“If the doors of perception were cleansed everything would appear to man as it is, Infinite. For man has closed himself up, till he sees all things thro’ narrow chinks of his cavern.”
-William Blake
I traveled north to Sedona earlier this month to take a day class to improve my oil painting skills. I felt enormous gratitude for having the opportunity to learn from a woman who was not only a gifted painter for decades but also a wise woman who infused her instructions with layers of life truth. This class focused on working with disappearing and reappearing lines.
If I could accurately give imagery to what my internal world has been like as I walk this journey of True Self, not just teaching it but living it, it would be the art of disappearance and the gift of reappearing.
It has taken me so long to write this section about True Self because every time I would sit down to write, I would come at it from the mind and logic. Could I write a really informative post about True Self from that place? Of course, but I am tired of living out of that place, to be brutally honest. What has been asked of me is to write from the heart, to write from the body, which holds ancient truth.
For so long, the common teaching in the circles I've been in has been to not trust the heart, the body, or the Self. Over the years, I've realized how much harm this false thinking has caused not only to myself but also to clients and society as a whole. Before we continue, for those who are new to Soul & Soma let’s review what I mean when I say True Self.
When I speak of the True Self, I mean the Self that was created in the image of God (Imago Dei), in all of its fullness and wholeness. This Self has complete access to God, His knowledge, truth, and wisdom; here total Union exists. I am convinced that we were all created good (I got it from scripture, but still, it is so offensive to many). Good is wholeness and fullness; therefore, a return to Self is a return to holiness and wholeheartedness. To live out of a space of wholeheartedness requires living out of consciousness, not subconsciousness, yet the average person operates out of 5% consciousness and 95% subconsciousness. Over the years of studying humans, the subconscious has been described as a variety of things. I consider the ego, shadow, and parts to be aspects of the subconscious. They all overlap; they can all be linked.
So, based on this understanding, we begin to paint a picture in which we enter the world whole and good, holy in our union, and then there is disconnection somewhere along the way. From that disconnection, the ego, parts, and subconscious are formed, all of which I consider to be aspects of the False Self.
When exploring this with God, I have always been led back to the Golden Age and the Garden. Sin has been described as "missing the mark," but it is rarely discussed in the sense that sin is "disconnection". It is a disconnection from True Self and God. So my question is, shouldn't we (culturally) be teaching more about True Self and Union with God, helping others remember who they are, rather than shaming in order to change behavior? Shame is at the core of disconnection as well as the creation and operation of the False Self.
Looking back and visualizing Eve leaving the Garden, I perceive the emergence of shame—the supreme force and mastermind behind alienation from oneself and God. The shame is then passed down through the generations. The network of shame is what holds everyone down when I close my eyes and visualize the conditioned and programmed world in which we live.
As mentioned in a previous post, what is the antidote to shame?
Unconditional love.
Jesus, who is the embodiment of perfect and unwavering love, led the way, freed us from the power and bonds of shame, and declared that the Kingdom has come. He provided direct access through realms to elements of heaven. Then, in order for us to function in union with Him and out of unconditional love, which is wholeheartedness, union with our True Selves, and union with Him, He gave us his mind and consciousness. This is connection, this is the holiness of wholeheartedness.
When we operate out of consciousness, we operate in truth and True Self. When we operate out of the subconscious, we operate out of the shadow side of truth, we partner with shame in one way or another, leaving us unable to fully walk in True Self.
I frequently tell my clients that it only takes 1% of shifting to alter the entire journey: from sleep to awake, from false self to true self, from shame to love, from subconscious to conscious. In actuality, once you see, you can't unsee. This is the play with lines that appear and disappear repeatedly that I previously mentioned. To see clearly where there is alignment, there must first be a realignment or a disappearance. Then, when your vision is clear and truth starts to define the painting of life in front of you, lines start to appear once more, but this time they are lines of reality.
When we begin to walk more in alignment with who we are and Whose we are, in that Holy Union (True Self) with our Creator, we learn to walk being led by the heart, where the soul resides. We learn to trust our bodies, and to trust what we know. Remember, this is a soul’s journey. The soul always seeks to align with truth to bring you home, to bring heaven down.
With you,
Lillie