In our current environment, we keep hearing the term WAKE UP! Sounds like a good idea as a general concept, yet what is the pathway to arriving there? And how do we know if we are awake or if we are still sleeping? Here is an excerpt from the first chapter of my book Me & My Shadow, Move from Fear and Control to Love and Freedom.
I hope it resonates and you find that it's relevance seems timely.
Sleeping
You have likely heard the expression we don't know what we don't know. Consider that it is also true that the more we know, the more we realize how much we don't know. So the question becomes how willing are we to investigate what we don't know? How willing are we to look at ourselves to discover how much of the beliefs we are living by are truly our own?
What if at the deepest level of our soul we always know what is right for our highest, greatest good even if that truth seems concealed from us? What if your inner knowing is prompting you to remember your truths, the ones you buried long ago? And what if given that at our deepest core we know, when we operate against it, we also know? The reason this is critical is if there is a misalignment between our beliefs at our soul level and what we are experiencing in our life, then an incongruence is created. That incongruence creates an inner prompting, a small voice that raises a red flag to say, “Something isn't right, Wake Up!” It is telling us we moved our eye off the ball, which is love. Amazingly though, while asleep, we ignore that voice because while we are asleep we are living unconsciously devoted to proving our false beliefs true. This is not because that decision is for our highest, greatest good. No, it is because we refuse to look at ourselves to discover the misalignment between what is for our highest, greatest good and how we are living. Instead, we continue to live with our suffering, not just live in it, but exacerbate it.
Being asleep is simply being in denial of the reality of our circumstance by unconscious choice, often because we choose to make those outside of ourselves an authority. We believe them over our inner knowing. That incongruence is telling us there is a misalignment. All we need do is remember or rediscover the truth about what we know, and recognize every action by yourself or another that is out of alignment with that truth. It is wholeness we seek and finding our wholeness is simply getting in alignment with ourselves, and nothing or no one else. While being incongruent we may treat others in alignment with our soul beliefs of right and wrong while we allow treatment of ourselves based on our false beliefs. The false beliefs are created as a child and held steadfastly to all the days of our life until we choose to examine them, and then have the courage to let them go.
So what makes us ignore our own thoughts and feelings? It starts when we are very young, often before the age of seven. We long for love and acceptance and at first we look to our parents or guardians, our first authority, for that love and acceptance. Through their guidance, good or bad, we become what we perceive we need to be to receive love and acceptance. This created “self” has little to do with who we actually are. Left unchecked, as we grow older, we never find “ourselves” again.
There are many people around us who wish to add to and influence our beliefs about what is required for us to be good enough or deserving enough, and our lack of understanding of who we really are and what we truly believe makes us candidates for that influence. Every person who wants to influence us has an agenda. Early on your parents had an agenda, consciously or unconsciously. Maybe it was to develop you into the person that could live the life that they wished they had, or maybe it was to control you physically or emotionally so that they could have power over or control of, something. Or maybe their agenda was to have a well behaved child, or the smartest child or the one that went to the best school or married into the best family. What is important to note is none of those agendas are about love of you, even though the parent or guardian may have believed that it was only about love. Instead, some of it may have been about ego, the desire to look good or to be seen as accomplished in the manner of society. We all want to be seen as good to obtain what we often believe is elusive: love and acceptance. Often we long for admiration and validation of our success from those outside of us.
As we get older where do we turn to learn who we need to be to achieve those things? And who do we allow to influence that? And do we consider, really consciously consider, whether or not those wishing to influence us have an agenda of their own? And do we ever assess their agenda against our own agenda, our own soul belief system, to see if it is in alignment? And just what is the consequence if we don’t make that assessment? I am suggesting that, if we don’t look at the truth in this arena, we remain asleep our whole life, unaware of the many ways in which we are being controlled, influenced or harmed. In essence, we blindly drink the Kool-Aid and, eat the porridge that is being given to us. We accept it as true, while pretending we are happy doing so. Or we accept that we are unhappy, just a victim of circumstance of our sad surroundings and our endless feelings of helplessness. We often believe we have no choice. What if this is simply not true? Wake up!
When others outside of us have an agenda they will look to create evidence to support that agenda. Any agenda is designed to keep you from being a free thinker, or simply free; a person that can discover and experience the greater whole...the all that is. The agenda, if we allow it, puts a narrow box around the possibilities...when in fact they are often boundless. People often use news reporting, textbooks, the Bible or other religious doctrine, and societal concepts and convictions, as the sole basis for their ideologies. Consider that there is often an accompanying view that those resources are all encompassing as if there are no omissions, omissions that may have been made from those resources to lead people to draw conclusions, perhaps to satisfy an agenda. This agenda may not truly be for our highest, greatest good, but theirs. I dare make the same claim of history books and other texts...what has been purposefully omitted from those books? Why has that information been left out? Again I state, the more someone chooses to know, the more they will discover how much they don't know. Yet in order to arrive at that place of knowing they have to be willing to acknowledge that there are things beyond the scope of their present thinking that they don't know.
