The Journey

Today, I am marking my 34th birthday. While traditionally a time of celebration in our culture, I find that for me–much like New Year’s–it has morphed into another important opportunity for reflection. A time to take a glance in the rearview mirror and to renew my mind and intentions for the year ahead. While I don’t find it particularly important to mark the passage of time anymore, I do quite like the idea of growing older here. Each passing year has brought me closer to God with increasing levels of peace and joy. For this, I cannot express the depths of my gratitude; and for this, I can only sit in happy anticipation of who I will be in another twenty years’ time. (I suspect I will be an even more authentic version of my True self than I can imagine right now–a welcome prospect!)

[As an aside: One of my beloved role models and teachers, Peace Pilgrim, ceased to recognize or acknowledge a birthday of any kind. She also forewent the use of her given name, in favor of the more purpose-oriented designation of “Peace Pilgrim.” She no longer identified with those fundamental, traditional customs, and I think she is an awesome inspiration as someone who “lost” everything to discover and embrace something so much greater–something far beyond the understanding of the ego–as a devoted advocate of the pursuit of inner peace.]

While I find it worthwhile to take stock in the progress and direction of my personal journey, I find my efforts to measure myself (in terms of “progress”) repeatedly frustrated due to the fact that there is no way for me to know what my destination is, much less how close (or far away) I am to it. In fact the more I learn, the less it seems I know, and strangely, the more peaceful I am. In A Course In Miracles, Jesus warns against our attempts to measure ourselves. He even says that we tend to count our greatest successes as our greatest failures, and mistakenly believe our greatest failures to be our greatest successes. This is (one reason) why we should suspend judgement of ourselves altogether. We cannot see the great, grand picture that He does with our limited perception.

While I cannot measure progress in terms of distance, I can certainly reflect on my internal state today, versus my internal state 3, 7, 10 years ago. And through this reflection, I know beyond any possible shadow of a doubt that the path I am on is the path I want to continue on. As the French philosopher Pierre Teilhard de Chardin is famously quoted for, “We are not human beings having a spiritual experience. We are spiritual beings having a human experience.” And while I have found profound, experiential truth in that statement, I have also come to understand that we have a choice whether we want to grow, individually, in the awareness of this truth, or whether we want to avoid it as much as possible.

I consider “the spiritual path” to be the active choice to grow in the awareness of this truth. And while it is the most deeply rewarding choice, or path, that you can take, it does come at a price. Or so it seems.

So often, when we look up to those who seem to be further down the path than us, we are inspired by all that they have attained: the peace, the joy, the wisdom. These are the invaluable rewards, and results, of traveling this road; and those are the aspects on which we rightfully tend to focus. We see our fellow travelers up the road as successful, and oftentimes, it seems like it’s so much easier for them than it is for us. But I think this is a result of seeing the outcome of their journey, to date, and what we don’t get to see or live through is all the harrowing, grisly details of the path that they have faced in order to get there. Anyone who tells you that the spiritual journey is all about lovey-dovey sunshine and rainbows, puppy dog kisses, and butterfly wings doesn’t know what the hell they’re talking about and is clearly in denial of some of the ground shaking inner work that is required in order to reach that little bit of sunshine.

As I think back to when I began to actively pursue this path, some 7-8 years ago, I am overwhelmed by all that has transpired. There has been loss, great loss, on many, many levels. There has been pain, struggle, and tears–so many tears! There has been fighting, begging, resistance and total giving up. There has been great strain in the perpetual trying, trying, trying to get things “right” until I felt my entire being was broken, as if I had been dashed against some metaphorical rocks that felt quite real. My world has fallen apart, repeatedly. I have asked “WHY?!” about anything and everything until I was out of breath, even long after I was told that it didn’t matter “why.” It has been one hell of a trip, y’all. I have broken down until I felt that there was nothing left to break, and then broken down some more.

I have given up almost everything I was ever told I should want, hang onto, or pursue. I have walked away from money, on grand scales. I have turned my back on perceived importance through professional “success” and even fame. I have let go of dysfunctional and damaging relationships that the world has told me I should cling to. I have at times lost my sense of self, lost all my concepts of God, and lost my last vestiges of hope. I have dealt with profound loss on personal levels, professional levels, and even spiritual levels. I have let go of those things that I was most convinced would bring me happiness, and harder still, I have felt the loss of those concepts I thought should bring me peace: home, family, love. It has been tremendously difficult as I have waged war against some of the most treasured ideas in both my own mind and in our society at large. My fingers are blood stained from the “little deaths” I have self-inflicted with God’s help and Grace. My back is broken from the straining and the effort of resisting those “little deaths.” And I will forever carry the indelible marks of these battles waged, both lost and won. And yet, there is more to lose, even still…and I welcome it.

This is the reality. It has not been fun, so much of the time. It has been grueling, arduous and overwhelming. It is, far and away, the hardest thing I have ever done or likely will ever do. So what, in the name of all that is holy, would ever entice or persuade someone to follow this path? A path of extreme letting go, extreme loss, and extreme inner work?

All I can tell you is…because it’s worth it. The more broken I become, the more whole I realize I am. The more loss I experience, the more abundant I become. The more I lose my self, the more I find it. It is a complete and total paradox, but it is the Truth. And at the end of the day, all I can say is that this is what I came here to do. By the time I set my first footsteps on this path, I truly had nothing left to lose in terms of pain, fear, and heartache. Nothing could be more unfulfilling or darker than the path I had taken up to that point. And in all that I have lost along the way, the real truth of the matter is that I have never lost anything that I actually had in the first place. That’s the bitch of it.

The outcome of this spiritual path makes itself apparent in little, sporadic bursts and in leaps and bounds, all at the same time. The thing is, you cannot see the progress, all you can see is the baggage and pain that you have lost, strewn across the road behind you through the narrow sight of the rearview mirror. That’s when you begin to understand that all you ever lost, despite how it may have seemed at the time, was fear, pain, and lies. And suddenly you wake up to the realization that you are happy, you are peaceful, and all is well.

This is not a path for the faint of heart. It requires enormous courage. We will all traverse this path, in our own way and our own time. Some of us may seem to be lagging while others seem to be far off ahead in the distance, but in truth, we’re all in this together. If you find yourself struggling, falling, and “failing” on this path, please rest assured that you are in good company. And while my rear view mirror shows a great, big dust cloud that has been stirred up in the wake of my personal trail blazing, the road ahead becomes increasingly clearer. One thing I now know for sure: there’s no destination in sight.

Today I am marking my 34th year on this earth, and I find that I am overcome with gratitude. Not gratitude for…. Just gratitude. There are no words to express this gratitude that would do justice because it goes beyond mental comprehension and it just is, in it’s own right. The funny thing is, from all external viewpoints, it might be hard to understand why I feel such deep gratitude. I don’t live in a nice house, I don’t drive a fancy car, I don’t have a “great job” (or any, for that matter), or any of the other things that my government and society seem to think I should have to be happy and successful. From the outside, there’s probably not much about my life that would stand out as enviable or covet-worthy. Except this: I am happy, I am contented, and I am peaceful–with or without all those other things. And this is why every bit of this journey is worth it. This is why I keep going.