© Lorne CraigA client and I were exploring his anxiety about how he was defining himself, engaging with his job and the world. I asked him what it would be like to trust his Soul. His reply left me in paroxysms of laughter, “How can you trust such a flake, it’s like inviting the hippies to the White House to avoid a war.” It appears that when the ego security is threatened the Soul’s relevance can also become diminished. It was not the first time I have run into this phenomenon with those who believe they are on a Soul journey yet when under pressure they regress into following the ego’s path.
Recently friend was backing away from an opportunity that appeared to have been clearly created from her inner guidance system. When I gently probed what I perceived to be her lack of trust in what appeared to be overt signs and synchronicities pointing the way, she suddenly exclaimed, “But I don’t trust my Soul”. A dream partner of mine almost suffered paralysis at the idea of following guidance that she deemed could run contrary to what she had already decided to do.
In his masterpiece the audio book Through The Dark Wood, Jungian analyst James Hollis puts it this way, “Focus on the external task leads to estrangement from the inner journey of the Soul and pursuit of “The bitch Goddess success.” He also suggests that each of us need to access the inner navigational system that can guide us through the challenges of life. He went on to say, “The alignment of the ego with the will of the Gods – the Soul, is the supreme task for the second half of life.”
Most wisdom systems support the idea that guidance from a deeper place is available to us. The I Ching talks about trusting the sage; Emily Dickenson stated, “the sailor doesn’t see the North but knows the needle can; Rumi’s poem The Great Wagon reminds us, “the breeze at dawn has secrets to tell you, don’t go back to sleep”; in Christianity the Holy Spirit is often considered the Spirit of Truth. There is oceans of support suggesting we have access to a deeper knowledge than that accumulated by the ego. So what prevents people who truly believe in the idea of Soul from accepting the wisdom that can be derived from the deeper self?
I think it comes back to what Hollis describes as the chief delusion of the ego, “it thinks it is in control” The ego thinks it is serving your security needs when in fact it is too limited to see the potential in other options. Unfortunately this is made more complex by the different languages spoken by the Soul and ego. The ego uses language like logic, order, fear, and rationalization.
The Soul uses the language of sign and symbol, synchronicity and serendipity, intuition and dreams. To trust the Soul requires an act of discernment. I suspect the very language of the Soul is uncomfortable and feels unworthy of trust to the Ego. Thus explaining why my client used the word “flakey”. We are so imbued with the logical/rational perspective of the world that we struggle to look beyond it into a world of potentiality.
In my book Life’s Little Book for Big Decisions, I explore the variety of languages of inner wisdom and the importance of developing ways to open up to our inner wisdom. That we need to find the languages that speaks to each of us. I recommend an ongoing practice to build faith and trust in the Soul. Keep a Soul Journal where you keep a record of your personal interaction with the amazing mystery in which we all participate. Write about the moments of magic in your life, about how synchronicity played a significant role in shaping the future, about dreams that carried specific wisdom and guidance, about moments of where you had a glimpse into the Mystery.
Visionary and mystic William Blake once wrote, “If the doors of perception were cleansed, man would see everything as it is – infinite. For man has closed himself up until he sees all things through the narrow chink of his cavern.” O
Is it time to open up the prison of your narrow vision and capture some of magic of this amazing universe. The ego is supposed to be the servant of the Soul not the master.
SoulClarity 