About 7 years ago, I began to have a glimmer of my purpose. In truth (and hindsight), I can see that all the experiences I’d had up until that point were preparing and leading me toward this purpose.
In 2011, I went to a teacher training for Qigong and Tai Chi – having never taken a class in either of these two practices. On a rather mundane level, I went because a friend of mine said I would really enjoy the practices, but I wasn’t able to find any classes in my area at times I could go. When I googled “Qigong in Wimberley,” this training popped up.
From a more Universal and synchronistic level, I went because I was absolutely supposed to be there. My bliss was calling me.
The first night, we went around the room to introduce ourselves. At that time I was “just a stay at home mom” (that was the story in my head). I operated from a place of having to – as Brene Brown says – “hustle for my worth.” I still remember, as I was waiting for my turn to introduce myself, imagining what I would say that could sound like I was worthy to be there. Everyone else had so much life experience, they had degrees and certifications – they were Important. They seemed to have Purpose.
One of our deepest longings is to have Meaning in our lives. Purpose. Joseph Campbell calls it “Following your Bliss” – it’s that thing that has you so fired up that you march toward your North Star no matter what obstacles come your way. You know – without a shadow of a doubt – that THIS is why you are here, living in this physical form.
As I sat in that room and imagined all the things I could list out to make it sound like I was worthy, I had a moment of clarity that would then later explode into Awakening. That moment of clarity was in the form of a Question:
Why?
Why am I here?
Not here at this training, but Why am I here living this life in this physical form?
That week, I didn’t get any answers, but I certainly opened myself wide for more Questions.
I had my first Initiation Dream, which led to ask What does this mean?
And in one of the most profound moments in my life, after a Qigong practice, I dropped to the floor and wondered
Who am I?
I want to beg you, as much as I can, dear sir, to be patient toward all that is unsolved in your heart and to try to love the questions themselves like locked rooms and like books that are written in a very foreign tongue. Do not now seek the answers, which cannot be given you because you would not be able to live them. And the point is, to live everything. Live the questions now. Perhaps you will then gradually, without noticing it, live along some distant day into the answer. – Rainer Maria Rilke