A few years ago, my husband Mike and I had plans to hang out with our best and dear friends at their house. A casual mid-week evening catch-up that would serve as a boost to get through the rest of the week. I remember that I was in an absolute hole - a deep one. The kind that made everything look dark and impossible. I was in the midst of a major career change, but didn't have a vision of where I was headed yet, so I was often in a state of mental chaos. Mike kept saying to me, "Let's just cancel! They will completely understand!" but I knew in my gut that I wanted to see them - I didn't really know why because I was an absolute basket case and looked as such, but it didn't feel right to cancel. The whole way over I was complaining about my sadness and the circumstances in my life that I knew for sure was the reason for it. When we arrived at the house, I couldn't get out of the car - I was so incredibly upset, but I still wanted to see them. So being the wonderful human beings they are, they came out to the car and stood by my open window while I sobbed and told them everything that I thought was horrible about my life. I practically fell into a panic attack because my thoughts were being spun up a million miles an hour and I felt incredibly trapped because of it. After a good chunk of time of me going on and on and getting tons of love and arm squeezes from my besties, we headed back down the hill.
Why share this experience with you?
It was incredibly pivotal in my understanding of how my (our) experience of life is being created. Read on for more clarity...
As we drove away from our friends, I remember feeling a little embarrassed by my extremely upset state, which was odd because I had absolutely been vulnerable with them before and felt safe to do so. Looking back, as I mentioned earlier, I was beginning to get a glimpse into the notion that my thoughts were creating my experience. Though life looked really stressful at the time and everything I shared with them felt really real, it was the first time the flicker of insight that my feelings are always coming from my thoughts began to spearhead my consciousness (awareness). I remember recognizing that the suffering I was sharing with them was all in reaction to the swirling thoughts that were going through my mind in that moment, and not what was actually happening in front of me. It felt a little out of body, to be honest - I couldn't even judge myself for being crazy, because I could see for the first time why I couldn't stop going on and on: I was reacting to my thinking. My in the moment experience was my husband and two friends looking at me with incredible love and care and offering up their supportive advice, but what I was experiencing internally was thought after thought that brought me pain and suffering, so that is the experience I was living in - I was appreciative of their care, of course, but I completely missed out on the heart to heart connection that comes with being in the moment, which would have inevitably brought me peace.
It's incredible looking back on something like this and seeing in hindsight how wisdom is at work, even when we aren't aware of it. That the principle of Mind, the greater intelligence behind life that our wisdom and insights come from, always ALWAYS has us. If Mind is the ocean, we are a wave within it. Even through the chaos of my personal thinking, I was able to follow the feeling that my wisdom was making me privy to - a peaceful knowing inside that I needed to make that visit to my friends. I know now that I needed to unravel in front of a different audience to experience a bit of a shake up in my awareness. I had fallen apart like that with my husband and parents, of course, but this insight was never able to come through after speaking with them because I would stay in the spin in my head. It took having this different experience in front of my friends to make me see what was actually happening in that moment. You know when you get advice from someone over and over again, then you hear that same advice from a different person and you feel like you've heard it for the first time? It was a similar feeling to that!
If you're an avid reader of mine, you may be thinking, "But wait a minute - if our experience is coming from inside out, it shouldn't matter who you're talking to - how did that insight come through during such an intense thought storm with your friends and you claim it couldn't come through with your parents or Mike?"
Ugh, you guys are so smart - I'm SO GLAD YOU ASKED!
Having the different experience of my friends as opposed to Mike or my parents, naturally made me reflect on what had just happened with my melt down, therefore allowing a *moment* of internal peace during that inquiry! In that moment of peace, wisdom saw that the door to my intellect was open for a split second and it ran through just before I slammed it shut again to launch into more chaotic thinking. What an incredibly relieving realization, that our wisdom will take any opportunity to spearhead the storm in our mind, even when we aren't aware of what's going on.
This points to such a beautiful part of life that we all so innocently aren't aware of. We have a bottomless well of knowing, an internal tour guide if you will, that is ALWAYS directing us... nudging us along through life. But when we're gripped by our fearful thinking about ANYTHING, we believe our mind is trying to warn us about something that we should pay attention to. It isn't so. Those fearful thoughts are purely thought turds trying to clog up the well (sorry for the image, but you got it, I bet!) The more we're conscious (aware) of this process, the more we naturally check in with our wisdom and begin to ignore our thinking when it doesn't feel right. And when we do, we return to a peaceful state, naturally allowing our new, fresh ideas and guidance to bubble up from our wisdom, turd-free.
Sydney Banks, the wonderful human being who had the initial insight into this life-changing perspective, the 3 Principles, had this to say...
"Look in the mirror and you will find one of the wisest people on earth IF you can take your personal thoughts away."
You've got it all within you dear readers - every single answer you've been looking for. But I will continue to share every experience possible with you, so you can see your reflection in me.
All my love and see you next week~
Jessie
