The Art of Transformation
You are always changing, whether you or others see it or not. It would appear that life on earth has a singular goal, alchemy. The art of converting one thing into another, like the seed into a tree, the cloud into rain, and the infant into an adult. Like a caterpillar transforming into a butterfly, all of your effort in the short period of time you have here on earth should be invested in improving your innate beauty instead of trying to prove it. The universe seems to have declared that the only thing you can be totally accountable for ... is yourself.
The Mysterious Power of Metamorphosis
Metamorphosing, a change of the form or nature of a thing or person into a completely different one by natural or supernatural means, seems to be the common and concerted spiritual objective of humanity. It is that which allows your divine compassion, your sacred love energy, your miraculous consciousness, to swell, to extend up to the heavens and participate in the creation of collective enlightenment. Be so busy with your own improvement beloveds of the Beloved, that you don’t have time to pay attention to anything or anyone that distracts you from your growth.
It’s important to remember that transformation is often full of torment and it comes in spurts; painful processes of growth. When you finish one round of change you are far more in touch with your sacred essence. Take those moments to breathe easy. They are your pause. Your sanctuary time to renew your strength. Take those moments to notice that you are something you were not before and marvel. Take those moments of new perspective and deeply and genuinely implement your new way of thinking, your new understanding of life, into your daily living.
But also know that without question, another challenge is on its way.
Finding Beauty in Painful Life Changes
We all look for comfort, always. Yet growth does not usually come in the moments of ease, it’s more often in the agony of being stretched. The newborns feel it and they cry, but nonetheless they must go through it in order to become adults. Growing spiritually and mentally is no different. Learning is often wrought with pain and accompanied by many tears. Cry if you must. Like the babies who know not what to do but to scream out in despair, cry. Yet, when the stretching is done, remember too that you will be different. Your soul will be taller, more developed, better able to traverse the path of life.
This is the pattern of life as human beings. This is the evolution of the masterful articulations of consciousness. If we look, we will see more clearly with each new day, that Life, God, Source, Universe, Soul, Spirit ... uses hardship and hurdles to help us grow fully into what we have the ability to be. Just as the stars of the heavens slowly release their energy and eventually explode, shooting their stardust out into the universe and facilitating your creation, you too are constantly changing. Like the celestial bodies of eternity, you too are daily shedding, little by little, the cloaks that hide your inner and sacred beauty, assisting the evolution of humanity.
The Magical Process of Transformation
With the removal of the old fabric of lies, fear, and deception, you expose the glorious light being that you are. Your essence will grow brighter and stronger if you radically accept that change is constantly happening. This knowledge can and should bring hope and healing to those who experience its’ magnificent majesty. While the stripping away of the thoughts that you’ve learned in order to function feels scary and difficult, you must know with all your might, that you must do it anyway; even if it hurts.
Remember that life's hardships are your spiritual cocoons precious sentient being. Know that successfully navigating them is your transformational process. Be aware that making meaning of them is your awakening to a new and enlightened self. When you unfold with intention you will unveil all that you have been designed to be.
The seemingly magical process of transformation, creation, or combination, is coded into your very essence. In your inexplicable design, you have powers that escape your own vision. Once you were the essence of unconditional love in the form of pure awareness. And when your magnificent and beautiful spirit was combined with the power of your exceptional fleshly mind and memory, you were changed. You became what did not exist before.
The sacred intelligence of all that source has been created with a magic that is deeper than deep, YOU, the material and spiritual blend called human, manifests. A meaningful, mystical, way of existing. You are the alchemy of the universe. A combination of stardust and consciousness.
Alchemy for Personal Transformation
Has the understanding of your incredibleness been lost in the translation of living out your everyday earthly life? Have you forgotten that you are a product of creativity and love? Within the magnificence of you, in your very cosmic design my beloveds, there also abides an alchemist. It is your heavenly inheritance.
If you think about it, you have been subconsciously practicing this ancient art all your life. Responding to hate with love and creating peace. Touching another with your hands and producing divine pleasure. Seeing the extraordinary in the ordinary and manifesting joy. Now just bring this to the forefront of your consciousness and do it with intention. Witness the real outcomes of your personal alchemy.
You might feel stuck and like you are drowning in your own miry muck. You might not feel like you are able to move through difficult emotions. You may not even believe that there is a solution to your predicament. This is when you must remember that you are never in any situation that you cannot rise above, crawl out of, or endure.
Others may definitely facilitate teachings or skills required to take your thoughts captive and identify triggers and to be more in tune with the counselor inside of you. Many can aid you in truly comprehending that thoughts can lead to false perceptions, resulting in negative life outcomes. But you are and always will be your own best guru.
5 Tips to Guide Your Personal Self-Discovery Process
Discovering how to tend to your own wounds and tune into your own infinite access to the wisdom of the collective consciousness, and understanding your glorious, mysterious, and mystical identity is where it all starts. Learning to make meaning of, and letting go of the past, is crucial to your positive well-being and your ability to move forward.
The capacity to see life as the supreme gift that it is, good, bad, and all the in-between, is truly critical. Self-awareness, self-observation, mindfulness, and meditation are key to learning more about you, and thus the cosmos you represent. Yet still this is all about you and what you can absolutely do.
