The interconnected pursuit of God and the Self
It all begins with an idea.
Religion often makes the claim that the pursuit of God is the opposite of the pursuit of the self. But the Eastern religious/spiritual understanding of the Self believes that the core of the human self is synonymous with God and not the ego. My belief and experience supports the Eastern understanding of the self. In this paper, I lay out my own pursuit of God, discovery of myself, and how they have been revolutionary to my healing and thriving.
There’s a theological belief in Christianity called original sin. This is the belief that Adam and Eve, the first man and woman of earth, ate a fruit of the tree of good and evil. This introduced sin into the world. Since then, man become inherently evil. I believe that this belief is wrong. I believe that it causes shame, power abuse, loss of boundaries, disconnection from the body, intuition, and God. I believe that connecting with ourselves deeply will help us connect with God and the inherent goodness inside of us. This will help us love God, ourselves, and others. This will create healthy boundaries, inner power, reconnection with the body, intuition, and God’s guidance for a thriving life.
“The world will ask you who you are, and if you don’t know, the world will tell you.” – Carl Jung
As Jung pointed out, it is important to figure out who you are so that your identity isn’t determined by the world. When we are young we’re naive and ready believe what others tell us. Of course, this is often good as we need the guidance of those older and wiser to help us navigate the world around us. However, others traumas, misunderstandings, narcissism, manipulation, etc. can easily hurt us and cause trauma for our very young, impressionable minds. As we get older and go through the psychological stages of development, we start becoming our own individual person. To heal and find freedom, we must delve into our unconscious wherein lies the trauma that others caused us when we were young.
Likewise, much of our understanding of God is formed by our parents and how they raised us religiously/spiritually. Oftentimes, our view of God mirrors the relationship we have with our parents. I was the firstborn. My parents expected a lot of me. They did not let me express my negative emotions. I learned to keep my needs inside, to not have boundaries, to be on guard at all times for my father’s mood so I would be safe and not do anything to make him angry. I wanted to be close to him and sometimes I was. We would play wrestle. I was always provided for. I knew that my parents loved me. But I also had to be well-behaved at all times, especially in public for others. So, I had a chaotic up and down relationship with my parents. My relationship and understanding of God was the same way. I wanted to be close to him. I believed he was loving, but I also thought that he expected a lot out of me. I thought that if I wanted to have a relationship with him and for him to love me, I needed to be totally devoted to him. I needed to hardly ever sin and please him. But I couldn’t live up to these expectations and often exhausted myself. So, I had an on and off again relationship with God.
“I searched for God and found only myself. I searched for myself and found only God.” – Rumi
For many years I searched for God, but I only found reflections of my subjective view of God, a limited conditionally loving God whose standards I could not live up to (which were actually my own standards). Finally, in Grad school I reached a breaking point. I began to focus on myself. I wanted to heal and grow mentally, emotionally, and spiritually. One day I found an article on trauma that resonated. I kept reading similar articles about famous authors, scientists, poets, etc. that went through hard times and found ways to love themselves through it all. Reading these stories helped me finally access the empathy, grace, forgiveness, and self-love that I had so yearned for and found missing in my life for so many years. I finally felt peace and understanding. At the end of the day I had an awakening, an experience of love, joy, peace, and ecstasy. I felt one with God. For the first time in my life I experienced the unconditional, all-consuming love of God.
“The eye through which I see God is the same eye through which God sees me; my eye and God's eye are one eye, one seeing, one knowing, one love.” ― Meister Eckhart
The next month after this experience I felt full of energy, love, and God. I felt like I was constantly hearing from him through my thoughts, my bodily sensations, through my experiences, through many synchronicities, discoveries about the truth of reality. I now understood that God is in everything. He is beyond my body and the physical world, but also within every single cell, tree, planet, and universe. We cannot be separate from God because we are a part of him. During this time, I no longer had any shame or fear. I was very selfless.
This time did come to an end when I had so much energy that I was not eating or sleeping often. I became delusional and was taken to a hospital and then psych ward. I was placed on meds and given the diagnosis Bipolar 1. My energy, love, and connection came crashing down. I was very confused. I went through a dark night of the soul for many years. However, six years later I read a near death experience book which contained many stories of people who had similar experiences as I did during my awakening. I then began an investigation into my experiences and what they meant.
Once I took my story into my own hands and explored what I thought it meant, instead of passively accepting the “expertise” of others I found a wealth of wisdom. I believed once again in the unconditional love of God. I slowly healed from the anxiety of others’ judgments on having my own unique beliefs that conflicted with others. I began to become empowered as I worked through shame, sadness, anxiety, and anger. I healed the childhood belief that anger is wrong and learned to feel through it rather than bury it within. I also took responsibility for forgiving others who had hurt me in the past without the expectation of them changing or asking for my forgiveness. I began to develop healthy boundaries with others and heal my anxious attachment style. I slowly got back my voice and started my own podcast. I became more comfortable and safe being larger instead of playing small like I did when I was younger. I connected with my body by picking up meditation and yoga again. I explored somatic healing modalities which helped me work through stuck emotions, trauma, and chronic pain.
