Becoming Sensitive to Pain

Becoming Sensitive to Pain

Everyone is on a Spiritual Path, whether they acknowledge it or not, just like we are all subject to gravity whether or not you believe in earth sciences. You don’t have to believe you are on a spiritual journey but no matter what your beliefs, you have made a choice to either be aware and  conscious of your Journey, or not.  So for those who have decided to “awaken” this life, it is good news/bad news. Just like therapy where we say the good news about therapy is you get to feel all your feelings and, the bad news about therapy is you get to feel all your feelings. When beginning your journey on conscious spirituality you tend to be quite stoic, especially if you were raised in a culture that holds “no fear,” “just do it,” “no pain no gain” as standards. That might be a good attitude for the gym but not for becoming sensitive to energies and Guidance from non-human sources and higher realms or for healing deep internal wounds.

Sadly, most humans will not participate in deep changes, especially changes that require acceptance and surrender to Guidance from a Higher Source. Left brain dominance (also part of the current culture bias is to follow the logic of the left brain) will attempt to “reason” you out of taking any risks that do not “make sense.”  Typically one has to suffer and be in excruciating pain before “jumping off a cliff” into the unknown, into a “leap of faith.”  Living in familiar pain is, for the majority of people, hipreferable to facing the fear, sometimes the terror, of the unknown, particularly when one has little or no faith. Most people have concepts of faith from readings or listening to a pastor or a new age “guru”. Few have a practice of faith.  This means that people are willing to make some changes, those that will keep them safely ensconced in a familiar paradigm. This is like re-arranging the layout of your prison cell, but the thought of changing neighborhoods is beyond consideration. In fact, you may have even forgotten that any other options exist outside your current prison cell. Whenever there is pain, you are being crushed and cracks are created. Light will force its way into cracks, into your dark places, and illuminate what matters and to show you the way out of the darkness. Then it is up to you to take the steps needed.

If you have chosen to live an awakened life, one where you consciously acknowledge and accept that you are a Spiritual Being having a human experience, your daily practice, your conscious spiritual cultivation you learn to welcome the cracks rather than fight them. You learn that pain and cracks are actually gifts revealing new choices, changes, and salvation. This realization can and will drastically lower your tolerance for pain. A daily practice teaches you and to listen and follow Guidance from a Higher Source when you hear a whisper, rather than needing to have a building collapse on top of you in order to get your attention.  You must have a daily spiritual practice to develop the sensitivity to listen for and hear the whispers from Spirit.

Before looking at what is a spiritual practice, let’s look at what is not a spiritual practice.  Listening to someone else talk about spirituality (in person, podcast, lectures etc.) does not increase your sensitivity to hearing or sensing Guidance.  Reading books can be helpful for knowledge, but it is not a practice. Knowledge without practice is like reading about how to exercise, without actually ever exercising. “Talking to your Guides,” which is a popular “new age” pastime, is especially dangerous, as if Spiritual Guidance can be immediately grasped by the left brain in casual conversation with a so-called higher being. If you can understand the so-called guidance in a casual conversation that makes sense to you while “talking,” you can bet that you are now engaged in rearranging your jail cell. It means you are conversing about subject matter you already know, you already understand and therefore can “discuss” with your spirit guides. So often these conversations are a product of a probing left brain and help the ego to feel more in control by deepening your understanding of an already familiar topic. The epiphanies you get through spirit guide conversations can be useful but should not be mistakenly identified as a practice of tuning in to Higher Source Guidance. There is also the danger of retreating into these spirit guide conversations as a form of self-medication, self-soothing, self- reassurance that you are “right,” that you are in control of your spiritual path and spiritual growth.

Higher Source Guidance can be called the path of Light and Sound. Light is knowledge, Sound is participation, surrendering to the unknown. When you listen to music for example, you are swept away, to someplace inexplicable. You are not counting measures, identifying instruments being played, knowing which key is being used etc. If you are doing those things, you are thinking, not listening. In spirituality it is good to learn, that is the Light and that is the majority of what is offered as spirituality in industrialized nations.  However, being swept away into the unknown, the inexplicable, allowing yourself to feel the uncertainty (at first) and freedom  of exploring terrains you have up to this point had absolutely no idea could even exist is the practice of Sound.  When you are receiving Guidance from a Higher Source, there are no words, no logic, no epiphanies (at first), there is only the music of the unknown. You cannot possible “understand” what you are being shown because what is being revealed to you is beyond your current life experience, beyond the ego (which loves to claim it “knows” something). You do not even have any language for what is happening (at first) because it has never happened before.  Imagine showing a 4 year old what deep love is. The 4 year old simply cannot grasp the concept because of his/her current stage of development and lack of experience.  As a parent, you slowly over time, bit by bit, present experiences to that child so s/he can begin to experience and finally understand deep love. Then later, much later sometimes, you can discuss deep love and reference the experiences you know the child had.  You are the child of Spirit.  You will be led, like a child, bit by bit to new worlds, to new ways of living. That takes faith, and practice..

Pain occurs when you refuse to believe or trust in the process of being shown something you cannot, at first, comprehend. This is when you clutch, desperately, to what you know, to your current circumstances, to your current logic (no matter how illogical it really is) because the fear of the unknown is too great to risk for you to try stepping into the Sound.  This fear comes from lack of faith, faith in a Higher Source, faith in yourself, faith in life, and a huge attachment to the power of the ego and the left brain. Your worship is of the ego and left brain and this indicates your need to feel in control, and the need for control comes from deep seated fear. Your fears need to be acknowledged and responded to with kindness and compassion towards the self, but also with honesty and courage.

How can you develop faith and pursue the path of Sound?  This can only be done through silent meditation. The silence holds the energy and wisdom of Sound, the Sound of a Higher Source. This is not to say that other forms of meditation are not good, they can be, but they are not the same practice. In the Silence, you are being “spoken” to in a manner that transcends the ego and the left brain. In day to day living, the practice of mindfulness is what will guide you in taking steps towards freedom in a loving manner. Mindfulness will reveal to you your daily decisions and will also allow you to feel your fears and the pain of where you might be stuck and resisting Guidance from a Higher Source. Feeling your pain and fear, choosing to face and feel them, means that you will awaken sooner and will become willing to risk the unknown without having to bleed. Sitting in silence creates the space for you to be with You, all of you, and to feel where you are at with your Self, your emotions, your energy. The Silence allows you to receive teachings and transmissions in the language of Spirit. The knowledge will come later, after you have shifted and changed and can now look in hindsight at where you were, and where you are now. It will be a miracle. It will be clear to you then, that you were led to a place beyond your expectations, a place you could not manifest, or intend, or even pray for because it is bigger and sweeter than anything your puny human brain could imagined.

Journey On. 
http://www.mariefeuer.org/