The Unpolished Self

It is said that we — when we are born — are perfectly whole. Yes, each of us has our own package of life lessons that we are taking along into this experience and some of those life lessons are health related. Therefore, our perfect wholeness is seen from our potential to grow as much as we can during this journey that we have embarked upon — rather than from a heath perspective…

Symbolically, one could say that as we enter this life, each of us is a perfect circle — an innate perfection that has everything within itself that is needed for us to achieve our goals, whatever they may turn out to be.

In a sense we are uniquely beautiful in a similar way unpolished crystals are mesmerizingly beautiful…

Then, as we grow up, the sharp edges are polished off, and bit by bit the unique expression of our innate perfection gets hidden. We are taught how to behave, how to act and react — we are told to be ‘nice’ and acceptable. And step by step, we adapt to what is expected of us.

Until one day we may find that this beautiful, unpolished core of ourselves no longer wants to be hidden. It demands to come forward, to show itself — and with that we may start looking for that part of ourselves that is truly authentic. We begin to rediscover the Unpolished Self…

The unpolished self is authentic, yet more often than not it also has a “wildness” to it. An intuitive knowing of where we stand, and where we are headed. And if we don’t like the direction our path has taken, or where it is leading us, there can be a deep seated drive to change. To move forward on our own terms.

This doesn’t necessarily mean that we let go of everything we own, quit our job, and walk off into the sunset. Yet it does mean that we re-evaluate our priorities, that we again decide where we want to spend our time and energy in life. It most definitely means that we look at what things in life are worth pursuing, and what is not. And perhaps most importantly, it can bring us to a point where we bring our authentic, unpolished self closer to what we do in life and how we are doing it.

In other words, as we get to know the authentic, unpolished core of ourselves better, we will find ways to use this understanding in the way we go about reaching our goals — whether those goals are job related, or are more personal in nature.

I would like to invite you to join me on a journey to the deepest core of your Unpolished Self…

Pondering truth… What is truly true?

In 2013 I posted a blog on “Truth”. Browsing through old posts, I just came across it once again and started reading it… ( Read it here. )

How our perspective on “truth” has changed in those eight years!

To start with, we now have the “fake news”. This has absolutely nothing to do with factual truth, but rather with whether we agree with the factual truth or not. If we agree it is true, yet if we don’t agree it is “fake news”.

And this seems to have been taken one step further… If we wish something to be true — yet it may not be factually true — we can still say it is true. And anyone countering this “un-truth” with facts, is accused of spreading “fake news”.

So which side do we believe to be true? 

And do we believe this strongly enough for us to make it our personal truth? In other words, who do we believe?

As far as factual truth goes, it is still fairly easy to do some research online. Or so one might think. Because what we are presented with online, is often driven by the loudest voices — not that different from the loud voices in protests in the sixties and seventies. Except now we don’t have to leave our computer to make ourselves heard. And therefore, we can stay pretty much anonymous, and therefore safe, no matter what (un)truths we spread into the world…

So, especially when doing our online research, it is important to verify the information we find on any one topic through multiple different sources.

Some may say that if it sounds hard to believe, chances are it isn’t (the whole) truth. And in many cases this is, well, true.

However, if anyone would have spread the word forty or fifty years ago that we would now make our phone calls on tiny supercomputers called “smart phones”, chances are they would have been met with the opinion that this couldn’t be true. And yet, here we are…

It is a reason to keep dreaming of what can become true — and for that matter, to dream big dreams!

So looking at truth at this point in time, factual truth is still factually true. However, lots of discernment and verification are needed in order to check the facts we are presented with.

The one perspective on truth that doesn’t seem to be different is that as we grow older — or more specifically, as the years go by — truth changes. It moves with our understanding, our discernment, our age — and it moves according to how we interact with one another…

There doesn’t seem to be an exact truth. As it turns out, pondering the question, it is hard enough to find that which is truly true…

Truth

Watching the news, forums, and social media it seems that truth is becoming more important. As the saying goes in my native tongue: “Truth takes longest” which means something like ‘it may take a while, but given time the truth will come out’. And this seems to be the case pretty much wherever you look, nowadays.

No longer is it possible to hide the truth; at least not for any length of time. And when it comes out, it comes out with a vengeance ~ or, in the vernacular of the social media, it goes viral.

And where ‘truth’ is looked at as being the polarity of ‘deceit’, this is a good thing.

On the other hand it makes me think: what is truth?

Surprisingly enough, there are many truths.

• There is the factual truth.
• There is what is believed to be true.
• There is cultural truth.
• And it appears that as we grow older, what we consider to be ‘truth’ changes. 

