Personal Mastery

When September Ends

/ Lauri Ann Lumby / Leave a comment

I’m hoping that what comes through me here today provides some sort of comfort, or at the very least, validation and affirmation for the small community that finds its way here.

September sucked.

I can’t even begin to point at the whys or the hows of it, but September was a truly challenging month, for me, and for many others I know. I would be easy to point our fingers at the obvious – certain political and global events that cast the world into a frenzy. But that’s only on the macro. Closer to home, it seems that every person I know was faced with some sort of bizarre fuckery during the strange month of September.

For me, the strangeness included bizarre human behaviors, out of left-field conflicts, unhealthy people trying to project their unhealed shit on me, and over $600.00 in unexpected expenses.

All of the above is pretty much par for the course, but when I’m draining what little I have of a savings account to cover September’s extra expenses, I find myself in a place of real doubt and fear, and all of my most vulnerable questions resurface.

“Not having enough ($)” really is my core fear and the one that has been the most stubborn lesson for me in this life.

So this morning, as I dared to look at my checking account balance, and felt the visceral fears arise, I did the only thing I know to do:

I prayed.

Then I was led to a few resources that provided comfort and reassurance. In these I was reminded that THIS MOMENT is a temporary thing. THIS MOMENT is not the herald of doom.  Neither is it the object of my fate.

I was also reminded of the strange miracles that happened in the midst of September’s perceived struggles – miracles that arose out of what initially felt like doom. Certain ghosts of my past paid me a visit and, in these visits, old wounds and deep pain resurfaced. But once I was able to identify the theme, the miracle appeared, and a profound reconciliation took place.

This is what happens with struggle when we allow ourselves to BE WITH IT instead of trying to run away. I didn’t run when the ghosts re-emerged. I allowed myself to be with the depth of emotion and the heights of the pain. I sat with it. I raged. I wept. I raged some more.

Same with the money. I see the fear. I am aware of it. I’m fully conscious of the doubts that surface when I’m in the glut – mostly I question my place in this world and what I’m doing “wrong” with this one life I have. But like ghosts, I sit with the fear. I feel it. I pray. I ask for guidance.

This morning the guidance came. Recently, I have included a daily reading of poetry into my practice. This morning, these words from Mary Oliver pierced my anxious mind:

“Going to Walden is not so easy a thing

As a green visit. It is a slow and difficult

Trick of living, and finding it where you are.”

THIS!  We’re all looking for “Walden,” aren’t we? No matter how we define that, we are looking for that place of peace. Thoreau sought it and found it in his time at Walden Pond, but it was not the pond itself that was the source of peace. Thoreau discovered the true source of peace was within him – but he had to get quiet enough to find it. Walden gave him that quiet.

Whereas we are tempted to believe that escaping the hustle and bustle of our everyday life and struggles is what we need to find this peace, Oliver points out that everywhere is Walden. Rather, WE are Walden. What we are seeking is right here, right now, exactly where we are, and whatever is transpiring around us. We just need to be still enough, and willing to FEEL the full extent of our unease, to find it. Peace is where we are – no matter where, what, or how that is.

September comes. September ends. And still our fears remain. We do not, however, need to be the victim of those fears. Allowing ourselves to be with whatever struggles life hands us, while identifying and being with the resulting fears, is ultimately the pathway to peace.

THIS MOMENT is not our fate. Instead, it is the source of our salvation – when we have the courage to be with it….because as is always the case, “this too shall pass.”

What struggles did September bring to you?  How did you find your way through them?

The Magdalene Order of Melchizedek is a 2-year training program providing participants instruction, guidance and support in the deep work of inner liberation.

Learn more here.

Not Your Celebrity’s Kabbalah

/ Lauri Ann Lumby / Leave a comment

Welcome to the official launch of my newly revisioned Order of Melchizedek Training!  This is a training that has been around for awhile, but which needed to be reconfigured – certain courses removed, and others added. Additionally, as times have changed, so too have the images related to this intensive training program. Without further ado, let me introduce you to the newly envisioned Magdalene Order of Melchizedek – the primordial tradition of mysticism and magic.

