Watercolor by Polly, 5/2/1975
“We are spiritual beings having a human experience.”
I’m sure you’ve heard this saying many times. I have confirmation from my 20-year-old self that this assertion is true.
When I was 20, I was mixed up, unhappy, insecure, and self-centered. At least, that’s how I remember myself as being. I suffered for years with insecurities and self-doubt. And yet, at age 20, I was able to write something like this:
“These times grow difficult; one can’t see the light for fear of knowing the truth. But we all see that light because it beats in our hearts. So many times, people confuse themselves with their human images. Why? It is a useless pain and does not help us. I wish we, I wish I, could see that light within at all times and proclaim it joyously. Yet I hold back for fear of getting clobbered. Jesus went all out, to be honest, and loving. He saw the light in everything and became that light by being its qualities. Perhaps Jesus, too, was afraid. Indeed, he got clobbered, but he could see how worthwhile it was not to hold back.
“History is a story of truthfulness, not the written past, but the history of being, the history that is. A person’s experience is true to him or herself. Whether or not fear blinds us, the light within changes us and shapes us into walking landscapes, panoramas of trauma or tranquility. We are patchworks of angelic qualities. Our lives are gifted by heaven, by the universe.
“Continuity—the flow of life. It cannot be stopped. It matters not what I say here, drifting from thought to thought, the flow and unity of words carry on.”
Today, I see myself as having two consciousnesses—my angelic, spiritual, eternal one, who I truly am, and my human experience self, my ego-self. Early in my life, I identified with the ego-self, while the angelic self was a significant presence. Slowly, the human-experience self took over, and I forgot the heavenly, spiritual self. I identified solely with the trauma of my personal story. Now, I need not take my human experience so seriously as I remember my angelic, spiritual self. Still, I have compassion for my brothers and sisters and pray for an end of all suffering and the root of all suffering. But as far as my grief is concerned, I can see that it is rooted in my ego. Today, it is that spiritual self I wish to identify with and to leave my suffering and self-doubts behind.
“We shall not cease from exploration
And the end of all our exploring
Will be to arrive where we started
And know the place for the first time.”
― T. S. Eliot, Four Quartets