Standing Stark: The Willingness to Engage
Chapter Eight
Conflicts on the Path
I was distraught. I could not imagine how I now found myself in such a distressful, heartbreaking situation. While I experienced every other aspect of my life as aligned with spiritual intent and practice, how could it be that I was enduring such terrible sadness and disappointment in this part?
After undergoing exponentially increasing discomfort, the thick tension finally manifested itself in my body as stabbing pain. It continually visited me in the middle of the night when there were no distractions from the day. I recognized that I was being given an insistent message that I preferred not to receive.
I was forced to look past the possibility that things would change to the reality that they would not, and could even get worse. I knew that I had to take an action I never dreamed I would have to take. And for the parties concerned, I needed to do it very soon. I fretted, the question about the right time being on my mind for weeks.
One morning, beleaguered with the need to act and the last vestiges of hope asking me to stay the action, my mind swirling and heart heavy, I seemed pulled to the forest by some unknown power. Walking the short distance to the entrance, I already began to feel a letting go. Once there, each footfall placed meditatively on the earth sent my anguish into the earth to be composted. The sun’s heat coming to me through the tall trees entered my skin, bringing me the sustenance needed, replacing the heaviness. My breath automatically began to support the process. On the inhalation, glowing warmth moved into the cells of my body. On the exhalation, grief vacated.
Then I suddenly had the overwhelming urge to sing. There in the middle of the wilderness with no one but forest dwellers to witness, I began to intone, softly at first, then full voice.
La Illaha Il Allah Hu!
Over and over again, still hiking steadily, I sang the Sufi chant with which I was so familiar.
There is nothing but God! There is no reality but God!
Just as the sun’s radiation replaced the burdens I felt in my body, so the true meaning of the line I had sung so many times before entered the cavity left in my mind and heart where desolation and confusion had dwelled just a short time ago.
Everything is God! Even the difficult trial I was encountering was Divine! As this deep realization sprang from the unconscious depths of my mind, I simultaneously felt my heart center open. Tears, not of despondency, but of joy, coursed down my cheeks. I felt a sense of great peace and strength even in the face of the situation that still existed.
Still basking in the afterglow, I returned home. And with a deeper wisdom informing my thoughts, I immediately took the needed action as gently as I knew how to do.
Cleaning House
A woman once told me about a significant dream she’d had during a time when she was undergoing a forced transition. Upon awakening, still seething with anger, she clearly remembered every detail.
She found herself in a large house with many rooms. It was crawling with workmen. Unbeknownst to her, her home was being remodeled. All manner of things were being dismantled and exposed. Ductwork and carpeting was being replaced. Secret alcoves were being divulged. Wild colors like chartreuse were being splashed on the walls.
She tracked down her mother who happened to be there and said, “What’s going on? I didn’t authorize this! We’re supposed to be partners in this enterprise! Nobody ever tells me anything!”
“Oh, we need to have this done and we have a little money put aside.”
“How much?”
“We have $3.5 million.”
She overheard some workmen chuckling conspiratorially that the work was going to take five times that amount of money.
One of them came up to her and said, “Things would go a lot better if your father would come out and engage with the workers.”
Searching for her father, she found him off in a corner, hiding away from everyone else, reading a newspaper. About that time, she awoke.
Often, when houses show up in dreams it’s a metaphor for the self — the make-up of our life, psyche or body. When she spoke of the meaning pertinent to her, she suggested the same. She recognized her father’s isolation as her own. She also acknowledged a probability that the fear and resentment she habitually held had lent themselves to manifesting a cancer in her body.
She comprehended that the dream was showing her what she needed to release — and to actively engage in her own healing process. Perhaps the large dollar amounts signified the energy and focus she unconsciously thought it would take to create the prescribed alterations in thought and lifestyle patterns.
It’s easy to become overwhelmed at this point, give up and retreat. The constraining arms of the past snatch us back just as we are walking the edge, contemplating freedom. And we succumb to what we knew instead of trusting what we don’t know. We try to go back to sleep. For most of us, there is no real rest, but a state of fitfulness. Ultimately we cannot ignore the message we’ve been given. If we do so, our soul suffocates, finally dying.
Thus, there comes a time when we are knowingly left with the ramifications of the choices we make. While it would be comforting to think that the progressions we undertake will be painless and smooth, any change involves conflict between what was and what will be. Therein lies the opportunity for learning and alignment to an authentic life.
It doesn’t mean that we were intentionally leading a false existence. Mostly we were taught to conform. In conforming, we gave up parts of ourselves, parts that wanted expression. Instead, those aspects found voice in muffled mourning, acted out through a fear of going against the grain, culminating in heaviness of various sorts.