In short, the Magdalene Order of Melchizedek training is a comprehensive and intensive dive into the most ancient systems of personal growth and transformation which later influenced and inspired Hebrew, Gnostic, Coptic, Orthodox, and Christian schools of mysticism. Whereas these ancient systems bear no identifiable origin or name, they have been most clearly articulated through the Jewish Kabbalah.

The Magdalene Order of Melchizedek, however, is not your celebrity’s Kabbalah. This training bears no resemblance to the “red string” Kabbalah that has been lauded by pop stars and the Hollywood elite. We do not promise wealth, outside power, or fame.  

Neither is this training an attempt to appropriate the closely guarded Jewish mystical schools. As I am neither Jewish, nor have I studied with modern Jewish masters, it would not be appropriate for me to claim knowledge of their methods.

Instead, drawing from (as close to as possible) original source material and incorporating my lifetime(s) of cross-cultural mystical and theological studies, this training gets to the heart of the mystical intention which is, and has always been – UNION. Union with Source (that which some might call God), Union with our truest Self (what some might call our “God-self”), and Union with all of Creation.

LOVE is the ultimate goal of this training. LOVE, not of intellect or emotion, but LOVE that is embodied. Embodied Love is arrived at through a thorough and deep process of identifying, healing, and transforming all that is within us that has forgotten we are Love.

To support and facilitate Embodied Love, the Magdalene Order of Melchizedek guides you through ancient symbols, tools, and practices that illuminate the woundedness within us that seeks to be healed, while providing the foundation for healing those wounds. You are additionally supported through one-on-one mentoring.

The Magdalene Order of Melchizedek is not for the faint of heart. Neither is this a shiny object to be claimed. Instead, it is a deeply personal, intimate, and often challenging process for catalyzing change with an eye toward empowerment that endures. As creator and facilitator of this training, I will hold your feet to the fire, while providing comfort and encouragement through that fire. The Magdalene Order of Melchizedek is not a process to do alone, but only in the company of one who has walked that fire before you.

Learn more here

When Your Demons Come Home to Roost

/ Lauri Ann Lumby / Leave a comment

Letters from Hell #6

Today is a bad day. This has been a difficult weekend. For no (every) reason whatsoever, I have been feeling profoundly sad bordering on depressed. This is a stuck kind of sorrow compounded by a prescription antidepressant that makes it really difficult for me to cry. I feel like I’ve got a 20 ton boulder sitting on my chest, just behind my sternum.

Usually, I know what to do with this kind of sorrow.  I sit with it. I allow myself to feel it. I apply Tonglen or Ho’oponopono to it. This time, neither seem to be budging the load.

I allowed myself a weekend of self-care. I planned for nothing and allowed myself to simply rest. I didn’t much have a choice as I’ve also been feeling the consequences of autumn allergies. To put it bluntly I feel like SH*T. I don’t do well when I’m sick. I tend to fall into judgment, self-loathing, and self-flagellation at the hands of my inner critic who looks an awful lot like the “Shame nun” from Game of Thrones. “Shame.  Shame.  Shame.”

I’m not good at being vulnerable. I feel embarrassed and ashamed. I don’t want to invite anyone into my vulnerability. There is really nothing anyone can say that will make it better when I’m feeling this way. I know I just need to wait it out.

This morning I wrote in my journal.  These are the words that surfaced:

Taking this moment to pause. Suffering fall allergies and the pure exhaustion of a forced life. How much have I forced my self to be and do ____________ instead of just being myself. I’m tired. I feel stuck, but I’m not sure I really care. I’ve worn out my dreams.

I’ve worn out my dreams.

My dreams of a forever love.

Dreams of becoming a successful writer.

Fantasies of becoming a sought-after teacher.

Herein lies at least one face of this deep sorrow. I’m grieving. I’m grieving the failure of the goals, wishes, and dreams I had for my life and which I pursued with a vengeance. No one can say that I didn’t try (though I know some who will tell me I didn’t try hard enough or in the right way – to them I say, whatever).

Life doesn’t always give us what we want. And when we don’t get what we want, we can be like Sisyphus vainly attempting to roll the boulder up the mountain, killing ourselves in the process, or step aside, letting gravity take the boulder to where it naturally wants to go.

At some point in our lives, we are all faced with a crowd of our unrealized dreams. We can cling to or try to revive these dreams, or we can surrender to the fact that maybe these dreams were never meant to be fulfilled and/or that the journey was the point, and not the destination.

