What Happens Next?
As we come away from the Advanced Retreat, we each experience a shift in our energy field, one of which includes a growth period. For some of us it may be an enthusiastic and exciting time that attracts more of the same. We seem to float through the week and everything feels great. We are opening ourselves to communicate in new ways, and we are perhaps aware of a low level of anxiety as we make changes. Others are opening up to us in a refreshing new way.
For some of us it may be an enthusiastic and exciting time, and we feel motivated to move, to get things done. Here we place our energy into organizing our personal and professional environment, perhaps getting to a few of those unfinished jobs. We might not yet feel comfortable communicating in a new way, but we are quietly processing ways to introduce contact while we are working.
For some of us it may be an enthusiastic and exciting time, but we feel fatigued emotionally, physically and intellectually. I refer to this as a spiritual hangover. We are fragile and feel vulnerable, perhaps moved to tears easily, and even slightly depressed. Our communication with others is touchy as we are still in the process of redefining ourselves. We ache to be touched with loving care and tenderness. This growth period may include being overly sensitive to how others speak to us or treat us. We fall back into old patterns of blaming ourselves when they share something that is bothering them. Their tone may sound alarmingly harsh or aggressive and we cringe. They got something off their chest and we were caught off guard. When we’ve had a chance to process things we stop blaming ourselves and we blame them; because it is, after all, their issue.
As we move through this form of growth, we can choose to make the connection our third chakra has with our fifth. We can observe how we took responsibility for somebody else’s pain by blaming ourselves, and did our best to deflect that same pain by blaming them – by falling into old patterns of judgment towards self and others. It is not uncommon to feel depressed or discouraged when this happens. It can feel like we took three steps forward through the advanced meditation retreat and have taken five steps back now that we’re back into daily life. This is an ideal time to feel our own emotions and identify what we want and need from the experiences. Remember we may want to run and hide, or share verbally with others as a way of deflecting our pain or gaining support (this latter example is merely another unconscious way of passing on the blame), but we have a golden opportunity here to observe which old patterns are trying to push us back into our old ways of being.
We are each evolving in our own unique way. I give myself time to receive massages, quiet time with music that may include singing and dancing, writing, eat lots of healthy green food, time with my family, and I allow myself to receive guidance by attending drop in meditations where support is offered with gentleness. Here I am assured the space is being held while I immerse myself to healing as spirit first.
Remember you are a peaceful spirit in a human body and that human body needs nourishment, a clear mind and emotional nurturing, but that spirit nurtures truth and everything begins on an energy level first.
Thanks for now, Regina
