushed me towards healing and growth. I have consciously amplified this parts voice within me, given it knowledge (book knowledge, education) and knowing (intuition, claires, etc.). And she is the one who engages the mind on its own ground, meaning she reasons artfully with the mind. My inner healer points out irrationalities, logical fallacies, harmful effects, the track record of failure of this line of thinking and while thanking the parts/ thoughts/ mind for their efforts she suggests better and more successful ways of protecting me from disappointment/ rejection/ pain/ shame/ guilt and other feelings it is attempting to avoid. She is strict where she needs to be but otherwise compassionate, playful and inspiring… and she never tires in meeting the parts who stray and bring them back to path of integration and growth.

Create timeouts from thinking and emoting

This might take the form of meditation, yoga, qigong, dance, time in nature or any creativity or expression that gets me in the zone e.g. mantras, cooking (my longtime favorite). Sometimes I just shake the funk out of my body, which appears to be truly stupid to my mind but eventually even my most stuck up aspects give way to laughing and the doorways to ease and grace open up.

Please remember you can be the creator of your experience. You have the power to create new doorways where your mind tells you there are none. Just educate yourself, practice and laugh yourself through the times you stumble and fall.. until you fall less and make a stumble part of your unique and beautiful dance.

May all beings find their golden door to freedom and love!

Photography: The Golden Door by Patrizia Guerresi 

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