There are times when we experience an overwhelming sense of free-fall. We go about our lives secure in our notions of who we are and of our place in the scheme of things and then, suddenly, we find ourselves staring hard into a cold, dark void. I personally have experienced such moments, perhaps you have too; moments when the world seems to submit to some weird inversion theory.
It can be the ending of a relationship or a betrayal by one once trusted implicitly, the loss of a career or an unexpected health crisis. Whatever the catalyst, in an instant, the compass is spinning wildly, the ground drops rapidly away and the sky over your head is rent asunder. In that instant, you become quite certain that nothing will ever be the same again and, of course, you are entirely correct.
From that moment on, everything changes, because you have changed; irretrievably. You have experienced the deconstruction of your world-view, the dismemberment of your self. Reduced to a ragged baseline, you have but one option beyond complete and final surrender; rebuild.
This is the essence of Jung’s metanoia, the genesis, I believe, of all shamanism. It is pure evolution, not as Darwin understood it, but as angels might.
Imagine universal consciousness reaching out with fingers of lightning, compelling you to shed the detritus of your life up to this moment and emerge, unknown, like a raw-skinned reptile, from the comfortable bondage of old familiar scales.
There is a kind of insanity to it and, for a time, you wear that insanity like a coat. Friends look upon you with pity; some stop calling. Spaces appear and through those spaces, new people find their way into your life; people who have no stake in who you were or what you have let go. Somehow, these latecomers always seem to be the right fit for the new skin you now inhabit. It is as if you have called them into being with the howl of your transformation. And who is to say you have not?
Metanoia, awakening, evolution; call it what you will but embrace it when it comes, no matter how painful.
Be the phoenix endlessly burning to be reborn.
Words and image are my own.
© 2015 – 2017
Runaway American Dream 