We are born into this world as inheritors of the legacies of man. We are born of the Light of consciousness merged with the form of our Human body and each of us are a unique expression of the One that created us, God, The mystery, the Great Spirit, Life, flowing through us from the moment of conception until we release our physical form and return to source of all that is. Who are we really? Who am I? Who are you? Where do we come from? Where do we return to?
These are questions of existence, purpose, reason, and faith. There are many beliefs across the spectrum of Humanity around our existence; where we do come from and where might we ultimately go when we depart this world? For me I do not know, not for certain. I cannot answer those questions for a fact, as I cannot show myself or anyone else where or what I/we came from or to. I only know I am here. I am alive in this realm... of birth, life, and death.
Living in this world of duality - light/dark, male/female, good/bad, up/down, in/out, I certainly realize more questions than absolute answers. If I were to tell you what I believe I would need to qualify my story as my beliefs, not absolute facts or knowing, but rather beliefs taught, inherited, experienced and imagined. This is the amazing mystery of life on Earth. We are here without an absolute knowing of before or after and still we are here, alive and experiencing each moment and breath, feeling and choice.
For a long time I gave my faith to the Sunday school teachings of my childhood. I took on those stories as the way “it” was and let it go at that. Then over the next 40 years, life happened. All those experiences that are so uniquely human. From the most beautiful, inspiring, creative, and magical to the most heartbreaking, tragic, terrifying, and painful, I lived one moment at a time, one day at a time. My awareness all over the place with the changing times, years and experiences. I took on many roles and identities. I lived my choices; very often without even being aware that I was making choices with each move, thought, step in life. I was in it, game on.
Then came the challenging times of being trapped in a cycle of behaviors and beliefs that had me spinning round and round, spiraling, out of balance, out of control. Ahhhhh the fall from illusion came hard. I hit the wall and damn, it was not a pleasant experience, BUT it got my attention. Life offered up an invitation. Would I like to pay attention? Real, present moment attention to where I was in relation to myself and my life? Would I like to learn about this person I thought I knew so well yet had lost myself to? That was the choice point.
The invitation which had many aspects to it, was in its purest form an invitation from Life, God and Mystery to wake up to who and where I was with my life. From one point of view I was an addict, a loose cannon, a rogue, a bad husband, a lost soul. From another point of view I was spinning from the inside out trying to keep all the balls of my life in the air without really knowing why or how all those balls got there. From yet another point of view I had lost balance within myself and fallen into the chaos and illusion of the matrix of beliefs, roles, labels, and identities of the world I was born into 40 years before. Grace had come into my life and I didn’t know its name.
Still, deep inside my true heart, spirit recognized the presence of truth and stepped forward to say yes to a helping hand. I had no idea on a conscious level what this all was about or where it might lead and I said yes to that grace anyway. This is not about a religious grace. This is about the light of our Spirit responding to the mystery calling us out and our deepest, truest self-responding, YES. So began my journey of the Spirit or what some call recovery.
My first responsibility was of course the out of control behaviors of my addiction. You can substitute any pattern or behavior here that is holding your life hostage. First things first meant assuming responsibility for myself and my relationship with my body. For the first time in my life I was introduced to my body as a vehicle for this lifetime. I was introduced to the idea that I am not my body but that I live this life through the experience of living with a physical body. This was a new perspective on my relationship to my body and I suddenly found myself taking responsibility for the care of my body, not in a vanity way or a comparison judgment way, but as my most loyal ally in life.
After so many years of using my body like a tool or science experiment I was aware of the deep spirit connection between my form (body) and my consciousness. Body and spirit, mind and emotions, we were now living this life together. I realized there was no real separation between these “so human” aspects of creation. The body was subject to how I chose to eat, what I chose to drink, how I kept it tuned up with exercise or not. My experience of living with my body was my responsibility now, to hold as a sacred connection.
This way of thinking was new to me. As I looked at all the old beliefs and judgments I had toward my body, I felt guilt, shame and excitement. It was time to own the neglect and abuse I put my body through. Doing so was not of judgment but rather a revealing to myself of the truth of how I had lived so many years in such a shallow, foolish relationship with my most loyal ally. By going into my old ways I could own those choices and take responsibility anew for how I would live in relation to my body NOW. Recovery became more than “not doing this or that.” It was reframing my relationship to self and taking responsibility for ALL aspects of my life.
Recovery was a deeper commitment, a new Covenant. This was, 100%, my responsibility and my choice to hold a new relationship with my body and myself free from old practices of judgment and abuse, and to be open to connecting to the wisdom of living in this body. I began to realize that all the wisdom of my intuition came through my body. Those feelings that are so important in the moment, that guide us in choices and actions, are cut off when we are not in tune with our body. After all, the physical body is an instrument of frequency, light, water, fire, earth and air. All the elements of creation come together in the formation and life of our body.
My awareness opened to the living relationships that exist between my Mind, Heart, Emotions, and Body. A new Covenant of Spirit merged with form took root and includes my relationship to the food I eat, the frequency of the foods I eat, the life force and the balance of nutrition. It expands far beyond the shallow cultural obsession with calories, fat, salt, etc. This was a higher awareness of living clean and free from anything that drags me down or undermines the integrity of my relationship with myself.
My new Covenant was of grace, as awareness and understanding that recreating my relationships, beginning with myself, was the new foundation I would live life from. Over time I realized that each aspect of my being Human was open to my creating a series of New Covenants, agreements and living prayers in how I would hold my relationships to my Heart, Emotions, Spirit, Mind. Each was open to be healed and brought into balance with my whole being. With each new covenant I could begin the practice of releasing the old ways, judgments, patterns, values and habits, let them go and restate and create a new commitment to My life and myself. The old was being shed like the skin of the snake and the new was being created fresh and alive now.
In practice, this New Covenant can be done best by journaling the entire process. First we take the time to write out what we know as our old ways, with no judgment, we simply own it and express it on paper. Then as we create new habits, commitments and practices, we write them into our new covenant practice and we keep this as our living commitment to our life and ourselves. Practice makes the master, so enjoy and know we are each worth every moment of love, respect and action we are willing to take for our healing and freedom from suffering.
Blessings, Lee.