It still makes me mad. I know what my gifts are and on some days it just kills me to know that they are not being utilized.

I grieve this as well.

As the Rolling Stones once said, “You can’t always get what you want, but if you try sometime, you’ll find, you get what you need.” (Hmmm….that might be bullshit too….unless they’re including getting what we need only by the skin of our teeth.)

Being human is hard. Today is one of those days where it feels especially hard. I don’t like feeling sad or vulnerable. I don’t appreciate the demons of self-doubt, personal loathing, or shame that dance around in my head when I’m feeling this way. I also know better than to try to “change my thoughts” (toxic positivity) in an attempt to make the demons go away.

Instead, I sit with the demons. I call each of them forward. And I do my best to LOVE them. Each of them arose out of some kind of need – whether it be the need to belong, the need to believe the lies of perceived authority, or to keep me in compliance with the system, they came as some kind of support. Additionally, they show up to remind me of the deep pain I’m still carrying from trauma I’ve experienced in my life, along with an invitation to tend to yet another deeper layer of that pain that is now ready to be seen, felt, processed and released.

As is always true of the spiritual journey – wash, rinse repeat. So back to the demons I go to hear what they have to offer me in the way of healing this time.

Thank you sirs, may I have another.

Navigating Loneliness

/ Lauri Ann Lumby / 1 Comment

Loneliness is a natural consequence of spiritual awakening. As we grow spiritually, turning inward to come to know and more fully embrace our true selves, we find the world and the life we were living less satisfying. We find ourselves seeing the illusion and falsehoods of the traditional systems of the world and find these increasingly uncomfortable. We find that we no longer fit in with the jobs, people, and experiences to which we had been giving time and attention. As we grow spiritually, we find that we never really did fit into these roles, but that these were just masks we wore to be accepted and acceptable to the system.

The more we tend to our inner journey, the less interest we have in spending time or energy with anyone or on anything that isn’t supportive of our truth. We cut away the relationships that are harmful or draining while cultivating a more peaceful and gentle life. Eventually, we discover that our “friend” circle has become very small – made up mostly of other people who have done similar spiritual work on themselves – and our relationships with these people are less about a need for belonging or gaining acceptance, and more about mutual sharing, support, and respect.

The need to belong is one of the greatest hurdles to becoming whole. The need to belong arises out of a codependent need for acceptance, and the price of that belonging is often no less than our souls. We lose ourselves in our compulsive need to be loved and accepted when the only love we truly need is the love we have for ourselves. Many become stunted in their spiritual growth because they are afraid of losing that (false) sense of belonging and because they are afraid of being alone.

Being alone is in fact one of the greatest gifts we can give to ourselves. It is in solitude that we are quiet and still enough for our deepest wounds, unhealed traumas, unnamed and unmanaged fears have the room to surface. It is because of this predictable dynamic that many avoid the solitude that their soul desperately needs. Loneliness is one of the aspects of our conditioning that surfaces in that space of being alone.

Loneliness is at once natural, and a conditioned response based on fear. As a species, it has been demonstrated that we need community to survive. Being wholly alone is not healthy for anyone. We need human interaction. As a species, we are interdependent. We could not survive without the collaborative work of the pack – each individual sharing their own unique gifts for the sake of their own fulfillment, and in service to the all. Loneliness, in this case, is a gentle reminder that we need human connection.

Loneliness as a response to fear, however, is less about our natural inclination toward tribal interaction, and more about the shield that flies up in protection of the ego (false self) when we are getting closest to our deepest wounds. The ego could be said to have its own life based on conditioning and on the fears that keep us imprisoned in the system. The ego defends itself when it feels threatened. It does not want us to heal or grow because with every step toward healing, a piece of the ego dies. Loneliness is one of the shields the ego throws up in defense of itself.

When loneliness arises in our consciousness, our first inclination is to find a solution to loneliness – to make it go away. We desperately seek after anything that will fill that emptiness that accompanies loneliness. Some turn to food, drugs, or alcohol. Others turn to compulsive activity. Others seek for someone (anyone) to make them feel less alone. Sometimes, the someone arrives disguised as love, but most often proves itself to be just another face of dysfunction.

