April 2022

Dear Blessed One,

In 2008, just prior to awakening, I was having many experiences of what I call expanded states of consciousness. At times I was literally feeling the birds flying overhead - - completely connected with them, and viscerally felt the truth of oneness with the mountains and trees. I popped beyond the ordinary, finite sense of self and encompassed a wider, infinite sense of truth. The experiences were always bathed in an incredible feeling of love (love like I'd never felt before).

Those were wonderful tastes of the magnificence of creation and the exquisite energy behind everything. It started getting very trippy when I began seeing 'the other' as self too.

One occasion, I was sitting in session with a woman, and listening while she talked about what was going on in her life. All of a sudden I was hearing her voice inside of me as if it were I who was speaking. It was like looking in a mirror and talking to myself but it looked like her, even though I knew it as me - - too. Difficult to put words to the event.

A few weeks later I had the same experience with my partner as we were walking and talking. I realized "I" was not separate from him and while he was talking, his voice was ringing in my being as if I were the one chatting.

There were others but you get the idea. They all felt a tiny bit scary and very vulnerable for the limited human perspective that I thought I was. All of the experiences were just around the corner of a two-and-a-half-year depression, which stripped away practically all ideas of what I believed brought (or would bring) me happiness.

Even with the magnificent states that I was going through, it was a tumultuous time for me. Relationship ending, deceit, transition of a beloved pet, healing crisis... I didn't know what was happening! I wanted to reverse the demand to life for my awakening, especially if it meant more suffering, and events that had me concerned about my sanity.

And then it happened. All went still. I won't go into the details of realizing my true nature; I've written about it in previous Tips and in my books.

I will tell you though, we are in the stages of a Great Awakening. We have all the symptoms.

One stage in the process of awakening is development of the ego, an important stage in life. It needs to know it can survive, create, be acknowledged, recognized. It is a natural process in awakening. Ego's desire (or conditioned mind, whatever you want to call it) is to master or conquer things in the material world. The ego needs to be expanded or crystallized in order to be dismantled, so to speak.

Ego expansion is different for everyone. For some, a little is enough, one may feel on good terms with life and continue their journey to a spiritual path. Others may first need to become a billionaire or a great movie star.

Signs that ego expansion has begun the process of reversal...
Boredom, unhappiness, anxiety, restlessness, hopelessness, confusion, longing, feelings of emptiness, disorganized thoughts and behaviors, etc. You may also be experiencing expanded states of consciousness.

Like a child who has outgrown its toys, eventually the heart begins reaching for something else. This doesn't mean you can't still be a billionaire or a movie star, it just means identification with the false sense of self has begun to dissolve. There is no longer a sense of self depending on the external world for fulfillment.

There is an innate wisdom always guiding us. Surrender to your center. Breathe, ask within how life would have you serve in the moment, or how to respond to a situation. Wait for guidance.

Let Life do Life. You are already free and already whole. Happy comes and goes like the wind, so do all the other emotions. Peace is always here when we stop fighting with life.

Life is perfect, which means you are perfect - - because you are life.

You are here to sing your song. No one else knows the words nor the melody to your song. Sing it loudly, or softly, or out of tunely, and contribute your unique beauty to the world.

Much Love and Blessings to You!
shellee rae

"Sing! Dance! Dance so totally that your egos melt and disappear. Dance so totally that the dancer is no longer there, but only the dance remains." ~ Osho