“The book to read is not the one that thinks for you but the one which makes you think.”~Harper Lee  

Similarly (to my chagrin), a teacher of mine once said, in reference to the Soulful realm, “They’re not here to lead you by the nose, if you’re an old soul, they’ll want you to figure it out”.  Argh, who wants to hear that when you just want the instruction manual for figuring out life’s problems. But, realistically, I would agree. I think, that if you teach, and it is in a way that a person can access their own innate knowing of truth, that is the only teaching of value.

image: peregrinacultural

In my experience, if we want the “instruction manual” for life, we’re better off to allow those “problem” aspects of ourselves, to be alive.  That way they don’t act out a kicking screaming rebellion, and we come to learn that they really aren’t so problematic. If this aspect is there, why not give it space, give it the time it needs for us to hear it and understand it.  In this way, our inner battles can cohabitate. Instead of going crazy trying to avoid it, deciding to know it, gives this “problem” aspect room to breathe and move toward functioning healthily.

It’s by Grace that we know anything of our deeper existence. But that tide that makes us float on the whims of free will is something we can learn to cherish.  Learning to read and understand that tide will refine our free will to work for us rather than against us.  But we need to provide the environment for our understanding to come, simply through our willingness. There is no guidebook for that, no compass to pull from our pocket, to lead the way. What is more likely is that we have a candle. Often, we need to light that candle in the dark of night, seeing only within the sphere of light that lands on the map that we were born with.  It’s us who holds that map, and we move the candle to illuminate more of the map. That candle, which may have dripped down to a nub from having been lit so many times before. 

image: 500pix

It’s in those times, that feel as still and black as standing in the dark of the Mongolian desert on a moonless night, that we’re open to hearing the strike of the match.  It’s necessary to know the significance of the match that lights the candle.  In our lives it can be anything, nature, the sight of an animal, a friend or parent….it’s only then, at these times of quiet, when we’re yearning for a roadmap the most, that we begin to respect the match that lights the candle. Once the candle is lit, the knowledge is our own. From here it’s our decision what to do with the light, and to apply what we’ve already come to understand and know of it. No one can do that for us. With that candle lit, we can look up from the map and into the darkness.  It’s wild out there, but we’re given a new courage with the tiny light from our candle; we grow a willingness to search the darkness, eyes wide.  

image incmagazine

Suddenly, you know you can do this, you know it’s in you and you know it’s out there for you. Find it. Walk it. Become it. Have that wonder in your eyes, your face, your heart and let that be from where you listen, this will be what guides you.  Then, when you tumble into the narrow confines of the darkness of “problems”, know again it is not about the actual darkness but about your willingness to hear the strike of the match that lights the candle. 

"And above all, watch with glittering eyes the whole world around you because the greatest secrets are always hidden in the most unlikely places. Those who don't believe in magic will never find it." ~Roald Dahl