These efforts to fill the hole left behind by loneliness will always fail, as the result of these attempts are fleeting and impermanent at best. Eventually, we end up right back in a pit of loneliness, except this time, the pit has grown deeper.

The actual remedy to loneliness exists, not in resisting it or trying to make it go away, but in being with the loneliness to find out what it has to say to us. What is the fear that loneliness has hiding behind or beneath it? Is it the fear that we are not loved? Is it the fear that we are alone? Is it the fear that we are insignificant and have nothing to share in the world? Once we can identify the fear, then we can do the work of healing it, and in that healing, becoming free of that fear.

One of the greatest gifts I have given to myself, was a 30 day loneliness practice. I was somewhat newly divorced and thinking I needed to find a new person who would love me. It turned out the person I was really looking for to love me was myself. The loneliness practice supported me in arriving at that knowledge and in doing the healing work that allowed me to be mostly free of loneliness.

For the loneliness practice, I turned to Tonglen. Tonglen is a mindfulness practice from the Tibetan Buddhist practice that supports us in being with our pain, our loneliness, and our fears.  Being with these wounded aspects of ourselves allows us to be healed of them. Here are my instructions for Tonglen taken from my online course “Starting a Spiritual Practice:”

Tonglen—a Tibetan Buddhist Healing Practice

Tonglen is a simple breathing and visualization practice that helps us to release powerful,

negative feelings and emotions.  Instinctively, when we experience a negative feeling or  

emotion, we are compelled to push the feeling away.  Tonglen invites us to do the opposite – to bring the feeling in so that it can be healed, transformed and released.

1) First, we FEEL the feeling. We allow ourselves to welcome it instead of pushing it away.

2) As we feel the feeling, we identify where in our body we are feeling it. 

3) If possible, we name the feeling (is it shame, hatred, anger, resentment, sorry, guilt, betrayal, etc.)

4) After we have identified where in our body we are feeling and feeling and if possible,

identified what the feeling is, then we breathe into the feeling.  More specifically, we breathe into the place in our body where we are feeling the feeling….while allowing ourselves to feel it. 

5) After breathing into the feeling, we breathe out love. While breathing our love, we might

also visualize what love looks like—maybe it is light and it has a color, perhaps it is the shape of a heart or the wind.  

6) As we breathe out love, we imagine it going out into the world, maybe even to any person

or persons who may be somehow connected to the negative emotion we are feeling. 

7) We continue this process of feeling the feeling, breathing it into our bodies and breathing

out love until we either feel a shift, or simply run out of time.  If during the practice we find

ourselves brought to tears, this layer of pain or woundedness has been freed and released.

8) Tonglen can be turned to again and again and again for the release of negative emotional

states.  We can us it both symptomatically (as a negative feelings arises) or therapeutically

(for example, daily if working on deep seated negative emotions or old and lingering emo

tional wounds).  

To free ourselves from the imprisonment of loneliness and its resulting fear, apply Tonglen to loneliness. With this I recommend a two-pronged approach. The first is a foundational approach.  In this, set aside 10-20 minutes each day to be with loneliness, applying the practice of Tonglen. The second is the symptomatic approach. WHEN you find yourself feeling lonely, apply Tonglen to that loneliness. Tonglen can be done at any time, anywhere, no matter what activity you are engaged in. It is a powerful tool for freeing ourselves from the loneliness that might otherwise drive us to act in non-loving or unhealthy ways toward ourselves. Tonglen also allows us to be freedom of the ego’s shield of loneliness so that we might increasingly escape the system that keeps us imprisoned in the false self, thereby freeing us to live more and more as our truest self.

Lauri Ann Lumby, MATP, provides one-on-one mentoring and support for those who are in the process of their spiritual journey and who are awakening to their highest selves and their most authentic truth. Lauri helps you to shed the layers of the ego made up of conditioning, past wounds and trauma, and fear so that your Soul might be free to live as its truest self.

Learn more here.

Seeking Refuge in Hell

/ Lauri Ann Lumby / Leave a comment

Letters from Hell #5

Increasingly, people I know and with whom I am close are retreating from the everyday world. Me included. This retreat is partly an act of self-preservation, but even more so, it is a result of their awakening.

