FINDING YOUR PURPOSE WITH A “SCOUT ABOUT”
In this healing story I won’t talk much about Qigong and it’s a winding story. I talk about gnomes, finding your purpose, playwright Arthur Miller, what it means to be awake, when I almost died, and the 7 things every one should know if they want to engage in healing work. Enjoy….
My daughter and I are reading a series of gnome books. They live in a magical world where love, kindness and an intimate connection to nature are the norm. One theme from a recent story, that prompted me to write my first healing story in quite some time, was the idea of a “scout about.” A scout about is a journey a young gnome takes around the age of 70 years old. Gnomes live a long time so this would probably be 18-21 for a human. This journey is about going out and exploring the world, having adventures, overcoming challenges, learning how to communicate and interact with others that are different than you, etc. The most important part of a scout about is that you are supposed to find your gift or your life’s work and purpose. When you find your gift you are then supposed to use it to give back to the world. Some gnomes find their gift quicker than others but they all find it at some point. Very often they have a chance encounter with an elder gnome who knows what their gift is and helps them bring it to the fore. Sometimes they just have that aha moment, other times it is just a feeling that grows and grows.
Like many young people about to leave their family for the first time, there is a bit of fear about the journey. A change of this magnitude, a step into the unknown will naturally trigger this fear. The parents and elder gnomes in the community have all gone on this journey before and know what skills are necessary and so they teach the young gnomes, often from a very young age. Early on they are taught through stories and legends, many of which are the daring tales of their ancestors. Later, they are taught:
About the importance of being still and turning inward. They are particularly guided to do this if they are lost or need advice or when something “bad” happens. They are guided to be still, breathe deeply and listen to their inner voice.
They are taught to communicate with plants (and animals) and how to heal themselves with them.
They are taught how to establish boundaries, by being kind, unless there is a reason not to.
They are taught that guidance will often come from the most unlikely places.
They are taught to be flexible and go with the flow. Even when things happen that are not so fun.
They are taught about the importance of giving, but also of being able to receive.
They are taught to list their gratitudes each night and to celebrate each and every day.
Further, each day should include acts of kindness, play and creativity.
And my personal favorite, they are given a “power item” of sorts, their gnome hat, which can protect them from energies which don’t have their highest and best good as their sole intent. I could keep going with this, that this is the classic heroes journey or that gnomes go underground in a sort of shamanic descent to the underworld to find their meaning and purpose and come back with the boon.
This list seems in many regards like a new age spiritual handbook and you know what, it works for Gnomes. It is not so easy for a human to actually live by these values. We can read that list and say, oh yeah I should do all that, but then to actually do it is a bit more of a challenge. You did not grow up in the magical world that a gnome did and you most likely did not grow up with parents and a community that instilled these values in you (really instilled them). Even if they did there were likely contradictions seen in their behaviors, life path and or the world around you. Why would your parents go to a job every day that they hated? Why would your parents say one thing and do another? Why would there be so much violence and hate in the world? These contradictions would cause you to consciously or unconsciously:
Not trust your intuition
Be overly kind and not set boundaries
Take but never give or give but never take
Engage in unhealthy relationships where you often play the victim or the victimizer
Complain about your life rather than be thankful for it
Take life too seriously and make no time for play and creativity
Be mean and judgmental towards others and your self
Follow a path that was not your own choosing
The key points are that most humans are not prepared to venture out into the world. And more importantly, their life path is not in alignment with their true purpose or their spiritual path.
One of my favorite quotes is from the play Death of A Salesman by Arthur Miller.
