(Continued from Part 1.)
By Pamela Wells, Divine Feminine Way – https://everydaygoddessart.com/?p=350
The Ultimate Solution – Ego Death and Finding God
Paradoxically the Dark Night is also a time of tremendous grace since deep suffering offers the wounded healer the opportunity to realize at any moment they don’t have control of everything in their lives. To heal, the wounded healer has to stop “playing God” and turn their life over to the care of a higher authority.
By choosing to surrender the egoic self to a higher authority in the name of the Divine, by ritualistically “retrieving the soul” or “calling one’s spirit back” a symbolic ego death can occur and physical death of the body is avoided.
The reason psychic death can feel like a real death is because of the amount of terror involved in not knowing what will happen after a wounded healer stops trying to control everything. Unfortunately, wounded healers often unconsciously or consciously choose to end their lives because dying often means stopping the pain and suffering.
The Serenity Prayer from Alcoholics Anonymous is the opening prayer at recovery group meetings and is a very helpful tool for wounded healers to use in letting go and beginning the healing process.
“God, grant me the serenity to accept the things I can not change, the courage to change the things I can, and the wisdom to know the difference. Amen”.
Also helpful are the first, second and third steps in a 12-step recovery program which are:
1. We admitted we were powerless over (fill in the blank) and that our lives had become unmanageable.
2. Came to believe that a Power greater then ourselves could restore us to sanity.
3. Made a decision to turn our will and our lives over to the care of God, as we understood Him.
However the wounded healer eventually finds a higher authority (God, Divine, Allah, Goddess, Shiva, Creator, Govinda, etc.), it is through surrendering control – a symbolic death of the ego – and finding a new faith in self, others and God, that is the most immediate and penetrating healing solution for curing the suffering of wounded healers.
Rebirth of the Authentic Self
It takes great courage and internal strength for the wounded healer to retrace her challenging past history in order to alchemically transform it into a wellspring of self-knowledge, faith and wisdom. Like a salve that heals a wound but leaves a scar, wounded healer’s scar tissue is their past personal story that can be retold to inspire and heal others.
This past personal story gives the wounded healer their unique healing skills to empathically understand and feel the fear, pain and suffering of others. Through their sharing of traumatic life experiences, they can help others transform their pain and suffering into faith of self, others and God. Love and faith in God can completely and miraculously heal the wounded self in one moment. So, without scar tissue, the wounded healer would be another kind of healer perhaps.
The Abundance and Joy of Life After the Dark Night of the Soul – Wisdom Through Experiential Knowledge
Like the Goddess Inanna, wounded healers internally strong enough to return from the Dark Night, bring back knowledge and wisdom about their own vulnerability and the necessity of sacrifice. They learn how the cycles of life are a thread of commonality for us all. Through the emotional dark underworlds their heart opens in compassion for all beings.
After the Dark Night of the Soul the past becomes a part of their bigger story about the eternal purpose of the soul. The past is understood as an essential component of bringing about universal lessons that grow consciousness and wisdom through surviving difficult situations, internal confusion and pain. The scar from the wound becomes a source of inspiration and empowerment. A new purpose is realized as wounded healers awaken to Divine Grace and the radiant wonder of the universe.
The Gift of Service
Wounded healers are often working in service to others through their careers. Because they have experienced a death of their psyches, wounded healers have the unique ability to fearlessly channel spiritual wisdom, combined with their own humanity and unfolding life story and through their passionate personal stories.
They have the ability to go beyond mind and perceive life as a gift of evolutionary growth. They also gain the discernment and wisdom to choose a conscious life of power and purpose. Wounded healers empowered by their own healing path are mystics who have traveled the emotional dark underworlds of human misery and survived to tell others what a beautiful blessing life is.