The self-preservation piece is obvious. People no longer want to be part of a world that is built on fear, power, and control. They no longer want to participate in the violent division that currently defines our world. They no longer want to fight or even be witness to the ignorance and hatred that fuels the fires of the hell humanity has created for itself. Instead, they are choosing peace and a sense of safety over ongoing conflict. They are choosing to separate from the noise so they may enjoy quiet. They are retreating into a sanctuary of their own making, based on what they have come to learn about themselves and their truest needs, wants, and desires.

This brings me to the awakening part. A dear spiritual brother recently shared with me a lecture given on the “disappearing” that was once predicted by Carl Jung. In short, Jung theorized that as human beings become individuated (Abraham Maslow called this self-actualization), they would come to realize that the system in which they were conditioned to participate no longer works for them. They see the system for what it is – false, abusive, and harmful and begin to find ways to detach themselves from the system. As they do so, they discover what their soul really wants and needs to feel whole, and they begin to choose that. For many, this choice leads them away from the outside world and into a space that is more quiet, peaceful, content, and gentle. This quiet place becomes their refuge from a world in which they no longer belong (if they ever really did).

This choice for refuge is available to all of us, when we so-choose it. Whether actively individuating, or simply wanting to find peace in a world at war with itself, finding refuge is simple:

  1. STOP engaging with the divisive tactics of the hell in which we are living. Don’t participate in the arguments, the projections, or the blame.
  2. Embrace the position of objective witness. Observe the dying world without reaction. See it. Observe it. Make note of it. But don’t get sucked into it.
  3. WHEN the dying world triggers your fears and unhealed wounds, instead of reacting out of those fears, STOP and engage in the many spiritual tools you have for easing and transmuting those fears.
  4. Start, or double-down on your daily spiritual practice. Make this your number one priority.  
  5. Be mindful of how and with whom you want to spend your time. Say NO to those people and activities that drain you or compel you to engage in division.
  6. Make your home a sanctuary. Gather around you the things that give you comfort and make you feel safe.
  7. Cultivate a routine of self-care. Choose at least ONE activity per day that feeds your soul – read, write, take a walk in nature, visit an art gallery, have coffee with a dear friend, watch a movie or documentary that informs or inspires. Cook a wholesome and delicious meal.
  8. Nap. The violence and discord of the dying world makes us tired. Get extra sleep and nap when you need to.
  9. Tell the “should” voice in your head to SHUT T.F. UP. “Should” is one of the strongest weapons of conditioning and is one of the ways we remain tied to the system. Cut the cord. Let it go. DO what you love and let the non-loving conditioning go.

Whether we acknowledge that the world we are living in is a kind of hell, or are simply outgrowing the conditioning that has kept us imprisoned by the system, refuge is necessary in our journey of finding peace and contentment in our lives. That refuge is available to you right now, if you so-choose.

Simple Tools for Finding Refuge

Hell Isn’t All Bad

/ Lauri Ann Lumby / Leave a comment

Letters from Hell #4

Living in hell isn’t all bad. Hell definitely has its perks:

  1. Living in hell allows us to clearly see the world humanity has created for itself – one that springs forth out of fear and which seeks after power and control in the hopes of mitigating that fear.
  2. Living in hell shows us daily the consequences of this quest for power – greed, gluttony, and the violence that humanity wields in their never-ending quest for MORE.
  3. Hell has been increasingly peeling back the layers of humanity’s corruption and all the lies that have been cultivated to justify injustice.
  4. Hell allows us to see who people truly are, including the lies they continue to tell themselves so they might benefit from the system hell created.
  5. Hell also shows us who we are not.
  6. Every second of every day, hell shows us the system that allows for its survival, along with how to escape that system – if only we would pay attention.

The doorway into hell is the same path by which we can escape. Humanity, as a collective, is not doomed to an eternity in hell. As individuals, we are not condemned to waiting for everyone else to wake up before we can make our own escape. The steps necessary for our escape are simple:

  1. We willing to see the hell-system for what it is – a system that is based on and manipulates us through fear.
  2. Harness the skills of observation required to identify all the seemingly infinite ways in which the system is attempting to manipulate you through fear (or shame).
  3. When you notice the system attempting to trigger your fear/shame – SAY NO!
  4. Instead of giving into the fear, STOP and turn your gaze inward – what is the fear that is being triggered? Where did you first experience this fear/shame?
  5. Engage in the mindfulness/meditation practices that you have for releasing/healing/transforming that fear.
  6. Wash, rinse, repeat.

