Waking this morning, I’m sipping coffee and reading Steve’s article about passing through the eye of the needle. (1) His is the latest in a series of articles addressing some very important core issues I see playing out around me at this time.
I can only report how it is in my world, but, in it, the signs of meltdowns in people I know are ranging from subtle to not so subtle, the difference being, in my view, the level of awareness that any individual is capable of bringing to it in the moment.
The energies are very intense at this time. It’s plain (to me) that this is in alignment with the reports of more light streaming in. Everything that used to be hidden from view is now coming up and out to be seen, and much of it is shocking.
I’m also seeing this same process in myself. It’s playing out differently for me, I feel, simply because my personal process has included a long, drawn-out phase of drug addiction. Having taken this extreme route has made it necessary for me to develop tools that I could liken to an auto-pilot version of what I call ‘catch and release’. The other critically important part of this process is not being willing to indulge myself in self-judgments.
Thirty years of drug abuse is a long time, and certainly nothing to brag about. The reason I share this is because a crucial part of my journey has been to abandon the notion that keeping secrets and spending all the energy it takes for ‘image management’ is not only a waste of time; it’s the very thing that keeps me from my power and my ability to be authentic with who I am and what I’m experiencing. Truly, these experiences are such a huge part of how I know what I know, and what I have to share with others.
The energy I spent in image management ate up a giant bite out of 30 years of my life, and ‘letting the chips fall where they may’ is the agreement I made with myself in exchange for getting my Self back.
It was not until I took the time to bring awareness to myself and started looking for the authentic me that I realized there was no way out of cycle of self-harm and self-judgment that I was in. Self-judgment is self harm. Whatever excuses we have for thinking that it’s permissible and appropriate to do this are incorrect. It’s a bigger ‘crime’ to harm self even than to harm others. At least one can get away from someone else. There’s no escaping one’s self, and there’s no way to harm oneself that does not also harm others.
So I found there was no way to find a surface for my foot to land on to take the next step. Also, there was no way for me to see others for their authentic selves either, as our perceptions in relations are always perfectly mirroring back to us our perceptions of self. No way out for me, so long as I carried and attached to the judgments I had made of myself.
It’s taken me a long time to realize the root of all judgments is self-judgment. We talk about unconditional love here frequently, and yet, when it comes time to ‘going beyond the talking to the walking’, what I see happening so often is that there is a breakdown in this very place where the self judging mechanism is operating. This is the wrench in the gears of bringing our awareness to this next level, both individually and as a collective. (2)
I think we all find it relatively easy to understand how making judgments on others is not the unconditional love we’d seek to have for ourselves. This unconditional love is the healing we seek. Each of us longs for this in every living, breathing moment. It is the longing for the beloved, the ache that never ends, the mourning for love lost, it is the true root for all of these.
What I observe is that the awareness gets stuck is this place where we’re not bringing this unconditional love to our Self. It’s these judgments that block our awareness (and distort our perceptions) of what the truth is in our relationships. It is not until the judgments of self are removed that it becomes clear that it’s these judgments carried about the self that are forming the foundation of our ability to justify and transfer judgments onto others. It’s only on the other side of the release of this baggage that the compassion and understanding which are components of unconditional love are truly possible.
These self-judgments are also the very things that are blocking our ability to be capable of feeling, knowing, and ultimately giving unconditional love to anyone else. And there’s no access in our consciousness to unconditional love until we’re capable of receiving it.
To receive, it’s necessary to move the judgments of self out of the way. It’s the judgments that jam the door to receiving. Self-judgments are the hidden lies that are underneath the armor we wear, which we believe we have in place to protect us from the harm that others bring. In reality, they’re the crown of thorns we wear that we’ve put on ourselves. They’re the invisible invitations we carry to receive what we don’t want, but secretly feel we deserve.
Any discussion of vasanas is incomplete, in my view, without understanding that self-judgments are intricately woven into them. They show up together because they’re formed together at the same time, more times than they aren’t. The soul knows better, but the connection between conscious awareness and the soul is also severed by this same mechanism of inappropriate self-judging. And the truth is, all judgments are ultimately inappropriate when carried like this, when we attach to them as if they are what we are.
If vasanas are the hidden volcanoes waiting to blow when triggered, then it’s judgments of self that hold them in place and keep them hidden. It’s the suppressed fear and desperation over holding these judgments in our field that makes vasanas remain beneath the surface of awareness. It’s what makes it so easy to blow up and blow onto whoever is so unfortunate as to fall into that pot hole that’s there just waiting to flatten the first tire that passes over to it.
I’ve found for myself in this releasing process, that most of the time the judgments on myself I’ve been packing around have been anywhere from just plain wrong to ridiculous. Even those that could be argued to be earned or deserved still are not appropriate to carry endlessly.
There’s no way to undo what’s been done, and the person I am now is only possible because I release who I no longer am. Who I no longer am is only held in place by the judgments I carry.
It cannot be correct to treat myself as if I’m carved in stone. I am not, and the only way to be able to move forward has been to realize this and let the rest go.
Footnotes
(1) https://goldenageofgaia.com/2013/05/buildup-and-release/.
(2) When I say ‘collective’, of course, what I’m speaking of is actually individual awareness. We’re each a tiny piece in the great puzzle of collective awareness, and how aware we each are IS important. Without each of us being aware, there’s no group awareness, only lack of it. Since we ARE the group, there’s no place else to go with this.