This is going to be later reformatted in the way of a course.
I want to release a course on challenging times and pulling through them.
Because once peace has really taken root in our lives,
Many other doors open.
And the fear of challenges and the fear of the darkness and the fear of our trauma and past is not going to be steering our vehicle once we have peace deeply rooted into our experience of life.
Guidance comes from the gentleness with life and then exploring that intensity and possibility as we go forward.
I cannot stress enough how important peace is for us in order to journey on the spiritual path.
So this first module that we're doing today,
This workshop is all about how do we handle hard times in life?
How do we manage and navigate our way through challenging times,
Through the unknown,
Through the darkness that we perceive?
The second module that's coming after this is really all about creating that foundation of peace.
And so today we're going to be kind of exploring with these raw materials.
That's why we have these raw materials in our toolkit because we want to be able to,
We want this to be a tangible experience,
Yeah?
So much of the spiritual world is so heady and woo woo and being expressed in so many different ways that we're like just in this constant revolving door of spiritually shopping.
Listening to this one over here,
Listening to that one over there,
Doing this meditation,
Doing that meditation.
It's almost like we have so many options and so many different people saying this is the way,
This is the way,
This is the way,
This is the light.
That we have to be very discerning about where we put our energy into and what we expose ourselves to.
Because the more exposure,
The more we have to process and a big part of the spiritual process is just dealing with what we already have to work with.
And it's very easy to get caught up and distracted in spiritually shopping when we have this stuff to actually work on.
We have this pain to soften,
We have these traumas to integrate,
We have these desires and aspirations to figure out how to manifest.
We've already got so much there,
So much goodness,
So much raw material to work with that it's very easy to get distracted.
And this whole world that we're living in now,
This modern world with technology everywhere,
People everywhere trying to get our attention to tell us what we want,
What to do,
How to be,
How to look,
How to live.
It's really,
It's really tempting to just get caught up in the shopping.
So to bring a sense of groundedness and a sense of awe into this whole journey that we're on,
That's what we're doing today.
So today,
I'd like to begin by saying every moment has elements of order and chaos.
And I find this so liberating.
I mean,
It's scary at first,
I understand,
It's like scary to really tap into what this means,
That there's chaos in every single moment.
But once we allow this to really sink in,
It is the fire of life.
It is the magic of life.
Because the truth is,
You do not know what is going to happen in the next moment.
But the unknown,
The darkness,
The chaos,
We perceive that as something that we do not know.
And that's scary.
It elicits a feeling of uncertainty.
Fear starts to come up even.
And if you were to know your entire future,
How boring it would be to live it then.
Imagine knowing everything that's going to happen in your life from here on out.
Would you still want to live it?
Does that sound like an exciting journey?
And so how beautiful it really is that even with all this intelligence and all these opportunities in every single moment being something new,
You still do not know what is going to happen next in your life.
How beautiful this is.
The next moment is miraculous simply because it has an element of mystery weaved into its fabric.
Our lives are like this flow of energy,
Right?
If you think about it from birth to death,
There's an energy inside of us animating us,
Allowing our mind to work,
Bringing energy to our bodies,
Allowing our emotions to blossom.
All this stuff is happening and there's a stream of energy.
This is the flow of creation running through us,
Running through our lives.
The quality of this flow of energy depends on many things.
How we eat,
How we think,
How we feel,
How we conduct ourselves,
How we walk,
How we stand,
How we greet ourselves,
How we treat ourselves when we're experiencing rough times,
How we bring ourselves back to the breath when we're distracted during meditation.
All these things contribute to the quality of this flow of energy,
The flow of creation.
And if you become perceptive to each and every moment being an opportunity for you to experience the magic of life,
Then every day is worth living.
Every moment becomes extraordinary.
And it's hard to become perceptive of every moment because we get caught up.
Our imagination wants to pull us forward.
What's tomorrow going to be like?
What's going to happen tomorrow?
Is this going to happen tomorrow?
Our memory and our karma built into us is going,
Oh,
But you shouldn't do that.
Or,
Oh,
This is what we're thinking about.
This is our normal patterning.
We're going into this again.
But if you really become perceptive to each and every moment,
Just as it is,
Both equally made of order and chaos,
We can really see the magic of life happening at every turn.
You are worth liberation.
We are designed to be liberated.
Your pain is worth liberation.
Your current manifestation is worth the magnificent process of transformation.
Life is worth living to the fullest because you cannot predict what will happen next.
This is the call to live in the present.
This is the call to live in the now.
Because you can either dance with the mysterious rhythm of life,
Which is always morphing,
Always changing,
Always bringing new life into it,
While also letting go of the old.
Or you can sit on the sidelines watching as your life grows closer and closer to the end,
Not knowing what is next.
It's suspense.
And it seems that we are in this huge cosmic production being filmed.
And I like to think of life in this way because there is already this huge thing happening.
When a movie gets made,
Think of your most favorite movie.
There was something already in place.
There was like a blueprint,
A path because of what was happening in the world,
Because of what was happening socially,
Because of what was happening within somebody,
That this movie needed to get made.
And it got support from thousands and thousands and thousands of people to be made,
To be created out of someone's imagination.
And yet in our individual experience,
We experience this movie as if we're a part of it.
In our own lives,
We are in a very fundamental way playing the director,
Playing the producer,
Playing the actor,
Actress,
The lighting technician,
Everything.
We didn't create all of this magical and majestic creation and chaos in the world.
But we are playing these roles in our life.
And until we accept that and truly see that as being the only way that we are playing this responsibility in our lives,
We're going to be missing the point.
We're going to be feeling like everything is happening by accident.
It should be a joy to create all of this.
You can make your life's experience profound and intense enough for something to blossom within you.
But without meeting ourselves where we currently are,
There is no way to go forward because we are not living in the present.
If you want to experience deep inner peace,
Happiness,
Contentment,
Joy,
Spirituality,
Transformation,
Divinity,
Then you first need clarity on your path.
You first need to find yourself and meet yourself gently where you currently are.
This goes for anyone who's looking to step into a new experience of life.
For instance,
Someone who's going through drug addiction.
What does the first thing that they have to meet when they go into rehab?
They have to accept where they are.
Otherwise,
They won't be there.
They won't have asked for help.
They won't have sought for help.
And in much the same way,
We may not be addicted in the same way or at all.
But we're looking for a different quality of experience.
That's why we're here.
That's why we're here together right now.
We're all seeking a particular quality of experience in our life and we're looking for answers.
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