We can gauge the measure of truth in our lives by the lightness of our body, emotions and energy. We need only be aware in any given moment of the state of our being, and be guided. This is what we are asked to do on the spiritual path. We aren’t headed for a continuing chaotic free fall, but an order of Divine nature.
In the progression, we most often dance back to what was and forth to what will be. We certainly face the confliction strongly as we venture inside Teresa’s castle and enter the first couple of Dwelling Places. With each dance step we perhaps allow the foot forward to rest a little bit longer, gaining familiarity and comfort there before submitting to the temporary step backward. We are also called upon to become, if not comfortable, at least tolerant of the conflicts we find in the transition. It’s this willingness that serves our evolution. We then move more easily through the next few rooms of the castle, by now being somewhat knowledgeable of the layout.
But we finally face the ultimate treaty when, in the most interior rooms, we discover what we are, in truth, asking of ourselves — obliteration of the self in order to pass into Unity. Only a few make this great negotiation.
Most of us who get this far hover on the razor’s edge, desiring, not yet surrendering. We’re unable to see the doorway because we are blind to it. It’s difficult to discern through a veil of hesitancy or fear. Who could blame any of us for wobbling on the path at this point? We don’t know for sure that a resurrection does take place and that we do return to a larger life.
For each entrance we cross, whether initially beyond the castle’s exterior walls, or the ensuing rooms within, we will cycle through the Re-membering Process. To gain some ease, we first need to recognize the dynamics. It’s the ongoing interplay of chaos and order, conflict and resolution, moving and resting. With the transition from one phase to another, one room to another, a certain amount of conflict happens, internally or externally, that signals us of the need to clean our house, to open the door to other experiences — and deepening, if we’re discerning. Opportunity comes most often through the chaos that breaks out, the creative spurt, the unsettling of sensibilities. But in the best focus of heart and mind — during Sparking, Separation and Search — we navigate through the chaos, finding what best serves the journey. We then discover an obvious order in Initiation before we enter a more ordered chaos in Re-Entry.
Then we cycle through again, but find the process more comfortable in its familiarity through the same territory, yet different ground. This is the ingrained nature of the path.
Guidance of the Heart
During the large portion of my life when I was heavily weighted in my head, a strange phenomenon would sometimes occur. Periodically I would feel uneasiness in my body, usually in what is known as the Solar Plexus, or diaphragm area. It wasn’t a pain, but some kind of energetic turbulence, even though I wouldn’t have known enough to describe it that way at the time. My mind would note the discomfort, but would be literally clueless to the cause and ignore it. I’d continue engaging in whatever I was doing without knowing that it was that very thing that was generating the response in my body.
The activity usually involved a relationship of some sort where I was unconsciously choosing not to recognize some dynamic that didn’t serve me. Oftentimes, it had to do with an old behavior of mine related to a fear of stating my own needs. I’d let things go along hoping that all would somehow turn itself around and that person would hear my silent requests and comply with them. Needless to say, that didn’t happen and was most detrimental toward one of my highest values — honesty.
At different points, it was as though a part of me had had enough of this playacting. This “honest” part always chose a time when I was relaxed with the person, after a nice dinner or sitting in front of a fire. Suddenly, a true pronouncement of the situation and any misalignment in our relationship would leap out of my mouth, very matter-of-fact, but never hurtful. The person I was with would be as astounded as I was. It was as though an invisible third party was present, and we didn’t know who it was.
The words would hang in the air awaiting scrutiny, mine and the other person’s. This was the impetus for candid conversations, ones we really both desired anyway in order to come clean. What would follow for me was an absolute clarity about being true to myself. It was about a direct comprehension toward what best served me, in order to walk a higher path, and the sometime hard decisions that came as a result.
Life being the learning curve that it is for me, I still revisit old thought forms and behaviors every now and then. But I’m much more astute than I was back then due to some painful lessons. When something is uneasy in my body, my Witness is much more apt to kick in and objectively alert me to any straying from integrity to myself that I may be doing. I’ve learned to listen and act accordingly, even though perhaps dragging my feet like a child told to undertake a disliked chore.
The heart’s wisdom holds intent and recognizes what aligns with it. If we weren’t taught to devalue the resident Mystery that resides within us, the knowing that comes from that place would automatically enrich our minds, informing our decisions. As it is, logic and unhealthy desire often take its place and rationale becomes the heavy, pointing out the direction to take. And how the mind can rationalize when the ego is insistent!
When the heart’s message goes unheard, its connecting circuitry dammed, it naturally seeks another conduit to carry the message. Finding the body and the subtle energy field as cooperative partners, it often launches its communiqué through that way. Most of us, being unused to paying attention, need to school ourselves to be consciously aware in order to receive the dispatch.