If we began to consider that every message from a source outside of ourselves had an agenda and to accommodate that agenda there may be something hidden from us, left in the darkness of the shadows in the hopes we would never see, would the temptation to wake up become compelling or more frightening? If it is compelling, you may already be on your journey to wakefulness or awake. If it is frightening or perhaps terrifying you might be dead asleep. Asleep, utilizing ignorance is bliss so that you might experience the illusion of joy, but you simply do not know what you do not know!
In my experience those things that you do not know are normally not found in a text book, Bible or any standard resource alone. Instead, you must not fear looking to resources that perhaps you had never considered looking to. That fear just may have been instilled in you, so that you would never know. That fear was created so that you believe you must stay on this tight rope for your own safety and salvation. Perhaps you will have to open the cover of books or resources outside the grounds of instilled thinking, to learn what you truly believe, your truth. Isn’t it true that their breakthroughs, the breakthroughs of outside-the-box thinkers, are often regarded as hogwash? Maybe even by you? Perhaps that label of hogwash is just a safety mechanism to keep you in your illusion, or to maintain a view-point you established at a very young age, that you just don’t want to let go of or are unconsciously afraid to let go of. After all, who doesn’t like the security blanket of the illusion of knowing? Yet as we step outside the bounds of those thoughts instilled in us and allow ourselves the freedom to discover what truly feels right to us...something magical happens. We begin to see that many free thinkers have drawn the same conclusions, those in complete opposition to some of what we have always been taught to know or believe. And it feels right. And at that moment...a congruence is formed. Something that tells you, this is true, this is aligned with my deepest core, my soul knowing...and then you suddenly realize to speak of these matters you will need courage, because others will go back to their resources to prove to you that you are wrong. You see while their resources may be accurate in the content they have, they may be inaccurate due to the content intentionally left out of those pages. You needn't convince others of your view, just be willing to establish a view that is your own. There is no need to be compelled to convince another that the tight rope they are walking on may be faulty. Only those that wish to see the light of the truth can find it. If they truly wish to find it, they will seek it. And the less you feel that you must persuade another that you are right and they are wrong, it may reflect nothing more than the significant truth that you may have found your wholeness in yourself. You just may be Awake!
Be warned, however, that the commonality that you discover in that small circle of individuals that speak outside the standard instilled beliefs about religion, politics, relationships, human behavior, the world, war, economics, the body, the mind, the spirit, anything at all, does NOT now confirm that this truth is the absolute truth and you should look no further. No, it is that once you are willing to go on that path, to venture outside the scope of the beliefs that you have perceived were yours all the days of your life, but have since discovered they were in fact someone else’s, that willingness compels you to have an open mind, a broad manner of thinking. In these moments you begin to realize that maybe establishing your own beliefs, becoming your own authority, can keep you safe from guilt and shame that others often would like to put upon you to keep you in line. Your willingness to look inside yourself and venture to any outside resource that you feel guided to allows you to have the benefit of knowing that learning never ends, and that your life is a constant flow of abundant happenings that prove each theory you embrace as you walk through. You begin to watch as you experience your new beliefs creating new realities...and once you arrive where you witness the truths of the new found wisdom and knowing, you will not be moved when someone tries to narrow your focus by referencing a text that has been labeled "bible" or “authority” by some...you see in that, all the wars begin. A command that my way is better, my way is right, as if there are not boundless possibilities of right or better will no longer be acceptable to you. It is in this text, reference, or book, therefore, it is true will be overcome by It is in my heart, it is in my knowing, and, therefore, it is true. You needn’t agree with me, I have peace in my own knowing, my certainty. And thus, you will finally know, you are Free.
It is not just texts and written data I am referring to. I am also referring to the words that we hear from people that we view as an “authority.” These are directives we get from others on how we should behave. There are those that wish to define for us what is proper and right by some standard, perhaps just capitalizing on the knowing that we are uncertain about whom we are and what is good and right for us. We are unclear of what will lead to our feelings of love and acceptance or right and wrong, so we listen. We listen to those outside of ourselves and trust their moral code, without every assessing the depth of morality of our chosen guide. Be clear that this is not to say that any doctrine, text or authority is wrong, and, frankly, who would I be to judge that for you? It is to say rather, regardless of your view of the rightness of any authority, what harm is there in venturing beyond the resources you have always sought? And what could possibly be wrong with turning inward to learn? As if you don't venture beyond where you have been, you cannot know if there is something that would feel more right to you because you will never know the truth, that the more you know, the more you will know you don't know...
Wake Up to how you're operating from past hurts, Stand Up for your non-negotiable qualities and Live Free into your next reality.
Life is not meant to be a struggle, and healing from harsh forces is a beautiful, gentle awakening to the one limiting core belief—the red thorn—that can be gently released (not extracted).
Cut Your Root of Captivity.
Email Diana@redthornsolutions.com for a free initial consultation. Or order our Guide to Freedom
“Me & My Shadow” by Diana Iannarone on Amazon.
We do not give legal advice, nor do we use legal principles to apply to your circumstances. We are neither lawyers nor medical professionals.
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