Dear Young Woman Walking an Alternative Path…

… Some observations I wished someone had shared with me as I stepped off the well trodden way …

You are never truly alone

… Although your solitude will be your greatest power and truest companion – isolation is a myth created to keep you ever doubting the way you are carving and co-creating.

You will be an enigma to those dear to you

… and that will at first feel like the most epic rejection. Our human instinct tells us to connect and reproduce – anything that does not correspond to this pattern seems to those on the well trodden path to be somewhat lacking at best and at worst just plain wrong and dangerous. This more than anything will keep you questioning … am I wrong? If I don’t belong – did I misinterpret the assignment brief? This can take a lifetime to see clearly for what it is – the other seeking validation through a mirrored expression – which feels comforting, whole and complete from where they are standing. To you it will feel like a mask you are happy to take off, like your bra after a long day at work.

This will feel impossible and then utterly wonderful

Although your choice to step off the path may at first feel like a betrayal to those you seemingly “left behind”, the truth very few are able to hold onto is that nothing is absolutely secure – we are all walking a delicate balance of existence and the illusion of conformity only exists in appearances and performances of a collectively misunderstood notion of “normality” sold at a cheap price and looking like a good deal, to keep us easy to control.

The glitz is smoke and mirrors

In truth there is no such thing – we are all striving for smoke and mirrors and so opting out is not a rejection – for there is nothing of substance to reject. Walking the alternative path is more truthfully a release from the corset of time worn traditions that have been upheld for so long no one really remembers to where or why they originated – all they know is that it must be perpetuated … “it” being a contract that binds us to a capitalist end.

When you stop buying the packaged deal – the shimmering glitz and glam quickly loose its appeal

… and you will question for quite a long time if you have made a terrible mistake … Your next ‘fix’ for validation will not be easily gained and not hit in the right spot as it used to. And here is where the true test begins …

The alternative path is not a very appealing hashtag or hero image

Its rather dull most of the time – while your thoughts and conditioning go through a multi-lifetime detox – your current day self will sit and be witness to the layers of attachments as they detach and re-attach in many multiple attempts at survival – as your ego attempts to re-assemble into a coherent tale of the hero’s journey.

Here you must learn to unlearn

… to unleash and to let go of trying and making sense entirely and completely. To edit out the patterns of language, culture, religion – for nothing new or original or alive comes from seeds already sown for millennium. At this juncture – the purest dose of self doubt vacillates between an almost silent whisper to a roar and the spaces between if you are able to capture them hide the only thing you will ever know again as real and true…

A some-thing beyond things that escapes the mind

… That dwells beyond the patterns of sound in the deepest chambers of the heart. Past rhythm before music, in a void full of boundless love – that half a second of sensing – beyond the barrier of time and space can provide enough fuel to light up the chamber and reveal the mystery of stories yet unspoken.

And from that moment on you can no longer turn back

(And so let this be a warning or an invitation – which ever sits best in your heart of hearts at this very moment)… for although you will attempt many times and many ways to return to the trodden path – it will no longer have much appeal in comparison. It will always be a poor cousin to the reality of that moment which is a gift beyond any gift – a blessing beyond all blessings and which will most likely take many many years to fully come to peace and terms with – for you and it live in different realms. Heaven on earth and for the rest of your days you will be occupied by how to build the bridge that can traverser the space between.

And you will forget time and time again that there is no separation

and you are never truly alone.

And so if nothing else – may these words remind you that you are loved – and may you know that you are love.