Stepping Back: Reflections on Detachment & Rediscovering the Authentic Self

Love is the only response to the complex questions of the Universe, again and again, and again.

As a holistic health practitioner and intuitive guide I am challenged daily by the opportunity to assist souls in embracing and understanding  “loving detachment”. This is a blessing for me because it affords me diverse perspectives on different days for the infinite ways each one of us might perceive a genuine understanding of this evolved, spiritual practice.  A complicated, yet simple concept it is obviously paradoxical in nature for most of us at present. Webster’s dictionary very clearly describes detachment as separation.  “Separation” from a spiritual vantage is the human aspect of our condition.  Feeling isolated, depressed, alone, invisible, abandoned or betrayed are common manifestations revelatory of a belief in separation.

These feelings typically arise in times of great transition in our lives.  The loss of a loved one, via divorce, relocation, death or even the end of a career, brings up the depth of our fears of abandonment and betrayal, and can bring an overwhelming realization of the temporary nature of life itself.  This is an organic process intended to facilitate personal growth.

It is startling to consider that anti-depressants are the number one prescribed medication in our culture, and even sadder to understand that from a clinical perspective they only worsen the situation by the deadening of critical emotional messages designed to guide us into more creative and healthy ways of living, and dying. Yes, healthy dying. It is common practice in our culture now to medicate anti-depressants to those with terminal illness or the elderly, who otherwise might benefit from a very spiritual, conscious awakening along their transition to the other side. Are we so afraid we might feel their pain that we dumb down their very personal, sacred journey and right of passage into what is promised to be eternal?  

It is also prevailing “wisdom” in this “culture” to suppress the natural flow of emotion in passionate, active, creative children with harsh stimulants and tranquilizers that contribute to a lifetime of bipolar patterning, substance abuse and confusion.  Labeling children as “Attention Deficit” when we have created a culture of running from one thing to the next in service of an insecure ego is a tragic misunderstanding of the law of cause and effect.

We are experts in the avoidance of feeling our feelings.  Evidenced by alcoholism, obesity, road rage, chronic fatigue from workaholism, and the missing aspect of the sacred nature of our sexuality as reflected on prime time television in programs like the Kardashians. These rampant afflictions of our time are all testament to underlying and unacknowledged emotions of anger, sadness, shame and fear running in a constant stream of unconscious reality just beneath the surface of our hypnotic, stress-filled lives.  Stress and anxiety attacks are what we call this continuous state of numbness which in essence is separation from the Divine and holy nature of the Self.  

The irony - it is loving detachment from the outer world that brings new awareness to our inner world, our emotional body and a reconnection to the sacredness of Self.  Control of the inner world is the only way we can control our outer experience. Emotions are primal and critical messengers for what direction(s) will best benefit our lives.  

How do we get in touch with the authentic nature of ourselves when we have built an illusory world around other people, jobs, materialism and outer appearances?

 

“The Greek word for truth, aletha, means not hidden.”

 

Make time, every day, to be alone with yourself in the stillness.  Listen to the wisdom of your own soul. That still, small inner voice is always there, though often put aside for the whims and whistles, screams and shouts of the outside world.  Just stop and listen with all five senses. See, hear, taste, feel and smell the grandeur of the present moment. The outer world will remain with all of its demands when you return to it.  But there will be a renewed since of understanding and purpose when you slow down long enough to hear and feel the wisdom that dwells within your own heart. The more you invite this loving intelligence to speak, the more it reveals itself.

Loving detachment then is not separation, but the intentional decision to reconnect to one’s authentic self, consistently, in order to show up in the world with an inner peace that brings great power to any situation.

Joseph Campbell spoke of “following your bliss.”  What is your bliss? What activity makes you glow, makes the hours slip away and makes you loose track of time?

With all its sham, drudgery and broken dreams it is still a beautiful world. Strive to be happy.  

- Desiderata

Follow your bliss ☺