As the journey into hell was created by a thousand steps, so too is the journey out. Escaping hell is all about identifying every wound, trauma, fear, and past conditioning that ties us to the system, and then unraveling ourselves from them. The journey out of hell is about healing through heightened awareness, and radical personal accountability. The more we see the ways in which the system controls us, the more power we have for making our escape.

Whereas the cacophony of the system wants us to believe otherwise, hell is not what the majority of humanity wants. At our core, most of us yearn for peace. We long for connection. We ache for compassion and kindness. And we’re driven toward justice. To escape hell, we cannot allow the system to convince us otherwise – for humanity is made of Love and it will ultimately be to Love that we will return.

For Support Along the Journey:

2 year training package
Transforming Fears
Self-Awareness
One-on-One support

The High Cost of Othering

/ Lauri Ann Lumby / 6 Comments

This post is not about Charlie Kirk – but if the shoe fits (shrug emoji)

I don’t understand why this is the case, but human beings seem to be pre-programmed to create division. I admit that I too am sometimes guilty of creating division in my mind even as my highest intention is toward unity and oneness. To some degree, I’m not sure we can help wanting to put each other into categories that define human beings by self-created divisions like religion, race, nationality, gender, etc. As much as we maybe can’t help separating ourselves, there is a cost to this dividing – as world events continue to show us.

It seems that the highest cost of this division arises out of, “othering.”  Characterized by polarizing terms like “us” and “them,” othering happens when an individual who identifies themselves as part of a particular human-made category (ie: Christian) then places this membership as higher than or better than the seemingly opposing category (ie: not Christian). Othering creates the false belief that the category/group to which one “belongs” is more right than other human categories. This othering pits those in the “favored” group against those who are not of this group. In the world as we know it today, this othering is easily recognized in such divisions as:

  • White/people of color
  • Republican/Democrat
  • Christian/everyone else (and then every us vs them division within Christianity and even within an individual Christian community)
  • Rich/poor
  • Educated/uneducated
  • Those who know/those who don’t
  • Straight/Queer
  • Male/Female

Othering arises out of ignorance (as in lack of information). Othering surfaces when one’s response to what one doesn’t understand is judgment. Judgment is one way in which humans have learned to temporarily ease the natural anxiety that arises in the face of what we do not know. Unless that judgment is corrected through curiosity and wonder, human beings will turn that judgment into a weapon. Weaponizing othering is the ultimate price of this division – the consequences of which we are seeing increasingly every day.

Us vs. them does not work. Instead, it pits humanity against humanity. Dividing human against each other results in misunderstandings at best, genocide at worst. “Us vs. Them” is what created Nazi Germany and what has led to the wholesale destruction of Palestine and its people. “Us vs. them” is what compels humans to create laws that punish anyone they perceive to be different than them. “Us vs. them” causes an individual to pick up a gun and assassinate an individual or shoot up a whole school. “Us vs them” is what causes one to celebrate a person sowing division as a martyr.

Othering, at the end of the day, is an uninformed choice. It is judgment in the face of what we do not know or understand. Judgment is a defensive reaction to anxiety, one that many have not learned to move beyond. Fear in the face of the unknown is natural, but when we allow ourselves to acknowledge the anxiety and move past it to curiosity, then we are able to seek after the knowledge we need to make the unknown known. When the unknown is known, it no longer presents a perceived threat. Coming to know the unknown helps to build a foundation of understanding that then allows us to sow harmony instead of conflict, unity instead of division, and collaboration over competition. If humanity seeks to survive it will only do so when we stop creating “the other” and seek, instead, to learn and understand our unique gifts and how that diversity is what, ultimately, makes us one.

