As more people choose a different path away from the mainstream conditioning programs of our society and towards an aware and awakened presence their current “tribes” (family & friends) will enviably confront them. Emotions of shame, guilt, blame, despair, regret and anger will surface for the person to process and deal with. And its not easy! Such a person may feel so alone and isolated and seriously question what they are doing and why is there so much pain.
Below is my pool story taken from my book “A Burst for Freedom” which I hope can provide some support and guidance to anyone experiencing this part of their journey. Know you are never alone. As hard and as impossible as it may seem the best action is to BLAST THEM WITH YOUR LOVE….
The Pool Story (Chapter 16: Feel The Power)
This meditative visualisation happened to me in September 2015. Only six weeks prior I'd announced to my wife of 22 years that I was leaving her. It was a very traumatic time, with deep emotional and physical feelings surfacing, so for the first four weeks we didn’t tell anyone. It wasn’t long, though, before people started finding out. With that came a LOT of disbelief, concerns, and comments around what I was doing. It wasn’t so much about the reasons for my decision but more about: What was I thinking?! How was I going to cope or survive on my own? Parents, siblings, colleagues and friends all felt the need to share with me their concerns over my decision.
I tried to explain. I was doing this to be true to myself, follow my heart, I no longer loved my wife in an intimate or romantic way BUT I still loved her in other ways, we no longer wanted the same things and were not heading in the same direction. Practically no-one had a clue what I was talking about!
Everyone loved my wife. She was an extraordinary woman who had endured much. She had survived breast cancer that involved a double mastectomy, had given birth to our four children (including our daughter who was born with a severe physical and mental disability), endured the loss of two houses and the financial stresses involved. It wasn’t easy being married to me but she had stuck by me. Pretty much everyone didn’t hesitate to tell me how big a mistake I was making.
All this created doubt and fear in me and I constantly questioned if I had made the right decision. In the meanwhile, I had developed a consistent set of morning rituals: I'd get up around 5am, drink up to 2 litres of water, practice some chi breathing, do wake-up-my-back exercises, do some stretches, followed by a reading ritual that involved reviewing certain lessons and two daily meditation affirmations from respected authors. Once I had completed that, I would meditate and try to centre myself and my intentions for the day.
Well, that whole ritual went out the window in the lead-up to and following the announcement to separate from my wife. I had trouble getting to sleep, staying asleep and subsequently getting up early. I would sleep to 6 or 6:30am and therefore have to cut out the morning rituals.
On this particular morning late in September 2015, I had slept to 6am. I got up annoyed that yet again I would have to make the necessary adjustments. I went through my water-drinking process, skipped my breathing exercises, did my back ritual, skipped my stretching ritual and rapidly read the lesson of the day so I could get in a quick meditation before the whole household was awake and moving. It was already 6:30am so I told myself I'd only be able to manage a quick 15-minute meditation. I'd check-in, check-out, and be back in the land of the living by 6:45am.
I settled myself into my favourite chair and tried to still my mind. It wasn’t working, my mind was way too busy for me to get into a deep quiet state. I persevered, bringing my focus back to my breath, trying simply to witness my thoughts. My eyes still closed, and sensing that my 15 minutes was just about over, I gathered my will one last time. I let go and surrendered to the moment.
Suddenly I was standing neck-deep in water, up against a wall in a very crowded public swimming pool on an extremely hot day. I recognised the pool as one I'd often visited as a kid.
Children were playing, screaming and jumping while everyone else was yelling, trying to be heard over the roar of so many excited people in such a confined space. It was standing room only, and as I slowly took in my environment, I became aware that the people nearest to me were in fact my parents, siblings, friends and colleagues. They had all turned to face me to let me know what they thought of my decision to leave my wife.
'You can’t cook! You don’t have any money! How do you think you're going to survive? You have no assets! How are you going to afford this, it’s a meat market out there! You’re too old! You’re out of shape! You can hardly hear! Just be happy with what you have. You don’t need passion in your life at your age. Think of the kids…'
The comments weren’t anything I hadn’t already heard, but never had I received such a combined chorus so close to me, it was deafening beyond words. I did the only thing open to me, which was to take a deep breath and go under the water to sit at the bottom of the pool. As soon as I did, the beautiful sound of silence greeted me. I could still see them up above, waving their fingers, stressing to me the madness of my decision but I was peaceful and serene at the bottom of the pool. I decided I was going to stay there forever and never go back up to the surface again.
