Death, the Void and Rebirth (one more time)

October 14, 2008 at 10:35 pm (Uncategorized)
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So despite my desire to write something a little more fun and light, I keep being compelled to address this journey of change, transformation, rebirth. More specifically, the passage from one form into another, this concept of dying to be reborn. It’s been a huge theme with my clients and friends recently. And, inevitably, within my own psyche.

A friend of mine read the previous post about the Shawshank Redemption and asked why anyone would ever bother to go through such a harrowing experience. In all honesty, I don’t think we always have that much of a choice. Many people are finding themselves in situations where life as they know it is crumbling around them.  Perhaps it’s a tragic loss, getting laid off, a divorce, investments being wiped out or homes foreclosed on. It can be subtler, like waking up one day and not knowing who you are anymore, or simply feeling enveloped in depression and an overwhelming sense of meaninglessness. Whatever the catalyst, many people are faced with the death of life as it has always been and completely at a loss at what else could be.

Welcome to the void. Yes, it is a vast emptiness… but it is also a rich and fertile ground for new beginnings. It is the feminine principle of receptivity, of stillness, of the unknown. We in the West really struggle with this. In a culture that values productivity, efficiency and profit we tend to experience the void as something being INCREDIBLY wrong. Often, that begins to turn into “something is incredibly wrong with ME.” We judge ourselves as lazy or impotent, we believe we are falling behind or have proven to be utter failures. Nothing we try to DO in the void works. We keep grasping at the next promise. We keep strategizing. We scour the internet or make dozens of calls all to fruitless ends just because it makes us feel better that we’ve done SOMETHING, for god’s sake. And we hang on for dear life to that one last remote possibility—it MUST work—because otherwise, we are truly lost.

And then that last spark of hope is extinguished. We are truly in crisis now. Thoughts of giving up pervade our minds. People confess they entertain thoughts of suicide (isn’t there a “reset” button on my life?)—though they’re fairly certain they would never act on it. Yet despite how hopeless and helpless it all feels, it is here where a real opening actually occurs. At this point, we are usually willing to try ANYTHING. We are open to new avenues that were unthinkable in the old life. We finally have surrendered our insistence that we know how to do this or what it’s all supposed to look like, and we are willing to try out a less resistant path.

I’ve had this conversation with many clients. It feels like life is squeezing you. That you are pushed into a corner, you have tried EVERYTHING you could think of, and nothing is working. I tell them that this is because you are being called to evolve into a level of consciousness. What you are experiencing is not solvable with the old framework. If it was, you would’ve done it already. You are not failing. You are not inept. You are being called to move higher. And because the only terms you know in this moment are the old ones squeezing you until you can barely breathe, all you can really do is surrender. You cannot KNOW the answer from this vantage point. You simply become willing to die to one way of being to be born into something that is more expansive than the old.

Because some part of us really IS dying. That part of our identity that has no place in the new realm you are being born into. Sure you are angry and grieving, but most of all you are terrified. Your old world was framed by the boundaries of your fears, and you are expanding through them now. Rev. Michael says when we are at this point, we are like a chick who is ready to hatch, having grown too big for the egg it’s in, praying for a bigger egg. We pray for more of the same, just bigger, more comfortable. But if we break through the shell of that boundary, we have an infinitely expansive world into which we are born.

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Free Your Mind, Shawshank Style aka Ch-Ch-Ch-Ch-Ch-Changes (pt 2)

September 16, 2008 at 10:15 pm (Uncategorized)
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I had been watching The Shawshank Redemption for the millionth time earlier this year (thanks TNT!). But for the first time, I saw it as an allegory for the journey the different parts of our psyche undergo when we attempt to make a “real change” (see Baldwin, above) which requires that we free ourselves from the prison of our current perception of reality. It illustrates what we go through when attempting to cross through that ring of fear that heretofore has defined the limits of our world.

First, we have Andy Dufresne (Tim Robbins). He is imprisoned for a crime he says he didn’t commit. He has never wavered in the conviction of his innocence. He is like our higher self that knows the truth of who we are. His integrity, his worthiness and freedom remain intact no matter what is happening in the world around him or to him. Despite any external circumstance, he knows he is truly free. No amount of time, beating or solitary confinement can change that. Just as no challenge we have ever faced now or in the past has any bearing on the True Self, our higher selves help us access our core essence which remains fundamentally intact in its innocence and wholeness. Andy makes his peace with the present moment, finding ways to enhance the experience of life of all around him.

And still, every night while everyone else is sleeping, he chips away at the concrete wall containing him. He does this unceasingly, patiently but determinedly creating a pathway that will lead him beyond the boundaries of that existence. He is driven by a vision of a paradise that he knows is his, that beach in Mexico… He invites Red (Morgan Freeman) to meet him there someday—a promise of something better than Red, our conscious self, can currently imagine. When the moment is right Andy makes that escape. He even blows the whistle on the corrupt powers that rule inside the prison walls on his way out of town. The simple willingness to undertake our journey begins to shed light on the perverted authority our inner prisons hold, and creates an opening for the more conscious aspects of ourselves to see that. Andy makes it to his paradise. He mails a postcard to Red letting him know that this paradise is obtainable.

Next there is Brooks. He has lived nearly all of his life inside the prison. He is such a part of the institution he has no place out in the “free world”. When he is finally released, he is overwhelmed by the dramatic change. He feels completely out of step and threatened by this new world. He commits suicide because he does not know how to exist outside of the prison walls. Brooks represents the aspect of our identity that only knows the prison of our current perspective and believes in its reality so strongly it must die in order for us to move forward…

And then there is Red. He is our conscious, choosing self. He must make the transition from prison to paradise. He feels so identified with his incarcerated life that the free world scares him, but he is also lured by the promise that Andy has shown him is possible. He must muster the courage to accept that challenge or he will die as Brooks did. Andy (his/our higher self) has even left him the MEANS through which to get to that paradise. He must uncover the buried treasure left for him and purchase the bus ticket. In the same way, the dreams we hold in our hearts are not idle wishes. They are placed in the realm of our desire with the means to their manifestation already encased within them. We can birth them into form if we are willing to delve inside and uncover who we really are.

Now, Red could take that cash and hoard it in a savings to feel “secure” while continuing to work in the grocery store and boarding in the room that Brooks once inhabited until he eventually dies or goes back to prison. Or he can take a risk and see if the promise holds true. In the same way, we don’t HAVE to go through with this journey of transformation. We can simply shift a few things around to make ourselves a little more comfortable and attempt to continue living the way we have always known. Or we can take a risk and embrace the promise of our fulfillment. When Red commits to the journey and buys the bus ticket, he starts getting excited instead of afraid and, sure enough, finds the paradise that was promised him.

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