You probably think you know yourself. But like most people, chances are you've kept your true identity a secret, not only from others, but also from the one who looks back at you from the mirror.
In order to navigate in the world, we adapt in order to fit in, get along, be liked, gain acceptance, and thus feel good about ourselves. But like the prodigal son or daughter, in our efforts to become the person we think others expect us to be, we've already left "home" and begun our human journey to discover who was the one who did the leaving.
Who was the one who didn't trust in her innate goodness? Who was the one who didn't know he was worthy? Who was the one who deemed she was unlovable? Who was the one who didn't know he was already enough?
Prodigal sons and daughters are we. We spend a lifetime trying to find our way back home to the truth of who we are. Meanwhile, back "home", the truth and our highest good awaits our return.
Sooner or later, life will expose us to ourselves and we'll come to know of what we're truly made. It's often when we're being tested, when our back is up against the wall, when life is pushing us in a direction we thought we didn't want to go, or laying at our doorstep news we didn't want to hear, that we find ourselves having to dig deeper than we ever thought we could and discover something within we didn't know we had.
How little we know about what lies hidden within. Yet our deepest wisdom is always with us, quietly informing us throughout our lives. Often it reveals itself when we're pressed up against an old threshold where, in order to enter into new territory, we must shed what no longer serves and resurrect ourselves anew.
Sometimes, it's not until you think you've run out of courage and have nothing left, that a deeper source of courage will emerge and you'll learn to transform the few remaining drops into a whole new river whose current will propel you forward. Sometimes, it's not until you've been wrestled to the floor and flattened by self-doubt that you'll discover a deeper source of confidence and commitment to call upon.
When the opportunity to look your fear in the face comes along, the inherent tendency is to turn away and protect what we think is being threatened. These moments arrive, often wrapped in difficulties and great challenges that shake us to the core and seemingly dismantle our foundations. How counter intuitive it feels to surrender into the moment rather than flee it. Yet, consider the possibility that surrender is the very remedy these times may require.
Surrender is not a passive state of "I give up", but rather an active state of allowing what already is, to be exactly as it is, without adding any resistance to it. True surrender is a very high state of awareness and requires the ability to be present in the moment, actively choosing to accept what is already so. When we're not fleeing, judging or condemning what is commanding our attention, we can attune ourselves to the deeper wisdom waiting to be discovered.
Everything can be used in some way to serve our highest good, no matter how difficult and challenging our circumstances. Some would scoff at this idea. They will point out that evil and malevolence exist in the world and argue that neither is useful for serving one's highest good.
At the level of appearance, this looks to be true. There is evil in the world. There are those who seek to do harm. Living one's life in fear of either, offers plenty of justification to keep the armor on and the self-made barriers intact. But in doing so, it is we who become imprisoned inside our armor having given our power up to fear, and it is we who ultimately will seek to be liberated from it.
When we seek liberation, we seek to be liberated from the belief systems that keep our minds imprisoned in ways of seeing the world that perpetuate our own suffering. We seek to open the doors of the mind, and set ourselves free. We seek to open our eyes and see beyond the cause and effect world of separation. We ultimately seek to enter into a harmonious state of alignment with what serves our highest good.
All human beings are called to seek their highest good. Not every human being hears the call and not every one who hears the call, answers it. Sometimes, in order to answer the call to your highest good, it will require you to look your fear in the face and discover the truth hidden inside it.
Sometimes, in order to answer the call to your highest good, you'll be asked to do again what you never wanted to do again and you'll do it this time with a different attitude and be transformed in the process. You might be required to return to the scene of the crime and remove your head from the jaws of the lion where you left it when you ran off last time for lack of courage. And in so doing, you'll find your courage.
But always, as the prodigal son or daughter, you'll be called to return home, to align with that which serves your highest good, no matter what the objects in the mirror appear to be. Know that your highest good is using whatever it has to use to get your attention. It is beckoning you to come home.
How are you answering the call to your highest good? What are the challenges you face and what deeper wisdom is being revealed? Please share your experiences and comments in the space below or on my personal blog and website at Rx For The Soul.
May you hear the call and answer. The journey, no matter how many turns in the road, always leads towards home.
Wishing you many blessings on the path.
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