It has been through tutoring myself toward awareness of my body and subtle energy field that I have come to be guided best. It’s been a matter of listening to the silent commands of the heart that continually show me the way. How encrusted the internal line of communication has become will determine how cleanly the guidance is presented for any of us. Sometimes if the passageway is too narrow and thorny, the heart must gather momentous strength and ramrod the instruction through the obstructions. This way it overrides the mind’s logic or excuses and catapults us into an action of some sort. This can look like impulse, something not clearly decided — particularly to others. Instead of rashness, in this case it’s actually a deep consideration coming from the still point. If not fully engaged, intent is always hovering nearby awaiting the opportunity to interject what will fulfill it.
The cleaner we are, clearing illusions and limitations generated by the ego self, the more awareness we have of the heart’s intelligence. The gentle prodding of intuition will then be the escort leading us on the evolutionary path.
Even so, followers of intuition may still be met with suspicion by parts of themselves and with scrutiny from others. The internal and external tribes typically stay within the confines of habit and what is familiar in order to perpetuate survival, even if it’s not truly safe or even useful.
My own biggest leaps in consciousness and subsequent richer life have ensued by going against the grain, stepping outside arbitrary learned rules, whether mine or someone else’s. During those times, rather than listening to the analytical, lawful voice, I’ve chosen to adhere to the code of the outlaw, knowing completely that by doing so I will break out of confinement.
The trick, of course, is to be able to recognize when the outlaw is actually a benefactor instead of some trespasser looking to lead me off on the rabbit trail of distraction. This becomes a skill learned over time and through experience toward the signal given. For myself, it’s been a practice of focusing inward and becoming aware of the location of the source of instruction. If an image or internal message comes from a point in my upper right visual field, I know I can trust it. If it comes from some other direction, particularly from the left, I know it’s somehow a detractor. This is my own personal awareness of my internal workings that have proven out over time. It may be different for others, but the knowledge is easily accomplished through honing perception.
The Promise of Light
When most of us begin wading in the watery depths of spiritual consciousness, we have no idea what’s ahead. If we did, we might well jump with lightning speed out of the pool and quickly towel off our feet trying to pretend they hadn’t been wet at all. But the cool sweetness of the initial waters is as seductive as the hormones released when we fall in love that make us crazy, losing any thought of what may come after the honeymoon period is past. Instead, we retain the notion of “happily ever after” until the road becomes uneven and too rocky, and yet still we insist on holding onto the fairy tale for a while longer.
The great cosmic conspiracy ensnaring novice travelers is the promise we think is extended: The journey will only be full of love and light. There is no such pledge. However, we do unknowingly make a covenant. We have light’s promise that its other side shall be exponentially present as well.
Typically, we don’t like to enter into the darkness. We don’t know how vast it is. The outlines aren’t clear. Since we don’t know the form, we can only imagine how monstrous it must be. Through imagination, the demon of darkness can grow huge … as opposed to the little troll it may really be. Rather than taking the chance to check it out, most of us prefer to keep it imprisoned below the landscape. That way it doesn’t escape and get out of control. So, we tread overhead keeping it contained. But every now and then, it reaches through the bars as we pass by and successfully grabs an ankle, thereby proclaiming its presence and demanding our attention. When that happens, we’re usually horrified at the warty, putrid smelling hand it exhibits and desperately try to shake free of its grip. But it only latches on more furiously, now a manacle that stops our progress abruptly. Or does it?
I was raised to be accepting of people. Even in childhood, I can remember an ability to experience the essence of others beyond any persona that was presented. It didn’t mean that I necessarily always liked the behavior, but could appreciate the person behind it. Later, this trait became part of my spiritual practice and my capacity toward compassion seemed to deepen greatly. As with any virtue, if taken to an extreme, it can be detrimental as well. I had to take a look at how acceptance could range into endurance and a negation of myself. Over time, I have come to be more in balance and realize that part of honoring others is also to honor myself. My connections and sense of spiritual community expanded as a result.
Then came what I considered to be a major setback. Someone who was very dear came to participate peripherally in the community that had begun to gather around our common spiritual intent. At first, her hopes for a deeper sense of peace seemed truly present, even though she behaved in overly self-effacing and unhealthy ways. But the fire was too hot. Or the environment felt safe enough to expose previously hidden sides. It appeared to me as though her backsliding was evolving into an avalanche that was going to bury her. In the course, she was projecting blame, especially toward me. A part of her cried out for help while the more vocal part wanted nothing of the sort and railed against it. The behavior was crazymaking. I was not only sad about this situation, but also greatly frustrated.
