It seems for quite some time, everyone I talk to has been testing their ability to let go, trust, and move forward while keeping their attention totally in the present moment. People are consciously, or unconsciously, jettisoning old limiting ideas and patterns of behavior in favor of entering liminal space—in hopes of discovering if there’s anything there!
I remember a few years back when I experienced a sudden ejection from a reality and self-image I’d been comfortably aligned with for quite some time. Events converged within a few weeks to lift me up like a leaf and blow me across country. Actually, I felt like a piece of tangled rope that was shaken out or snapped briskly into line by some higher force. I needed to move— suddenly—after 30-some years in the spiritually active San Francisco Bay area. Where to go? I thought about other energetically progressive cities like Boulder, Santa Fe, Austin, or Asheville.
But my inner voice said that I must go to Florida to help my mother who was dealing with health issues. I knew that meant I would be living in an environment that didn’t match my frequency. And I had no sense of the overall purpose for this life change. I realized I was realigning with something higher, but Florida?
As I settled in at my new home, I found myself living among warmhearted but conservative, fundamentalist people. When someone asked, “So what do you do?” I learned to avoid an awkward silence or a lecture about what the Bible thought about my views by saying, “I write self-help books.” I socialized with my mother’s eighty- to ninety-year-old friends. Superficial conversation was easy, and they were all lively and fun, but I couldn’t mention what I really thought about or what my deep truths were.
“What am I doing here?” I thought. “Is this the next phase in my spiritual growth and transformation? Maybe this is the death knell of my career.” My inner voice chimed in occasionally with insights. “It’s easy to be ‘spiritual’ when you’re surrounded by like-minded thinkers and people on your wavelength. The so-called ‘outside world’ validates you. But can you be spiritual, and feel the way you like to feel, anywhere?”
There were times I sensed people at the market or gas station who were on a hair-trigger, just waiting for someone to say the wrong thing. I would worry then about showing up fully. It could be dangerous. When I began to feel compressed and restricted, even sacrificial, my logical left brain tried to make me feel better by saying, “But here you can expand your work—up the East Coast, into Europe, even back to the Midwest.”
Immediately, my inner voice said, “It’s not about expansion, it’s about exposure! You don’t have to project yourself out into more of the world, just let people see you. Don’t protect yourself or hide, don’t volunteer your knowledge if you sense it won’t fit the person, just be transparent.” The voice continued, “Just become a clear space in the field of Florida. If people match your vibration, they’ll see you and find you and if they aren’t, you’ll be relatively invisible.
One morning, I got up and found a note from the police taped to my front door, cautioning me about the danger of leaving my garage door open. My conservative neighbor, who was somehow vigilant at midnight, had called to report it. The police came into my house through my utility room, looked in my bedroom, saw that I was sound asleep, didn’t wake me, left, and locked the doors behind them. When my neighbor told me what had happened, I was shocked. Yes, I’d allowed myself to be exposed and had been invaded—but by protective forces. Quite the testament to transparency!
It taught me quite a bit about energy, frequency, and being my true self—anywhere. I learned that this move was indeed a great lesson in love. The “old” people I counted as friends were not at all unconscious inside, they were quite alive and open-minded. When I didn’t push myself toward people and just let them see me, it seemed that my being—that part of me occupying “liminal space”—was doing much of the work of creating safety, compassion, and space for important insights to occur. Things can appear one way and produce results that are surprisingly educational!
My inner voice wrote in my journal:
We’re entering the “Time of Great Ironies.” What seems restrictive is really freeing. What seems dangerous is really protective. What seems safe is really detrimental. What seems problematic is really the answer. What seems easily spiritual is really numbing. What seems sacrificial is really an increase. What seems empty is actually full. When it seems nothing is happening, you’re really increasing in frequency. It is the quest for and attainment of transparency that reveals the deeper truths, and it brings with it some welcome humor and relief.
All in all, I suspect we’re about to find greater clarity and the ability to “see through.” In fact, my custom Florida license plate has a lighthouse on it and says, “A State of Vision.” It’s like what Don Juan told Carlos Castaneda: “Stop the world.” Then it reappears, recreated from the true place.
