How Long Will You Put Off What You're Dying To Do?

What if all the things we've been taught were wrong? What if all those millions of things our parents, and school teachers, and church elders told us were just wrong? Things like, “you have to work hard to get anywhere in life”. Or, “get there early, stay late, give your all and one day you'll have a home of your own”. Or, my favorite, “nothing in life is free”. What if, after all those many years of hearing all those many things...they were wrong? What if?

I've been thinking about this a lot lately. Perhaps because all of what I've learned seems so inapplicable to me now. Perhaps because I've been really giving great measure to what are surely limiting beliefs. Perhaps...I'm finally at a place where the rules I've been told were the “right ones” no longer seem right. Because here's what comes to mind every time one of those old teachings floats into my brain:
“Nope. Don't think so. I think you got it all wrong.”

If you think that doesn't unnerve someone, you're mistaken. It's utterly unnerving to examine beliefs you've held for your entire lifetime and realize that most of them just don't make sense anymore. It's quite possible they never made sense. I just hadn't taken the time or given thought to them. I was a good little robotron, motoring along doing what I was 'supposed' to do. I was my father's daughter.

Recently I came across something that knocked me right off my steady little boat. It was just a short little missive I received via email. It read:

“....money is not the issue. Having the courage to give your highest gift is the issue....
There is no security in doing something for a living when you are dying inside while doing it. That is taking care of the body at the expense of the soul. And a withering soul cannot help but produce a withering body. So do not think you are "taking care of yourself" by killing your spirit to keep your body alive.

How long will you put off what you are dying to do?”

It struck me so hard, I had to read it a dozen times before I trusted what my eyes were seeing, and my brain was refusing to register. It sounds simple enough. But the reason it struck such a chord was that for the past two years, I've been experiencing a 'withering' of my own. My physical body has been going through the most excruciating things. But all along the way, I've been completely convinced it was all 'for a reason'. I was (& still am) certain that it was my Spirit's way of getting my attention. Because, you see, I'd been 'dying' inside while I tried so hard to 'make a living'. How stupid is that? Well, I suppose it's not so much stupid as it is ignorant. There's a difference there. Stupid is doing something when you know better. Ignorance? Well, you just don't know any better. Big difference.

In my ignorance, following blindly the lessons I'd been taught, I scratched and clawed and tried so hard to do what I thought would make my parents proud. I wanted to “make something of myself”. I wanted to prove I was smart enough, good enough, talented enough. I wanted so much to be what they tried so hard to have me be. Oh brother.

When the malady began, at first, I was simply stunned. I was such a healthy, active person, it just didn't make any sense. How could this be happening to me? How could someone so strong and agile and vibrant suddenly turn into a giant ball of pain? I felt like my body had been petrified. You know. Like a tree. Have you ever seen a petrified tree? It is as hard as stone. Unbending. Cold. NOT what a tree is. That's what it felt like. Somewhere along the way, I'd turned into a petrified Being.

Ouch.

Small wonder that little missive struck so hard. All of a sudden, it all made perfect sense. I felt a rush of tingling course through my body. I heard bells going off in my head. I had this innate sense that what I'd been thinking (about this physical manifestation) was exactly what was going on. I'd spent a lifetime trying to be who and what I am not. I'd denied all the many whispers that wanted so badly to be heard. I was too lost in a haze of numbness to even have a clue. I was, for all intents and purposes, dead.

It's a pretty mind-boggling thing to have such realizations. Some call them 'epiphanies'. Others may call them miracles. You can call it what you want. All I know is, something shifted the moment I finally got those words. I could feel it. Still do. I feel it all the way to the bones that have been screaming for these past couple of years. My beautiful, pain-filled bones are doing a little dance. They're having a party. They're sending out signals to all the rest of Me.

The message reads:

“Halleluiah! Whaddya know! She finally got it!”

Now, wouldn't it be something if I woke up tomorrow and the pain was gone?

Can't wait to see. In fact, I'm expecting it. I've heard tell that is what the 'secret' is all about.