My spirit guide J suddenly entered my mind. He reminded me that while I was sitting in my underwater refuge, I was also holding my breath; he was curious how long I believed I could do that. I thanked him for his interest, but said I had no intention of ever heading back up to the surface again. No further response. I continued enjoying my peaceful bliss.
It wasn’t long, however, before I became increasingly concerned that I would eventually run out of air and have to resurface and face everyone. As if on cue J popped back into my mind and asked, 'Well, what are you going to do?' Rather annoyed at his bluntness and what seemed a lack of empathy, I stopped myself short of a curt reply and considered his question. It being J who was asking, his game would almost always be about forgiveness. Rather proud of myself, I responded, 'Okay, I guess I need to forgive them all.' But then rather smugly I reminded him that there were just too many of them up there for me to forgive before I ran out of air.
J simply repeated, 'So what are you going to do?' Typical, I thought, some guide he is, always deflecting back at me to work it out. But the silence and expectation nudged me to give it thoughtful consideration. Finally I announced, 'I will BLAST them all with my LOVE!' I sensed a nod and a grunt of approval. I looked up at the surface and tried to dig deep for this blast of love, only to realise I had a small problem. I wasn't feeling much fondness for them right now. In the same instance I recognised I was about to run out of air. I started to panic.
I said to J, 'I just can’t find it within me to blast everyone up there with my love.' 'Ahhh…,' he said, 'that I CAN help you with!' I sensed J embracing me. Thoughts of how each of those people was only acting out of genuine concern for me started to enter my mind. I felt that each was only reacting based on his or her own beliefs, anxieties, fears. Indeed, they were mirroring back to me my own thoughts and fears.
Then I sensed J pulling me deeper into what appeared to be an all-encompassing, brilliant white light. Wrapped inside this incredible light, I lost track of time and self. I felt the presence of what I can only describe as pure, unconditional love. When I finally re-emerged from this light, I felt as if I was filled with so much love I was bursting at the seams. I didn’t hesitate to push up from the bottom of the pool.
As I broke the surface I released all the love I'd gathered in one nuclear blast after another. I could sense shock wave after shock wave of unconditional love rippling out and reaching as far as the eye can see. When I opened my eyes, every baby, child, teenager and adult was riveted to the spot, staring at me. My first thought was, I may have overdone that a bit! I reached out to J and asked, 'What do I do?' 'You do nothing,' he said. 'That I CAN do,' I acknowledged with huge relief. And for what seemed like the longest time, everyone stood stock still, staring at me, but then I noticed that their eyes were glazed over and they were deep in inner reflection. Ever so slowly, sound rose up again and people began moving about, but in a much more subdued quiet way.
I found myself back in my house, in my favourite chair, and out of my meditation. I had tears streaming down my face but had no real recollection of what had just happened. All I could remember was something about a pool. I was so confused. What was going on? Why was I crying? Why did I feel so strange? What the heck just happened? I looked over at the clock on my desk. I had been meditating for over an hour. I was SO LATE! I leapt off my chair and rushed to the kitchen.
It took me several weeks of returning to my meditative space to slowly piece together the full extent of that visualisation. Every time I tried, I was overcome by a HUGE welling up of emotions and I would break down. Eventually it was shown to me that such a presence of love, as was demonstrated by J, cannot be truly felt at our earthly level of physical form. Our bodies are simply not capable of withstanding so much love. J had assisted me by returning me to reality in a 'safe space' of temporary amnesia, allowing me to incrementally gather the threads of the visualisation without impacting my physical form too much.
However, a sense of the light and the pure unconditional love remained.
Subsequent to the visualisation, my siblings, parents, friends and colleagues did not feel the need to question or share concerning comments on my decision again. Evidently, the love, forgiveness and acceptance were shared by all.
Thank You!!