My point in sharing my experience is that pursuing God externally without pursuing understanding myself inwardly will always be marred by subjective understandings of God based on childhood. If you have a great trauma-free childhood then you may not need to do much inward probing and reconfiguration. But this is a rare experience. By going inward to discover our unconscious beliefs, thoughts, and emotions, we begin to heal these things and come home to God. We begin to have a closer and deeper relationship which leads us to the experience and realization that we are one. This powerful loving experience empowers us to continue building the gifts placed inside of us to help others and inspire them to also discover and reflect the divine inside of them. I will leave you with this poem:
Are you looking for me? I am in the next seat.
My shoulder is against yours.
You will not find me in stupas, not in Indian shrine rooms, nor in synagogues, nor in chathedrals, not in masses, nor kirtans, not in legs winding around your own neck, nor in eating nothing but vegetables.
When you really look for me, you will see me
Instantly-
You will find me in the tiniest house of time.
Kabir says: Student, tell me, what is God?
He is the breath inside the breath.
-Kabir
The Pathless Path
It all begins with an idea.
The Map is not the territory –Terrence Mckenna
When I thought about what I wanted to write about this month the title The Pathless Path. That same day I found a podcast episode by Michael Meade with the same title. I listened to it and really enjoyed it. I took it as a beautiful synchronicity. My article will have some similarities, but also some differences. Here is the episode if you’d like to listen.
No one is a blank slate. We all come into this world with identities pressed into us: White, male, 10 pounds, American, etc. As we get older we’re taught more identities: Religious- Christian, play sports, piano, socially awkward, can’t sit still, rambunctious, not good enough, trouble maker, etc.
These identities or maps are both good and bad. They’re important to help us understand ourselves and the world around us. Our minds need cognitive understanding to help make sense of a confusing world, especially when we’re young. But these maps are also dangerous. When we’re young our brains are highly suggestable. We have little to no defense systems and naively believe what others tell us. This is usually the time period where deep trauma begins and unhealthy patterns form. We begin to develop unhealthy relationship patterns (anxious, avoidant, chaotic), stress responses (flight, fight, or freeze). For those of us with controlling parents we’re taught “the way” or “the path” that is the right way. We confuse the map for the territory.
Some people never grow up and question the map. Some people question it as early as their teenage years. For myself, it was in my mid 20s when I really began to do some soul searching. I was so lost that I was in grad school and I didn’t even know what I wanted to do with my life. It took a kundalini awakening and 5 years of dark night of the soul for me to really begin to question my upbringing and figure out what I believed for myself.
Many people go through the same patterns of being taught a certain path, developing trauma and unhealthy patterns, and then finding a new path that really helps them heal and grow. However, the trap that many people get stuck in is believing that their new path is also the path for everyone. This could be religion. It could be certain spiritual practices. It could be as simple as working out. I’ve had people tell me that breathwork, meditation, psychedelics, astral travel, spirituality, the Bible, Christianity etc. was the way. I’ve tried many of these things. Some I found helpful and some I did not. Some I found more helpful at certain points of my journey than others.
Which brings me to the title of this blog post. There is a path that leads to healing and growth. But its pathless because only you travel it. Everyone’s path is unique. Those who travel on well-worn paths are struggling in lethargy and confusion. They want the certainty that if they follow a path that it will lead to certain results. But they don’t realize that they’re not the same person as who they follow and it won’t lead to the same results. In their chase for certainty, safety, and particular external results they abandon themselves and become lost.
By following our own path we discover the territory. We discover our own inner landscape. We discover our emotions, thoughts, and beliefs which shape our perception and way we live in the world. This helps us understand and take responsibility for the way we live in the world. Yes, there is still things outside of our control that affect us, but how we respond to these events is within our control. By learning to control, shape, and change our inner landscape we begin to move forward in power instead of seeing ourselves as passive victims to life’s whims.
Following your unique path isn’t easy. It takes ownership of ourselves and how we’ve sabotaged ourselves and hurt others. We have to forgive ourselves, have grace for our continued stumbling, courage to get back up and keep going, hope that the path will bear reward, faith when the way is dark and we don’t know what the future holds, and love that God is working all things for his good.
When we choose to walk our unique path, it is polarizing to people. They will either love you, fear you, or hate you. Some will hate you because they understand deep down that they’re not following their unique path and it’s painful. But you are and they’re envious. Some will fear you because you cannot be controlled and they haven’t realized that following others while safe, is harmful. Some will love you because you’re inspiring and gives them strength to continue following their unique path as well.
When we choose to explore the territory we must accept these facts and look to God instead of man’s approval. In this journey we become front runners of society. We inspire imagination, creativity, and new life. We help others reject the status quo and conscious thinkers and leaders rather than mindless followers. We help others become revolutionaries, not violent, forceful people, but one’s who’s inner power changes the world from the inside out like Jesus did.
So I ask you today. Will you take up the call of your soul to follow your unique path?
I’d love to hear from you about your life’s journey and what you’ve learned on your path. Send me a reply to this email! If you’d like my help on your journey you can sign up on my website for 1 on 1 coaching.
