Soul Whisperers

It was back in the mid-90s that I remember seeing a PBS special on the Horse Whisperer for the first time.  With my connection to animals, this struck me as nothing short of profound. The idea of training a horse through working with its own natural born communications of body language and manners, without the use of unnecessary force in breaking the animal's spirit? Holy crap!  This struck me as so profound that the next morning I woke up sobbing.  I mean, I didn't wake up, start thinking about it, and then cry.  I woke up with my pillow already soaked with tears I'd been crying in my sleep, that were still free flowing from my eyes for all the horses over all the years that had been brutalized for no reason. There was a better way -- A more harmonious way for a more mutually beneficial outcome for both species.

This has been playing in my mind a lot recently as I've finally extricated myself from a situation that was beginning to break my spirit.  I find that the old fear-programming and the puritan standards at the basis of our society are really hard habits to break, and despite years spent releasing such patterns, I find I'm still susceptible to being seduced by them.  It's easy to mistake fears for safety, knowledge for wisdom, and pain for growth.  ...No pain, no gain.  ...Life is a battle/struggle.  ...Fighting the good fight. ...Nothing comes easy.  ...What ev-ver!

Even in some Spiritual circles it seems to be all about fighting the ego, or as I heard one person put it, "Every day you have to battle your demons, and wrestle them to the ground!"  It makes me start to wonder --when on your spiritual path are you suppose to get time for peace, harmony, and love with all that fighting going on?  No wonder everyone is so tired!  We seem to be taught to struggle against anything and everything that stands against us, to choose sides, and to go down fighting, but in my mind all that does is breed more separation. In that scenario there is no room for wholeness.  Granted there are challenges and tensions, some painful, that are natural and necessary for growth and strength building, but those are in harmony with our path not against it.  That is the adventure, the unknown, the fun part of learning, growing, and expanding.  And if you truly trust that everything is one, and that everything happens for a reason, then everything that happens -- seemingly good or bad -- is there to bring you to your highest growth. At least that's how I see it.

When you're fighting something for the sake of fighting something, you are actually creating what you are fighting against.  When you are fighting demons all the time, you are actually creating those demons.  Just speaking from my experience, the demons I deal with are things such as feelings of inadequacy, low self worth, and such.  The thing is, these don't exist.  They are not solid, self-propagating entities.  They are the absence of something else.  And to take this further, they are not even the absence of something -- They are the perceived absence of something.  They are illusions!  The strength and confidence I have gained in just the past few years has always been inside me.  I just wasn't in touch with it and just needed to learn to bring it out.  And how did I learn to do that?  By focusing on the things that made me feel whole and joyful, strong and confident.  Inadequacy and low self worth are none entities, but if I focused on my inadequacy, I would be validating it and making solid something that is just an idea, making it stronger and giving it power over me. I would be feeding it my power and in that way, dis-empowering my self.  I have been learning that when my 'demons' pop up, they are actually there for a good reason, so instead of fighting and wrestling them, I invite them in for a cup of tea to see what they have to say...

And so I have decided for myself that I will no longer accept for myself that regimented, militaristic, tearing-down-the-ego-so-you-can-rebuild-the-person mentality when it comes to learning.  I will no longer accept as wiser than me those who, as I heard one person bragging, "Find people's buttons and then keep pushing them until they realize there's nothing there."  And I will no longer accept opinions and judgements guised as "the Truth."  You know, those movies where someone is under a spell to only speak the truth and then they tell some one they're ugly?  "Ugly" is not a truth -- It is a judgement and an opinion. 

It is time to stop breaking, and to start building spirits.  There is a better way -- working with spirits in their own language in order to empower them. Nurturing spirits rather than breaking them is much more productive, and strengthens everyone.  That is my goal in dealing with people, particularly when doing readings, or reiki, or whatever.  I would rather be surrounded by, and become myself, a Soul Whisperer.

Pssssst!!...