1) Acceptance and Growth
Accepting that intrinsically everyone wants to do good is the beginning of unconditional love, for yourself and for others. Being open to the reality that life happens, hurt happens, disappointment happens, and walls have been built to protect your mind and heart is paramount to alleviating your dis-ease. Most assuredly, at the time of construction those walls were likely very necessary. But at some point you have to tear them down so that you can move outside of the boundaries that once kept you safe but no longer serve you well.
The fortifications that you once upon a time built to protect you are now your prison, serving only to encourage the development of calloused or overactive emotions; allowing you to believe that there is only one right way to be in order to be safe. These barriers isolate your openness and reduce your sensitivity to the point that you or someone you love might even become cruel and unforgiving. Yet there is not one person on this earth who does not still possess their original, pure, and holistic beauty; your essence of genuine kindness and real compassion that entered this existence upon your birth. Worry not though, because walls can be torn down. But you must do the work. It is an imperative to know that one cannot heal or fix another man’s mind.
2) Recognize your Personal Power
Remembering that you are simply morphing into a deeper and more authentic self will allow you to start the process of unbecoming. Taking the time to unravel the yarn of the old sweater that is hiding the true you takes much patience. And like the caterpillar who isn't really a caterpillar but is actually a breathtaking butterfly, the task of transformation is often cocooned in pain.
You likely misunderstand hardship and heartbreak, thinking you have done something wrong. But could it be possible that you are simply expanding your true character; understanding more profoundly that life as a human is often messy, complicated, and yet so very exhilarating? Perhaps you are even wondering how best to make the most of what time you have been granted here on this resplendent planet in outer space.
3) Gratitude Impacts our Happiness and Well-being
Yes indeed, going through the labor of growing pain is very normal. And maybe, if I might suggest, even a wonderful experience. Knowing that all of the discomfort and doubt that you wrestle with is a gift, not a curse, is a consequential element to embracing and experiencing the fullness of your life. Remembering that you and only you can respond correctly to the stretching of your consciousness. You and only you can begin to explore your innate longings and aching's. You and only you can see any form of hardship as your most beloved teacher, given to you to instruct and explode your glorious and sacred presence; allowing you to unveil in a most spectacular way the original awareness that resides within you.
Even remembering what it means to be alive, not just living. Every day you can discover that which you already know; that you are truly magnificent, majestic, and miraculous. That you are born finished and complete. That you are and have always
been enough. And that from this deep understanding of your identity and personal power, free and fabulous ideas can flow from your spirit into your mind, leading you to new and holy ground to stand upon. Both in your inner and outer space.
4) Embrace Your Core Values
You have the ability to know that life naturally unfolds and there is nothing you can do but embrace it; remembering it is best to move with it instead of resist it. You are designed to correctly make your own choices, to discern which way you should go when you encounter a fork in the road; remembering that your primary responsibility is to discover how to navigate your most successful way in existence.
And when you begin at once to live, and count each separate day as a separate life, you will be aligned more intimately with your sacred purpose. For you are indeed a rare and noble member of humanity; a bright and shining light of hope under all the pain that you have walled yourself within. You are an ever-changing spiritual being having a human experience. You are so much bigger, grander, wiser, and capable than you realize. You are being led by the light of the natural and intelligent Spirit of this holy and supreme universe. You always have been. You need only stop and listen to the divinity that resides within.
5) Practice Mindfulness
It's important to remember that you heal yourself with the simple things. By remembering the grass is green exactly where you water it and learning to bloom where you are planted. By believing in the magic that once captured your youth and allowing it to illuminate your life. By letting your beauty and the beauty of others naturally unfold. And finally, but so importantly, by believing in that which you currently cannot see, yet intuitively seeing the possibilities of what is yet to be.
Life is a Celebration:
Today, may you walk this beautiful earth that you have been so blessed to live upon, with love, kindness, compassion and concern for your own imperfections and the imperfections of others. Life is a perpetual process of growth. Be kind to one another as you expand more fully into your whole and holy selves. Remember that when one is in the midst of a spiritual leap into a new way of thinking, the transformation itself is wrought with hardship. No one is perfect. So do your best to be better today than yesterday, and more genuine tomorrow than you are today.
Look out for one another too and forgive each other’s shortcomings. Help one another be the best version of “self”. It feels good to be good, to do good, to see good. It’s called Transformation!
If you are ready to create meaningful transformation in your own life then please consider joining us on one of our sacred spiritual retreats with Seeking Sacred Journeys.
Sheri Eckert is a Professional Counselor, Public Speaker, and the Chief Petitioner of Oregon’s historic and globally acknowledged 2020 PSI Ballot Initiative. She is also the creator of A New Way of Thinking and author of Dear Human. As the Co-Founder and Executive Director of Innerwork Portland, Sheri offers Psycho-Spiritual Counseling in private and group practice.
Sheri works diligently to help others expand their perspectives and derive meaning from their existence. Educating people about the importance of looking at the cosmic beauty that resides WITHIN them and the magical beauty that externally surrounds them is paramount to her counseling practice.