It's been a long time since I've posted - it's been an eventful and challenging period for me. I will bring you up to date on the amazing happenings and continue to share my ideas as I promised in earlier posts. But from now through September 4th, I am participating in the Bouncless Living Challenge. (www.boundlessliving.com) It's an event created by Bob Doyle. He's created an online community of about 6000 people whom are utilizing the 45 day period from July 20th - Sept. 4th to define and go after a challenge - something they've always wanted to achieve. Every member participant has a blog on the event's site and can thus share their goals and get support from others and access amazing support tools to help one achieve their goals. Check it out. Anyway, below is the first post from my Boundless Living blog in which I state my challenge for myself.
Introduction
I am an intuitive counselor, astrologer and past life specialist amongst other things and I've been telling my clients for most of this past year that the month of August for many would be like a bridge to a new and exciting level of living for those ready and willing to finally walk their true path. And along comes this challenge to galvanize a bunch of us to start living the lives our highest selves intended for us! Thank you Bob!
Before I share & declare my goal, let me give you some brief background information. In March of 1979, while I was a 16 year old freshman at Columbia University, I had a profound, psychic awakening. Over a few days, I began hearing voices, seeing colors, feeling energy in my hands and having experiences with healing, precognition and other things. What happened to me was so invasive and life transforming and so weird and unexpected that I had to drop everything in order to figure out what had happened to me and why. I started studying different religions, philosophical traditions, psychology, tribal cultures in an effort to understand. And I've been studying ever since!
The most powerful experiences that happened, however, were the voices and visions. The first night there was a purple light in the corner of my dormitory room that started to move towards me until I screamed in fear. The next night, there was a blue light which seemed more gentle and calm. It started to move toward me and I heard it soothingly call me by my name and it introduced itself as Mary. My life has never been the same since. Within the coming weeks, I had just about every single spiritual teacher of note from history come to me and introduce themselves to me. Jesus, Buddha, Moses, Krishna, Gandhi - you name them and I communicated with them in depth - as clearly as having a conversation with a friend. Even though I had been raised a Baptist, numerous Catholic saints, St Francis, St Therese, St Anthony and others came to me as well. They all seemed so happy to see me, they all talked about how happy they were that I could hear them and how excited they were about my mission and what I had come to do. Umm,,,this is where fear began to trickle in.
These were exciting and scary times. And though it was exhilirating to be meeting and getting to know such amazing souls on an intimate and personal basis, two things came to mind that kind of stopped me dead in my tracks. One: I had grown up in a very abusive environment and even though I was smart and had started college at 15, my father had always told me that I wasn't good enough - thus, I had no self-esteem. And so as these great souls seemed to celebrate me and treat me as if I were one of them, my prevailing thought was - "They must have the wrong guy." Second: I knew that each of these amazing beings whom we all take for granted as masters who are above it all - I knew that each of them, during their lives here on earth went through a period in which they were absolutely alone, full of fear and self-doubt, alienated from family and friends who thought they were crazy and sometimes at the brink of death. They had to go through an abyss to reach their enlightened state. I knew that if I were to fulfill my mission, I would eventually have to go through a similar experience, and I was terrified because I didn't think I could do it and didn't want to.
So I basically spent the next 28 years living like a coward. Half of the time, I was trying to regain my family's love and approval (they essentially had disowned me when I withdrew from Columbia to study spiritual things). by working in fine establishments, going to good schools (graduate film school at Columbia, MBA from Duke) etc. Trying to live an ordinary life. Got married, had kids, got divorced, worked in jobs I hated etc. The other half of the time, I would try to follow my spiritual path to appease the masters who had reminded me of my mission. I would quit my ordinary jobs, to write books and screenplays and reach an audience with spiritual teachings. But because I was terrified of going through the abyss process of becoming my true self, my efforts were all half-assed and didn't amount to much. I lived an ineffectual life, never fully committing to the ordinary path or my true path.
To make an already long post shorter, let's just say that finally last year, I did it. I jumped into the abyss.
