KALA AND KALI...AND TRAUMA (a shifting perspective)

KALA is the Sanskrit word for time. KALI, the great compassionate and fierce goddess, also is the taker of time/keeper of time/dissolver of time.

Kali is greatly compassionate when we offer ourselves to Her for our awakening. She becomes fierce in the face of obstacles when we are sternly attached to our identities.

With time everything is taken. I had a patient the other day say that she felt amazing after her treatment and wished she could hold onto the feeling. I said be present with what is because "good" and "bad" are only temporary in the face of consciousness and holding on to anything brings great sorrow and misery.

When we hold onto anything, there is pain that follows its loss since nothing is constant. Everything is a passing expression on the canvas of consciousness. Be with what is and know that misery is as transient as pleasure.

In these current days, I am experiencing great inner churning and upheaval, along with turbulence. There is a "presence" that is witnessing and untouched by the actual impressions that there is an awareness of. Yet, the stormy weather of the mind is being given birthed to something else that is much deeper and truer.

Whatever identity there has been an attachment to is slowly being transmuted. The holding on to the identity is what causes greater pain but essentially it is unavoidable.

When I fight the reality of what is by thinking how it should be any different than what actually is...is what causes greater stress. Some might say "stop fighting" but in reality it's not always that easy when I'm aware that the ego has created so many defenses to protect itself and safeguard itself. These mechanisms served a purpose when the trauma of life was happening.

Identities that aren't in fact us must die. Living a life of masking an untruth to ourselves just brings in more of that. The world is a reflection of our perspective. If we want to see what is going on in a person we can see what and who they are surrounded by. The partners and intimate partners we attract are reflections of aspects of ourselves that desire to be known in whatever context and whatever capacity.

The reality of accepting that 8 years of being raped as a child still has rippling effects in my journey and unfoldment of the today. So I witness what comes up. I react. I don't act. I witness. I breathe. I lose my breath. I sleep a lot. I don't sleep as much. I feel anxious. I feel calm. All of it is happening. By accepting and letting go a little more each time, it will deepen to whatever the next layer is.

There is no "spiritualizing" that actually works. No "it's all good" or "everything will be great" or "just trust and believe in love and light." That's all bullshit. The way to experience is to experience and go deeper with what is and not avoid it.

It's inevitable, whatever identity the "I" have taken on to define myself yields itself to the place where that which is true exists. It's not easy but it can be easier when I don't fight that which is true in this moment that is trying to reveal itself, or that which the space is being created for so that I can see what has been here all along.

Whatever isn't love returns to Love. Whatever isn't true returns to true. The dissolution of untruth is generally a painful process when truth is wanting itself to be known but what awaits us is by far greater than whatever we were trying to hold onto. Whatever is hidden in the shadows shows up in the face of light.

Any attachment will bring us suffering. The great masters aren't attached. They are fluid and present in each moment.

In my current process I move at whatever pace and remind myself to be patient and compassionate and forgiving as I "work" this process. I continue to be in integrity with all that I do and embrace more and more, slowly, all the parts of myself (the light and the shadows) that make me whole. The embracing of our light and our shadow pieces is what makes us/me whole.

Jai Kali Ma! Divine mother of fierceness and love, I bow down before you and pray that you support me in the process of remembering the fullness of what I really am as I traverse this reality.

I am humbled by you. I offer my tears, my sadness, my pain and all that I am and all that isn't me.