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Written by: Dr. Rosie Kuhn
What is it really like to be on a spiritual journey – one of transformation? The truth is: It is hard friggin’ work, and sometimes, it hurts like HELL.
We think transformation is easy. It seems as though it’s something that just happens, right? Like miracles and magic. It’s as if we have to do nothing, and all of a sudden – presto-change-o, we are transformed. We imagine that with transformation comes a life that is easy and effortless, and that there is no more hard work to be done.
Change, on the other hand, occurs through conscious choice-making. This obviously requires consciousness, which means you have to start by cultivating a desire to be awake, aware and open to what is. Change doesn’t occur on its own; it requires conscious choice. I know I’m repeating myself, but this consciousness piece is a very important factor.
Cultivating the Desire to be Conscious
Choosing to be awake is a choice that requires a change in perspective. This in itself is costly to the egoist-self. When you change perspective, you start perceiving and witnessing as a witness, separate from the reality you thought was real. This can create a conundrum – doing I want what I have, or do I want what I don’t yet have, and may not want, further down the road.
Choosing to be conscious and awake to the plethora of possibilities one could choose to believe to be real, leads to having to take inventory of all that has been true, or believed to be true. This, more often than not, leads to some hard bumps, as this sorting process channels one toward that choice-point, where change takes place. This choice-point leads to the next step, where one chooses a different perspective, thought, or action, only in service to what is fundamentally known to be true.
The Risks of Choosing Change
Every time we consider choosing change, we face a long list of risks and consequences that may befall us. Humiliation, heartbreak, grief and loss arise, as the dismantling of the personal paradigm shifts and unravels. All of the threads that had been woven together over lifetimes begin fraying, thinning and disintegrating over time, as a maturing-self begins to see what couldn’t be seen before. You find yourself realizing that the consensus reality doesn’t fit you anymore.
Choosing to awaken, choosing to see what is, from your own unique perspective, requires the steps of letting go of what no longer serves you. You have to choose to release yourself from those dreams, wishes, hopes and beliefs you so desperately wanted to be real. Every fiber of your being is attached to the way you made-believe it to be, and it is excruciating when you begin to separate yourself out from that, knowing nothing more than the mere fact that you are not that.
Change takes conscious choice. Change takes intentional focus, commitment, faith and discipline.
Change feels as though you are suffering and that it isn’t worth the pain, and agony that you are enduring. This is when most of us begin screaming for the sweet taste of transformation.
Rarely does transformation take place within a heartbeat. Transformation is founded upon what has been built through intentional processing and change. I’ve seen and heard many stories about instant transformational experiences. The fact of the matter is that, many of those transformations were not sustainable because they didn’t have the foundation or infrastructure to hold all that the experience of transformation brought with it.
Those who truly know and speak of transformation have done the legwork. They’ve been intentional and committed and have endured the conscious choice-making process. Those who’ve experienced transformation often forget all that had gone on before, which prepared them for this moment. They forgot how they had felt lost, or in a maelstrom with pieces of their lives flying in all directions. They forgot that they had made choices that, at the time, seemed insignificant and unimportant. They minimized the courage it took to choose differently, from those around them, who thought them foolish. It didn’t occur to them that during the grieving over their loss that they were opening up to an expanded capacity to be in the world in such a way that allowed the fullest expression of their essential nature.
Believing in your dreams, enough to change, takes will, surrender and faith. It takes conviction that its worth letting go of what no longer works, for what you truly believe in, no matter how far into the unknown you have to go.
Personally, sometimes, after receiving the best news ever, is when I plummet the furthest. It doesn’t seem to make sense at the time, but through experience I’ve come to understand that as I keep choosing to change and push the edge of my comfort zone, I have to clear out clutter and reboot. It’s sort of like when installing the latest updates on your computer and you have to restart. Sometimes your computer crashes and you gotta start all over again. Sometimes.
If you want transformation you have to be willing to change.
You have to be willing to do whatever it takes to have whatever it is you say you want. Transformation, or change is not for sissies; but, no one on Earth came here to be weak and pathetic. Sometimes it feels like a good option, for a while, but more often than not, all of us will choose to change, doing whatever it takes to live fully into our exquisiteness.