Being Soft

/ Lauri Ann Lumby / Leave a comment

For my entire life, I have been hard. I have worked hard. In school, I studied hard. I have been hard on myself by creating high expectations of myself. I have been hard on others by projecting the expectations I have for myself on them. I have tended to a strict moral code. I have been a master of discipline, persistence, tenacity, and work ethic. I hold myself to the highest of integrity – while expecting others to do the same. I have been hard on my physical, emotional, and mental self by forcing my body into my own dysmorphic idea of “perfect weight and size,” by stuffing my emotions (don’t let them see you cry), by covering deep hurt with rage and unmet needs with resentment. I love deeply, but when wronged, the ax falls. Because of life’s many heartbreaks and betrayals, I have built a shield of armor around me in an effort to keep myself safe.

All this hardness has given me the illusion of being safe and made me feel like I was meeting society’s expectations of achievement.

We are conditioned, after all, that we are only valued based on what we achieve.

Straight A students are lauded by parents, teachers and other authority figures (while being despised by their fellow students for being a smarty pants and a showoff). Valedictorians get into good schools and receive scholarships. Those who earn a doctoral degree secure positions of prestige at universities. Skinny girls are more loved and popular than those with curves.

Right!?

WRONG!

If there is anything that life has taught me, it is this:

Our value has absolutely nothing to do with how we look, what we do, or what we have achieved. Instead, our value is intrinsic in our very being.

As the prophet Isaiah quoted Source as saying:

You are precious and glorious in my sight, and I love you. (Isaiah 43: 4)

As I have increasingly come to understand this and have done the work of healing the wounds within me that have then allowed the Love within me to be more fully known, what has been hard in me has become more soft. I no longer seek after a size 6 body (menopause took care of ever thinking that would once again be a possibility). Instead, I’m working on accepting a curvaceous post-menopausal form. I’m no longer seeking after achievement, recognition, or fame. Instead, I’ve learned to embrace the gift of invisibility along with the precious few who can actually see me. I’ve come to understand that my work in the world is mostly done on invisible planes and what is done in this world, is meant for a rare and precious few. I’m still disciplined as I find I do better with a structure of some sort in place, but I’m also more flexible with my time and can even embrace DOING NOTHING (gasp!). I’m more forgiving of myself and of others (though the betrayal rule remains in place – betray me or take advantage of my generosity and I reserve the right to sever that connection). My heart is wide but fragile. I reserve the right to protect it as I see fit.

Being soft is also a mindset. Instead of walking like an elephant through the world, can I move more gently? Instead of always hurrying, can I begin to slow down? Instead of punishing myself with all of my conditioned shoulds (I should be able to drive when and where I want. I should go outside. I should take a walk. I should…..), can I be more kind in my expectations of self and allow myself to simply be?

After a life of being hard, I think it’s time I embrace being soft.

Shining a Light on Reality

/ Lauri Ann Lumby / 4 Comments

This past Thursday morning, I was gifted with a dream that felt more like a lesson or an attunement than merely a dream. In this dream, I was visited by other-worldly beings (aliens? angels? Who knows!?). I was together with a group of spiritual companions, and a light was being shined upon us, that light reached out to enfold a multitude of human beings – too many to count. As the light was shining upon us, I heard, “These are the people who are opened to and have made a commitment to being and living as the fullness of Love.” I then saw the light shining on a second multitude of humans. As the second multitude was engulfed in this light, I heard, “These are the people who can yet be awakened by Love.” Finally, the light shined on a third group. About this group I heard, “These are those who are unwilling to be opened by Love.” Finally, the other worldly beings spoke these words: “This is how it has been. This is as it shall be. This is how it is.”

It has taken me several days to process (I’m still processing) what took place in that dream and to notice the effect the light and the words had upon me. As the days have unfolded, I have felt an opening and a softening in me of the hopes I have held out for humanity. More pointedly, this dream has made me keenly aware of my tendency to judge and the disappointment and sense of deep sorrow I feel when coming face to face with humans who are unwilling to know Love.

All my life I have found myself heartbroken when individuals, or the collective, demonstrate bigotry, cruelty and/or violence toward another human. Why would anyone choose cruelty? Why aren’t people eager to know and practice Love? For what reason would one turn away from the deep healing that occurs as we open ourselves more and more fully to Love?

By Love, I’m not talking about romantic love, parental love, or even collegial love. Instead, I’m speaking of the “Love that surpasses all understanding” (Eph 3:19). The Love that is our Source (what some might call God). The Love that makes up all the Universe. The Love that is our true and original nature. This is the Love that dwells within us always and to which we can turn as we seek healing of separation and for all the traumas and wounds we have experienced in our life. Love provides us with an opportunity to more and more fully embody our truest self. Refusing that Love keeps us imprisoned by the tragedies of life and the conditioning that causes us to remain in shame.