“Why am I trying to become what I don’t want to be? What am I doing in an office, making a contemptuous, begging fool of myself, when all I want is out there, waiting for me the minute I say I know who I am!” - Biff Loman
That quote still brings tears to my eyes as I had a similar realization near age 30. Reportedly, many men attending the play were moved to tears, many had heart attacks when they got home. Like me, they were struck by the mighty realization that their entire life was a lie. They were living someone else’s dream and it shattered them. But in that knowing, they were finally awake. But they had a choice, they could go back to sleep, go back to their lives. Or they could stay awake. Staying awake would not be easy. A part of them would have to die and they would have to confront things which they had been hiding from their entire lives. They would have to venture out into the world with no external compass and no control. It has been about 13 years since I have had this realization and decided to stay awake. This is awake in the sense that you are on your true spiritual path with all the ups and downs, grief, joy, pain, love, bliss and everything explainable by words and not explainable by words. This is awake in the sense that there are times when you are going to fall back to sleep, sometimes this sleep can be deep and you can mistake it for being awake.
This is what happened to me at age 40 (about 10 years after being somewhat awake). I had been working in the healing space for about a decade and had implemented a number of healthy changes in my life. I had adopted a new persona though as healer, which became mostly ego driven and worse, I never really embraced it as my life’s work or my purpose. I took it all for granted and amidst some amazing opportunities I self-sabotaged my way right out of the healing space. I stopped helping people heal and kept what I knew to myself. During this time I was getting increasingly ungrateful and controlling about various aspects of my life, and I started employing a variety of spiritual bypassing tactics (to be discussed in another story). You know what happened. The universe taught me the most powerful lesson I have received to this date. More powerful than my Biff Loman moment. It leveled my life and showed me I had zero control. I will spare the details, but I really thought I was going to die and it took a period of 3 months before I got a handle on what was happening.
What I would tell the guys at the play, myself at age 30 and myself at age 40 would be the following:
If you don’t learn the lessons that are set before you, they will repeat until you get the message. They will often ramp up in intensity if you are not “listening”. Additionally, if you don’t learn your lessons they will get passed on down the ancestral chain. You have the POWER to end the cycle.
You need an energy practice like Qigong to:
Keep you grounded
Regulate your nervous system
Balance the main energy channels that run through your physical vessel.
Harmonize your relationship with your environment (the 5 elements).
Harmonize the Yin and Yang both within and without (no pun intended)
You need to consciously engage in psychological and spiritual healing work. This is indeed work, hence the terms (inner work, shadow work, grief work, etc). And...
That there will help along the way, but no one is going to save you.
There will be times when you should step away and allow GRACE to do its thing.
That the work is never really done.
There are forces out there that want to put you back to sleep and you need to learn how to recognize them and learn how to PROTECT and clear your energy on a regular basis, otherwise you may be vectored off your healing path.
The path won’t be easy and many times it may seem easier to forget your realizations and go back to sleep. In some instances you may even fall into a slumber.
Real healing work gets pretty darn REAL at times and you need to make time for play, creativity and maintaining a connection with other humans who are going through the same process. Spending periods of time in isolation can be helpful, but be careful you are NOT doing this to avoid dealing with your problems.
Spiritual Prayer coupled with being grateful for ALL aspects of your life is the most powerful thing you can do, bar none.
Well, I think I am just coming out of my scout about and my life’s work is to help people heal. I take this both seriously and lightly at the same time and will share all that I have learned (and continue to learn) with those interested. Here is how I am currently sharing:
With this newsletter. I only write when I really have something to say and very often I cry as I write these stories. I hope that you feel the healing energy infused in them. Please share with others if you feel these words will help them. They can SUBSCRIBE HERE
With my Instagram Account. I have over 100 free instructional videos on Qigong and other simple self-healing techniques. I have recently launched a subscriber section with even more detail.
Online Qigong Course - Learn Qigong with me online, full length instructional videos and practices
O.U.T Healing Session - O.U.T is a healing process which I developed and which I use to help people engage in psychological spiritual healing work.
O.U.T Energy Clearing - A remote healing option where I tune up your energy systems and clear any unwanted energies.
FUTURE Projects in the Works
5 day Qigong and Healing Retreats
Live Streaming Qigong Classes
1-2 Workshops
Hotel Partnerships