Being Needed

Neediness is a red flag because it speaks to a mind state of self disempowerment and delegation of responsibility for one’s life. That is something I have been training myself to release and no longer accept, enable or am willing to engage with in myself or others.
Being needed is different as it arises from a temporary state of exhaustion or overwhelm. I have learned to check in with my being to ascertain if I have the energy and capability of being supportive before answering another’s need. Equally I check myself when in need of support to honor the other’s agency in saying no to my request. And I make sure to observe the dynamic of being needed and helping to ensure it doesn’t become chronic or lastingly shift the relational dynamic or perception of each other. I am aware that both tempt me to step into old patterns of becoming a ‘helper’ and ‘over-giving’ before feelings of resentment start poisoning the waters.

Being Wanted

Being wanted generally feels good to the abandoned and neglected child I once was. It felt like something good and healing when I was younger and knew less about my inner workings. And for the most part it anesthetized or silenced the old wounds, which I then mistook for healing and goodness. But looking back I can see that it never had a healing effect and was just another tool of avoidance and perpetuation of the status quo. I see how easily being wanted becomes a dependence, a drug, I can hunger for and through which others can manipulate my feelings and wellbeing. And it rarely serves to feed the ego with what it hankers for if one is on a path of liberation, healing, and wholeness.

Being Valued

Being valued would have been hard to detect, understand and know for my younger self. I was too superficial, too conditioned to discern it and its unique qualia (quality of experience). When someone values me, everything they do and say differs from the actions and words of someone who wants or needs me. There is a balanced equality in the relational dynamic, a calm unhurriedness, a warmth of affection, and general openness and willingness to attune to me. Even if power differentials happen, they rarely move to the extremes and are part of a constant shifting and changing flow which doesn’t allow for fixed roles. When someone values me their engagement with me will more often than not take a form that nourishes the soul, there is a greater willingness and ease in giving, and much less of a grasping for my energy and being. I feel more spaciousness in these connections, more ease and grace.

There is an innocent joy in being helpful to someone in need, and I delight in giving of myself. And I no longer do it in a form that is depleting or harmful to myself or the relationship. That is in almost all of my relating, except with my primary care givers where I am still learning to calm my nervous system and uphold my boundaries.

It is nice enough to be wanted and I now look into the unvoiced or unknown motivations hidden in the wanting, the stickiness that would create distortions in the relational flow if left unexamined and unaddressed.

Not much compares to connections of reciprocal value and love, though.
The fabric of these connections feels light and luminous like gossamer and yet when put under strain it is stronger than Tungsten. The fabric of connections built on want or need are more fragile, volatile, and lacking in resilience in comparison. Which is why I prefer being valued and valuing those I connect with. Less may do for a while, at a distance, or until lessons are learned and contracts are fulfilled.

With gratitude for the eternal Guru and her infinite wisdom and guidance in this complex dimension of consciousness evolution.

Photography by Venuskind

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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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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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1) CALCINATION: The process of Calcination is meant to assist in Destroying the Ego’s Attachment to Material things or things outside of the Self. Physically, Calcination is related to exercise and Chemically to Fire, as it burns away at all Material that is undesirable. Psychologically and Spiritually it is the Flames of the Higher Consciousness which will burn away the dross of the restricting habits, beliefs and limitations of the Ego Self.

7) COAGULATION: Coagulation is like the Precipitation of Purified Ferment which arose during the Distillation. The final operation of Coagulation occurs in the 7th or Crown Chakra on the top of your head which effects the Pituitary Gland. It is believed that some sort of Brain Ambrosia is released from the Pineal Gland (phallic shaped gland)and that it combines with the Matter of the Pituitary (vulva shaped gland) to give Birth to your Permanent Body of Light; which is the Immortal Vehicle for your Highest Aspirations and Evolved Aspects of your Mind. The Body of Light retains your Memories and Feelings from your Lifetime on Earth and is able to become one with Soul and Spirit at Death. The Body of Light is similar to the concept of the Astral Body raised and purified through repeated cycles of the entire Process until only the True Essence of the Astral and Mental faculties of the Individual remains. The remaining Being is your Rebirth and that is the part of you which is Immortal and Born from Humanity. This Body of Light is the “Greater or Philosopher’s Stone” of the Alchemists. The achievement of a Permanent state of Coagulation is also referred to as a Return to the Garden of Eden and denotes a Solid Unification with the Divine Mind.

~ via Chaosophia218

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It’s easy to fall for the wiles of the ego that tells us caring for them means to give them „tough love“ and yes, it’s important to assert boundaries to protect ourselves from undue harm and continuous disregard for our feelings and rights. Yet being harsh, self-righteous and insensitive with someone’s feelings and rights in return for equal actions is plain childish behavior we need to leave behind in our process of maturing.

It’s easy to fall into patronizing, denigrating and contemptuous tones and behaviors but true mastery of love demands a different kind of strength. The strength to abstain from saying the things that disempower and reduce the other and to keep ourselves firmly focused on finding solutions that embrace the validity of differing views, realities, feelings and dynamics while creating outcomes that are a win for all involved.

Let us discard beliefs that sugarcoat and reframe unloving actions and words as being acceptable because our motivation was loving and caring. Let’s invest ourselves in lovingly listening, co-operating and co-creating understanding, common ground and solutions which honor and respect everyone – no matter what the circumstances are! Let us learn to be respectful of everyone’s humanity and respond to their behavior from consciousness and love. Because remember, if we deny one, we deny everyone’s human rights.

We are in this together and the fastest way we are getting out of this is: together!

~ 21.08.2014

Photograph: Tokyo, Japan, 1964 by Michael Rougier

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This mean ego move is not unknown to me, I have been doing this and might be in the danger of doing so when triggered, out of ignorance and lack of sensitivity.

I understand the discomfort with labels some might feel with a view to how many people utilize them as a means of setting themselves apart, exotizing the other or rendering the unique human being behind it invisible in any other way.
I get the subtle ways words and labels can have a self-limiting and -isolating effect if we are not mindful. “I AM” is a very powerful self programming sequence that can be useful or create unexpected suffering when chosen unwisely.

Rejecting the use of any labels or self chosen prescriptive of others is an expression of a lack of respect and understanding of another human’s equality and sovereignty. It speaks to me of the person’s lack of freedom to be all of who he truly is due to strict critical and judgmental self-management.
Not using labels, as a shorthand to convey multi-layered concepts, ideas or identities without adequate explanations is showing a lack in communication skills and understanding of its challenges. When you side-step labels to monologize on their content you might be in danger of being disrespectful of another’s time and communication preferences.
If using an appropriate label gives you a feeling of being “less than” our being out of your league and makes you reject and reframe the meaning the labels instead it speaks of old pain of being shamed to me.

I have compassion for internal conflicts and protective patterns but fiercely oppose the externalization that hurts another’s feeling or becomes part of systemic oppression.
Our discomfort and pain are invitations to inquire, to educate ourselves and use the tools of language even if they are lacking. When we follow that invitation and explore we inevitably will be met in our shared humanity and enriched by the diversity of lived and embodied realities and the kaleidoscope of insights it affords those open to receive.

The freedom of some to relabel themselves and their preferences is an act of liberation for all, opening the pathway to understanding our society and freeing ourselves from any label that limits our self expression.

Respecting everyone’s freedom of expression and choice of labels is a small admission fee to our own freedom, don’t you think?

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