The quest for a more rich, fulfilled life must start from where you are. To rush to heights you are not ready for will only cause a fall to a level that is more uncomfortable than the one you are on now. How can you reach higher than your arm will allow you?  How can you climb the ladder if you keep skipping a rung.  One step at a time will take you to your goals, your dreams, to your truth. Those on a spiritual quest, a search for inner truth and meaning, may feel a need to go beyond their awareness and therefore, rush what is to be learned.

You cannot learn what you are not aware of.  To clear your way means, in part, to clear away the issues and emotions and beliefs that keep you from experiencing the true happiness and peace that is truly yours and within you at all times.  When hard times hit you, you may  retreat, withdraw, thinking and believing that you are not as far along your evolutionary quest as you had thought.  You may feel that you are taking a step backwards and not progressing at all.  In reality, these lessons come forth, to show you what is stopping or blocking you so that you may go on with your quest, and growth.  How can you go beyond what you cannot see? How can you let go of what you do not know you are holding on to?  This can be as simple as a belief of no self worth, but in the reality of your time and space can seem like devastation.

Let us look at relationships.  You are striving for that wonderful connection of the physical, spiritual, and mental, but you find  you are still alone. All your relationships seem to end in despair.  They start out hopeful and filled with excitement, but end with a feeling of loss and rejection.  You may feel like the victim, or you may think, I pull in the wrong people all the time.  There are no vicitims, we draw to us what we believe we deserve, and what we need to learn at the time.  Some may say this is karmic, and in a sense it is, but not from the standpoint of "I did you wrong" and now it is payback time.  It is karmic in love, for that being came to show you what you believe about yourself.  The person who hurts us the most, is the one who loves you so very deeply, that they agreed to "play" out this scenario with you, as a gift for your growth.  When the outside world does not "give" us what we need, the only place to go is within.  To seek out the answers we so desperately need, want and yearn for.  This is the only place where we will find truth, and peace, the only place where the true unconditional love exists.  How can we expect unconditional love from one that does not unconditionally love themselves?  How can we expect to be taken care of by another that cannot find peace and balance within themselves?  Everyone is searching, but the only true love and safety of wholeness and completeness is from within ourselves.  And this starts with but a small step of where you are.  For when the outside becomes too harsh, and our outer reality falls apart, then we are on the path to finding our true connection, our true love, within ourselves.

We have a choice at this point.  We can feel the victim, or we can truly learn that we create our own reality, and become the Co-creators of our life, with the power to manifest what we know we deserve.   For truly, that is what we do, we create the reality that we believe we deserve.  If we believe we are "stupid", or "fat" or not "good enough" to love, then that is what we will attract.  We have within us all the resources we need to learn where our truths lie, and what needs to be cleared to create the reality we so longingly desire.  Some or most of our beliefs are so deep, so sub-consciously buried, that we need a powerful event to bring them to the forefront to be looked at and cleared.  If we don't see it as such, and take on the victim role, then that pattern will be repeated until we see the "light".  How many patterns repeat themselves in your life, how many changes are needed to create the life you so desire?  The answers lie within you. And only within you, for you are the creator, you are the power behind all that happens to you.  With this knowledge you are the one who can uncover the truths and clear the "false" beliefs to set your path in the direction you so deeply yearn for.

Is this path an easy path?  At times it may seem as the most difficult one to follow. Is it one that you chose for this lifetime?  Only you know the answer.  We are all here with a mission, and what is more wondrous than finding your unique inner truth, your inner unconditional love, your inner peace.  Once on that path, all else in your life will follow.  For once you clear the blocks, issues and beliefs that keep you from happiness, you will find that the happiness, love and peace naturally are drawn to you.  For that is the energy that is coming from you and this will only attract like energy to you.  The path becomes clear and any roadblocks along the way are easy to recognize and pass through.  For as you learn more and more about your inner truth and perspective, the easier it is to see why you drew the experience to you, and you begin to recognize it for the gift it is.

But you must begin from where you are.  Allow yourself to feel the grief, the pain, and allow it to show you where you are coming from.  From this point, you may find within yourself the forgiveness that is needed to move on. Forgiveness, in the sense of letting go, and freeing you from the experience and patterns that brought this occurrence to you.

One step at a time, one experience at a time, one lesson at a time.  Step by step we learn more about ourselves and the lives we have created.  Step by step we can learn to honor and love all that is drawn to us.  I believe the key is patience and forgiveness, for if we didn't have these experience we could not learn, although it may feel far from that at the time.

Finding inner core issues and beliefs, and the energy they attract takes time and love and patience.  At times, the journey may seem hard and too difficult, but the rewards at the end of the tunnel are freedom, love and peace, to name a few.  And the knowledge that the experience has brought, and the drama and pain that came with it are needed no longer.  This is the beginning to the end of painful patterns or cycles in our life, that are released forever.  For the "lesson" is learned and the inner truth can shine through.  Clearing the way to more learning and understanding, and the lighter, clearer life you truly do deserve. 

(c)1999, Sandi Hunter.  Published in the 1999 August-September Issue of the Conscious Creation Journal.  Feel free to copy this article for personal use only.  Please include this copyright notice.  http://www.consciouscreation.com/