And last September, after 28 years of off and on searching, I had a phenomenal awakening experience, similar to the one Eckhart Tolle wrote about at the beginning of his classic book, The Power of Now. In a flash, my self-esteem issues evaporated and in the next step, my aura, my entire being exploded and I became one with the entire universe and ever since have been in a perpetual state of bliss. Yes, some days are less wonderful than others, but even when the blissful feeling of oneness and joy is not in the foreground it is always there sustaining me and replenishing me.
Possible Challenges
I wrestled with many different things to focus on in this challenge:
1. To tell the story of my awakening to larger and larger audiences and to share the amazing insights I have been blessed with from my conversations with masters and 28 years of spiritual study. But in a way, I am already moving forward with this. I've written a book that is being considered for publication. By the time this challenge is over, I will have completed and shared a vblog of me telling my story of awakening. This week, I am scheduled to tell my story at a function here in Austin, Texas. I am moving away from doing one-on-one counseling work towards speaking to larger and larger audiences. This goal is huge for me but there is something even bigger. However, I will utilize this challenge to get my story out to the world.
2. Financial freedom. Jumping into the abyss was such a consuming psycho-spiritual process that I dropped everything for a couple of months to focus on it. I had already been out of work for 1.5 years to work on my book and other things, when I felt compelled to abandon everything to focus on my transformation. After my awakening experience, I returned to a mundane reality that was in a tailspin that was impossible to recover from. I lost my apartment and ended up being homeless for the first few months of 2008. (A fascinating and invaluable experience - more on this later). Finally, my friend Roberto invited to be a guest in his home in Austin. So things are better though my financial situation is in dire need of attention. So focusing on financial freedom, being wealthy and debt-free is an important goal for me. But there's something even bigger.
3. Finding my partner. Working on the book, then jumping into the abyss, processing my new state of being, returning to financial stability and fulfilling my mission by trying to get my story and knowledge out into the world has left very little room for romance in my life. Now that I am my Self and love myself, I am so excited about finding my partner and creating a wonderful love relationship. But there is something even bigger.
4. Restoring myself to perfect health. Definitely intend to take strides forward in this area throughout this challenge. But there is something even bigger.
The Something Bigger
If you were to spend the day with me, you might not notice my joy, my light, my bliss. I'm very knowledgeable about spiritual things and so I could answer just about any question you have for me and I'm very intuitive so I can give you great advice. But generally speaking, I keep my light hidden.
Sure when I'm speaking to a group, I let it shine. Occasionally it flashes out in my one-on-one sessions or over a dinner table. If you had a hidden camera on me when I am alone, you would definitely see it. But most of the time, I hide it.
This is outrageous. I have talked to Jesus, Buddha, Mary, Moses - all spiritual masters. I have so many amazing stories and insights to share that could help millions move forward with their process of awakening. Because of my intimate knowledge of the masters, I can demystify their lives and all of the illusions we hold about them and demonstrate that they were just people like us and more importantly, that we are people like them and can thus attain their heights and beyond. I can clarify the arc of human history and explain where humanity is now and what is next for us. I can help people understand the process of awakening and its aftermath so that they will not be so afraid of jumping into the abyss and moving forward on their paths. I can do all this and more, easily - it's what I'm here to do - but most of the time, I'm the quiet guy in the corner, hiding my light.
We live in a time in which the world, the universe, desperately needs each of us to show up in all of our divine glory to tell our stories, share our unique gifts and wisdom and to love and nurture each other.
My goal, my challenge is to let my light shine. To step fully into myself and share the things I'm here to share, and to live my every moment like I know it can be lived. No more momentary flashes of my essence, I want to be turned on all the time. I know how it feels to be turned on completely - I intend to allow myself this gift, this pleasure, this bliss all of the time!
By embracing this challenge, I know that the other possible challenges I listed will be realized as well and probably will be the best way to evaluate my progress.
I will keep you posted. And for starters on this day, my day 1, I will share an affirmation about myself that was given to me years ago:
I AM A STAR. MY LIFE SHINES WITH CREATIVITY, PASSION AND BEAUTY. I BRIGHTEN THE UNIVERSE WITH THE BRILLIANCE OF MY SPIRIT. I MANIFEST ABUNDANCE, INSPIRE FREEDOM AND SHARE JOY THROUGHOUT THE WORLD. I GIVE THANKS!
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