I began having judging thoughts about her. I’d push them away and return to recognizing what pain she must be experiencing for her to generate such conduct. But the more I chose to ignore my own responses, the more they began to arise. In my mind, unflattering cartoon-like images began to surface in reference to her. I was ashamed to be thinking in this manner. Yet, as her behavior worsened, not only did these thoughts loom in the foreground, but I also took what measures I could to absent myself when she was around. I did make a few attempts to talk with her about what was poisoning our environment. However, these encounters ended rather quickly as I sensed real physical danger present.
Finally, a separation occurred. We were no longer around each other at all, nor did she have any contact with our community. The circle closed, covering what space she’d left. When that happened, I felt incredible relief. The internal tension involved in keeping any thoughts that weren’t “nice” or loving must have relaxed because what had been trapped below came out with a vengeance. I felt revulsion. At a chance encounter, I found that I literally could not look at her. As though if I had done so, I would have gotten physically ill. I was horrified that I was experiencing such emotions. Never in my entire life had such intensity of this sort occurred. And I still tried to stuff the feelings back into whatever hole from which they’d emerged. But having found an escape hatch, this vehemence wasn’t going to be repressed any longer.
I awoke in the middle of the night. I lay there for a while, fully present. The darkness was still and my sleep had been untroubled as far as I knew. But through the window of silence, without any conscious thought, loathing engulfed me. Waves of nausea moved through me. It wasn’t even object-focused. It was as though I was surrounded by a leper colony, the worst suffering of humankind, clawing at me, trying to bring me down. I could feel myself trying to shrink, to skitter away. Silent screams were ricocheting in my head. Suddenly, a message came through. “Be still. Be with it.”
Every instinct was telling me to leap out of bed and turn on the light, but I forced myself to remain stationary. I consciously released the contraction in my energy field, body and mind. And when I did so completely, the heaviness dispersed, the impermeable shield no longer there. Light returned without the use of the traditional bulb.
Years ago I had a professor who said, in much more graphic terms, that in every pile of manure there was a nugget of gold. At the time, it was shocking to me to hear that rather staid-looking woman make such an earthy statement in an academic environment. The phrase stuck with me because it’s true. We need only look for the jewel in even the most difficult situation and allow it to open the way before us.
What does it mean to be a spiritual being? For most of us, it means expressions of kindness, compassion, unconditional love, and complete surrender. It’s also about being present, perhaps in a way not often practiced. In most spiritual traditions, beatific attitudes are emphasized. We’re given the thought that anything else is unacceptable. It we take this as true, then the internal critic will have a field day when we think uncharitable thoughts.
In reality, the brighter the light, the darker the shadow will also be, maybe just stored in the deeper realm of consciousness. The practice of being present is recognition of both aspects inside each of us, and the gradations in between. When we fight against anything, it just looms larger than it needs to be. Understanding what truly dwells in the interior places of all humankind, including ourselves, tends to level the playing field.
I’ve learned that if someone is acting out a heavy emotion and I become triggered, it’s because it also lives in me. Sometimes in feeling like a fraud compassion and humility can take its rightful place.
Missionary Work
This then becomes the profound practice that conflict can bring. It’s the willingness to face the wounded, unacknowledged parts of ourselves that we find through any incongruence we have allowed over time. Indeed, how does the regular appearance of a particular incongruence actually show that a part of us is overly ripe for healing?
A measure of where we are in our own evolution becomes the point where a split takes place. We somehow stand outside our own thoughts or actions and watch, fully aware of the mismatch to where we want to be. Yet, we engage with it anyway. This is the cue that we’re in the awareness phase, the first step to transformation. The old habit will begin to fall away. And reintegration will occur.
We will continue to bump up against others and ourselves when there is misalignment. Even if we’ve been traveling quite some time, any old residue that would block our progress will be presented to us in the needed form in order to be acknowledged and released. In fact, collisions may become even more dramatic just because the investment toward intent is greater … to remove anything that would insult it. And the missionary work of conflict provides the tool for the soul’s learning.
All events described in this book are true. Some of the names have been changed to protect the privacy of the people involved.
I will publish chapters every few days until complete. Find links in the Table of Contents below.
Table of Contents
Chapter Three: The Inner Point
Chapter Four: Intentful Existence
Chapter Five: Connecting With the Cosmos
Chapter Seven: The Space of No Need
Chapter Eight: Conflicts on the Path
Chapter Nine: The Edge of Limitation
Chapter Ten: Asking the Answer
Chapter Eleven: Living With Contrast
Chapter Thirteen: Unconditional Being
Standing Stark: The Willingness to Engage
Copyright 2004 by Carla Woody. All rights reserved. No portion of this book, except for brief review, may be reproduced in any form without written permission of the publisher. Inquiries may be directed to: Kenosis Press, P.O. Box 10441, Prescott, AZ 86304, [email protected].