The factual truth seems easiest to distinguish. We quite literally look at the facts and see if everything truly adds up. Whether all the information is there, with nothing left out. It is a logical process through which we conclude if what we are presented with is true or false.

What we believe to be true is much more intricate. It comes from the subconscious, as the subconscious holds not only our dreams and intuition, but also our belief-system. And suddenly we can find ourselves in a situation where we believe something to be true (for instance because we were told as we grew up that this was so), whereas when we look at the facts from a logical perspective, this is clearly not the case...

Cultures can have their own set of rules and mores that say something is true or false ~ and so what is truth in one culture doesn’t necessarily have to be true in another. Clear examples can be found in the separate legal systems, for instance when looked at the acceptability of the death penalty.

And then there is the phenomena that truth appears to be changing as we grow older... When we were 5 years old, truth was that we were not allowed to have a cookie right before dinner. At 20, for most of us this is no longer true; it is our choice whether we want to eat a cookie, and when we would want to eat it. And at 30 truth may be that cookies make you gain weight and should be steered clear from at all cost.

So, pondering truth... What exactly is truth?

First published in 2013

Skipping Stones

Somehow, skipping stones are something that seems to defy the laws of physics. After all, when a stone hits the water, on all accounts it should sink, well, like a rock. And yet, under the right circumstances that is not what happens; at least not right away. When that stone hits the water at exactly the right angle, at precisely the right speed, it jumps back up and floats through the air once more. And sometimes that happens again and again.

I remember that as a child we tried to find the perfect stones, taking great care in how we would aim them at the water’s surface just so that they would skip again and again, and again! Leaving us in awe…

And so it is in life.

Under the right circumstances, that which seems impossible does happen. It can even happen over and over again; without us really trying for it, or even being appreciative of it. After all, sometimes, when we kick a rock in the pond, we just want it to disappear.

In a sense it is like the Rolling Stones have been singing since 1969: “No, you can't always get what you want, but if you try sometime, you just might find you get what you need.”

The thing is that we don’t always know what we need. We may now what we want. We probably have a fairly good idea as to what we desire. But whether that is also what we need is a different matter altogether.

We may say that the minimum we need is three square meals a day, and a roof over our head.

When we then start working towards just that, three kinds of things may happen. 

• We may get just that. Enough food on the table and a roof over our heads.
• We may get more than we are asking for. Things may work out better than we thought possible, and what we set out to manifest into our lives gets there more smoothly, more quickly, and in a bigger fashion than we anticipated.
• We may get less than we desire. No matter how hard we are working at it, at the end of the day we find ourselves just scraping by.

When things work out way better than we thought they would; we tend to call it a miracle. When it just doesn’t happen no matter how hard we work at it: ‘bad luck’.

Either way it seems to defy logic.

Either way it is Divine Intervention.

The Universe has a knack of providing us with what we need to stay on our individual, personal paths; in such a way that we have the opportunity to grow. The prospect to unfold our greatest potential.

And sometimes that is achieved by not just getting a roof over your head, but by finding yourself having a big house, a nice garden, and everything that comes with it. Other times we may be best served by not being tied down by too many material things… In that case, perhaps all the work we have been doing was directed toward what we wanted more than what we needed. As soon as we redirect our energy, for instance toward travel or something like that, suddenly we find that everything is coming together wonderfully!

Recognize that?

Then you may agree that Divine Intervention is a lot more common than you may have thought.

Just like skipping stones are…

First published in 2014

A thousand eyes are watching me…

Every once in a while I find myself in a place where it seems I’m being watched. Usually this is not a matter of people watching me ~ my sense is that as far as people are concerned some may, yet most won’t.

However, in nature it is a different matter.

In nature there are places that somehow are special places, places that have a specific energy. Often places that are old. Older than memory, even. And while they may look non-assuming in the present, they have a decidedly different feel to them.

It is in those kind of places that I often feel watched…

Perhaps it is the animals that live there. Or the birds.

Yet many times it feels like the trees and plants themselves are watching me. Questioning me as to what brings me there. What are my reasons, my goals? What do I have to offer?

And the longer I look at nature in a place like that, the more eyes seem to be looking upon me.

A thousand eyes are watching me…

Sometimes, while meditating in a spot like that, flashbacks come. Images of long forgotten times. Snapshots of rituals performed in ancient times ~ some of which could still have a place in the present, while others have long since outlived their purpose. They may even give me a sense of belonging; an idea that I could have been part of that in a different time, a different day and age…

Whenever that happens, it feels that throughout time, a thousand eyes are watching me…

It brings up thoughts and questions in this current time.