In my own life, I have experienced the transformational power of this Love. Love has helped me to release resentment. Love has helped me soften my judgment and grow in compassion. Love has supported me in peeling away sixty years of conditioning, trauma, and woundedness, to find an even deeper Love waiting to be known. Further, Love has helped me to be forgiving and compassionate toward myself for all the times I am imperfect in Love.

Because of the benefits I have experienced from Love, I believed that everyone would want to know that kind of Love. I have spent a lifetime trying to be that Love while providing opportunities for others to do the same. In this work, I have experienced receptivity, suspicion, and flat-out refusal. Until this dream, I found myself perplexed by this refusal. Why would anyone refuse the opportunity to know and live from Love? The reality, as the dream reminded me, is that many do not want to or are unable to be open to the healing power of Love. Proof of this reality is in the millions of examples we are given each day of human beings choosing gluttony over temperance, lust for power over fortitude, wrath over mercy, envy over love, greed over generosity, sloth over knowledge, and pride over humility. Since time immemorial, there have been human beings who have refused Love, and in doing so, have refused themselves.

It is what it is. There is nothing I/we can do to change this. There are humans already doing the work of Love. There are humans open to being awakened by Love. And there are those, no matter what we do, who will flat out refuse it.

Today, I am working on acceptance of this reality. In each moment that I consciously acknowledge this truth, I find myself freer to focus my energy and attention on those open to Love, and less on the disappointment I feel when that Love is refused. Acceptance of this truth also presents me with a question – how am I choosing to be Love – especially toward those who outright refuse and in this refusal continue to act in cruel and hateful ways?

Growing in Love is a life-long journey!

Rising Above the Chaos

/ Lauri Ann Lumby / Leave a comment

As the world as we know it continues in its collapse, there are bound to be times of unbridled chaos:

  • Chaos created by those who stand to lose power.
  • Chaos manifesting as distractions, impulsive actions, and irrational and rash decisions.
  • Chaos instigated as an attempt to control a narrative.
  • Chaos created in the hopes of causing confusion.
  • Chaos as the reaction to above-mentioned chaos by those unable or unwilling to acknowledge their own anxiety and sense of unease in the face of said-chaos.
  • Chaos in the irrational anger, frustration, and impatience that arises in the face of unacknowledged and unmanaged fear.

Human-created chaos and human-reactions to chaos, most simply, are symptoms of the death throes of a world imploding. When the life we have known approaches its end, humans’ initial tendency is to cling to what has been, and that clinging most often manifests in rash attempts to manipulate and control their own dying.

Death, however, cannot be controlled. When a way of being has lived out its usefulness, it comes to a natural end. Nothing can stop it. Neither should one try.

In the face of a dying, however, humans are rarely rational. This is especially true in those who do not know how to acknowledge or manage the natural fears that arise in the face of endings. This unacknowledged and unmanaged anxiety comes out sideways in angry, rash, impulsive, and often irrational actions. These actions can be enormously obvious such as deploying military troops “to help eliminate crime” in areas where crime has already been effectively managed, or as subtle as rudeness or road rage.

No one is immune to the natural fear of endings. We have two choices in the face of these fears: allowing the collective chaos to sweep us away in a storm of our own anxiety and worry, thereby triggering our own responses to fear; or acknowledging the anxiety that we are feeling and employing the tools and resources we have for mitigating and managing fear.

Tools for managing the fears we naturally experience in the face of a dying world (as we know it) include: medication, meditation, movement, music, mindfulness and mindful actions and activities. Mindful activities can include anything from cooking to gardening, hiking, exercise, making love, and more. Really, anything that allows us to rise above, or move beneath the chaos of a world in its death throes works. It doesn’t matter what form our practice takes. What matters is it allows us to be present with our anxiety and move through it so we are no longer a prisoner of our own anxiety, or vulnerable to the fear-driven actions of others; but instead, we are peaceful, content, and safe as the world around us goes up in flames.

How are you rising above or moving below the chaos to find your own place of comfort and safety?