Alchemy
“What is to give light, must endure burning.”~Victor Frankl
Every Tuesday night, I return to the Healing House for Women to take part in a meeting about recovery. It is such a gift to return to a place I once lived; to me and the women that come and go from its shelter. Last night, a lovely woman grabbed my arm as I was walking to my car, looked me in the eye and said,
“Thank you so much for coming. I just love hearing you speak. It gives me such hope that I can recover and return to the world too.”
Sentiments like that are gold to me, and it took work to mine them. Nothing moves me like they do, and I cry every time I get one, because God is becoming real to them too.
When women like this lovely one say such moving things, I take a breath, and a moment to compose myself, before I deliver what must feel like a blow, of sorts. I tell them that the process of recovery takes time, life experiences, and the ability to live with some discomfort as the painful patterns of reactivity that rendered us unconscious and destructive, become conscious, and healed.
“Try not to resist what comes up here, because what matters is what is going on inside of you, not what is happening around you.” If you get to know what you are reacting to, you can allow the light to transform a wound into a gem.”
Most women want a recipe, and an assurance that in time, they can get their children back, their car and house back, and their job back too.
I deal another, softer blow.
” I hope you stop wanting to get things back, but to become new in how you see what shows up.”
Spiritual and emotional freedom are the results of submitting myself to the greater mystery of love, which is God, and making that relationship primary. When I do that, I am less dependent on people or conditions, and the rewards are astonishing. I urge these freedoms in the women I work with, because it is the only hope we have of achieving lasting sobriety, sanity and happiness; developing a relationship with God, as each of us understand God.
When I was in training with the Order of Christ Sophia, I experienced the mystical reality of light, and it transformed me. It also revealed my ignorance, darkness, arrogance and mistakes. Becoming clear, and healing was not a pleasure cruise, but it was so worth it. I got closer to the light of God because less was in the way, and I could see and feel the light vibrating in my being. What made it possible, was believing that love was orchestrating the process because it wanted to know me intimately, and the support and love of other mystics in the community.
Spiritual and emotional freedom are not about behavior changes only. They are the byproducts of a refining process that renders a perpetual, life-giving grace.
going naked being seen 