After all, if I had certain knowledge in that other, long forgotten time, what did it entail? And is it still there for me to use? Is it information that I feel comfortable about in today’s world, or do I feel the whole world would be watching me if I would start working with it again?

The more I look into that; the more I ponder those questions, I find I am looking at these strings of thoughts with different eyes. There are the eyes that see the flashbacks, and the eyes that see the snapshots. There are the eyes that see the rituals unfold, the eyes that see the energies build, and the eyes that see the energies wane again and go dormant…

And I realize that I am watching me with a thousand eyes ~ through time.

A thousand eyes are watching me, inviting me, bringing back memories to me of long forgotten times.

Do you wish to have an experience like this?

Click here for more information...

This blog was first published in August 2015

Foot Prints

We all leave our foot prints.

Whether that is on the beach where our impressions linger in the wet sand until the next wave washes them away, or rather the paths we have walked that become road maps for others who are traveling in a similar direction… 

Yet no matter how you look at it, we all leave our foot prints — and have done so throughout time.

The fascinating thing is that even when we are not necessarily trying to retrace our steps, we may stumble upon them anyway…

Have you ever had that experience of familiarity in a place you were visiting for the first time? Or when you were reading about a certain place or time, that you just knew how it was at the place, in that point in time? Perhaps experiencing dreams of a long forgotten time…

Chances are, that even when we tried, we would not be able to retrace our actual foot prints. On the other hand, our dreams may give us a lot of information about those far away places or timeframes that are buried deep in history. We can also use meditative processes to gain ever greater insight, not just about what was happening in that place once upon a time — but more interesting — what it has to offer us in our lives right now.

Did we leave our foot prints at that time just for us to retrace them now? Sort of like a “Back to the Future” moment, helping us to gain a different perspective? A way of looking at things that may have been commonplace back then, yet is all but forgotten in our world today?

And if that would be the case, how far away — both in distance as well as in time — would that take us? How deep do our roots run?

For me, I find that there are many foot prints to be found — and retraced — in North Western Europe. Ancient foot prints. Old enough that they  seem to accompany the fossilized bones of the Woolly Mammoth that roamed the area as long ago as before the last ice age, about 120.000 years ago…

And looking at those (metaphorical) foot prints — listening to the stories they have to tell — I find myself surprised every time by the wisdom they have two offer. The insights that in a sense are “not of this world”, and yet are so needed in our world today.

Messages that turn out to be valuable and productive in my life, right here and now…

Are you curious what those ancient foot prints have to offer you?

Check out our 2022 workshop here…

Imagination

Imagination is probably more important than we give it credit for...

Whereas fantasy is not based in reality ~ or even is a flight from reality ~ imagination is our roadmap to where we are going. Without it, we would be stuck right where we are now; just because we cannot imagine ourselves being anywhere else...

All great plans started out at some point in the imagination of the person that thought: ‘What if...’

What if... my business would really take off?

What if... I would be rich, like having won the lottery jackpot - rich?

What if... I could travel to where-ever I would like to go?

What if... I could help groups of people becoming more aware?

What if... there would be peace on earth?

And just by pondering the question with an open mind, we are giving it positive energy. It is the first step to actually manifest it in the physical world ~ yes, even the ‘peace on earth’ thing.

As soon as we can see in our mind’s eye what it would look like ~ whether ‘it’ is something mundane or spiritual; something personal or something global ~ a path forms that shows us how to get there. And again, it is to a certain extend up to our imagination whether that path is wrought with challenges and obstacles, or whether it is smooth, even easy-going.

This doesn’t mean that imagination is the only thing that is needed. 

We can imagine things; we can think about it all we want ~ at some point we need to bring that which we have imagined outside of ourselves. Usually that is when we start talking about it, making logical plans, doing actual research as to what we need in order for our plan to be successful; and finally, we need to put in some physical action.

If your ‘what if?’ is about getting rich by winning the lottery jackpot ~ buying the lottery ticket maybe all the physical action that is required. If you trust yourself more than the lottery, maybe looking into what is necessary for you to get that really well-paying job is a better route.

Of course, as soon as you are thinking: ‘oh, finding that job is going to be sooooo hard ~ and even then, I would have to put in 80 hour workweeks...’ Then that is what you are imagining, and likely what you will bring into your life.

On the other hand, if you are imagining 20 hour workweeks at double the pay you have now with your 40 hour workweek...

As the seraphim Julian has said: ‘Imagine the greatest, most wonderful thing you can achieve ~ and realize that is only going to be your first step!’

Julian Teachings website  

First published in April 2010