The authentic Self is always communicating its energy to us, guiding our awakening. It can be presented to us as emotion, intuition, discernment, or as the urge to do something creative; as simple daily desire to operate a certain way; as synchronicity, in which a sudden awareness meets a sudden external event that matches the new awareness; or as deep passion or compassion. It can present as the body sensation of aliveness, the need to dance, hike, run, or play. As we have said, the psyche is always leaning toward wholeness. Therefore, all of life can be considered to be an opportunity to grow deeper into the Self. That deeper essential core that is the I AM, the Self, is a force within us with an intention to bring us home to ourselves.
Growing into Your Self—the Power of Your I AM
We can trust the Self to continue the process of awakening for us. Indeed, we can surrender wholly to it, for it always knows what it is doing. Like the roots of an ancient tree, the Self intends to take what is needed from the Earth experience and grow us to the sky.
Once we are awakened to the Self, we operate from the will of the Self. The will that operates from the urgings of the Self will look very different from the will that operates at the command of the identity. We will move according to deep and authentic desires (needs, dreams, and hopes), rather than the bargains, compulsions, ego aggrandizements, and compensations of the identity (shoulds, ought-tos, loyalties, and obligations, etc.).
When we reach this point, we are much more likely to feel congruent, that our emotions, thoughts, behaviors, and beliefs are in alignment with each other. We no longer feel that our desires are asking for one thing while the behavior provides another. As we develop more and more awareness of the Self, we develop more and more awareness of our choices. Therefore, fewer and fewer choices are made unconsciously.
Rather than apologizing for existing, the voice of the authentic Self sings its essence loud and clear for anyone who wishes to listen. It prays its soul with words it can believe. And when it attains to silence, it is the silence, the stillness of spirit, of soul. The voice of the Self can be heard, for it speaks to the hearts and souls of those with whom it relates. The Self speaks a rhythm and pitch that resonates from the deep heart, the deep soul of the roots of the ancient tree I AM. When it speaks, there is meaning.
As we begin to practice getting more in touch with our emotions, intuitions, discernments, and desires, we are naturally getting more in touch with the Self, which is our natural being. When we walk the inner terrain, listen to the Self, and follow its leading, we are opening to being. And each time we do these things and get in touch with a deeper level of beingness, we want more and more of it. Therefore, the sense of aliveness, the sense of being grows and grows as we transform into the Self.
The impact that the power of the I AM has on others is that the Self feels real to them. When real enters a room, everyone in the room knows it on some level. Most people will receive the impact of our realness with a kind of reverence. They will either know that they have had an encounter that was real, or they may feel that they, too, are being challenged to be more real. And because we are not all caught up in trying to fix the dramas, meet the needs, and establish the well-being of others, we now have much more creative energy to create the lives and projects that are meaningful to us.
Being real is not going to please everyone. However, it gives us so much peace and joy that we just don’t care whether or not we are pleasing others or whether or not they approve of our choices. That is its power. Once we live in the authentic Self, we don’t need others to make us okay. We are just okay.
It’s as if we open the door a tiny crack and all the light in the universe begins pouring in. Once someone has had a conscious emotional experience with the authentic Self, the light goes on. He begins to see that this is who he really is, and it’s all he’s ever wanted. One primary evidence of a budding conscious connection to the authentic Self is a deep sense of peace. As we learn to live more from the urgings of the authentic Self, the peace comes anytime we do what is real. It comes when we tell ourselves the truth. It comes when we laugh. It comes when we receive the joy of a given moment, a delightful sunrise, an open book, a deep connecting look, an open and honest communication with Self or other; and we begin to trust that peace is now available to us all the time. The power of the I AM is its ability to grant us that peace.
Finding Your Peace
We all want peace, but we don’t often know how to go about getting it, or realize that it, like other emotions and personal powers, can become a guide for our lives. I often present workshops in which I ask participants to answer this question: If I could give you anything in the world that you wanted right now, what would it be? At least one person in the group, if not many, will commonly say, “I want to win the lottery.” So, we play with that idea. Okay, let’s say you’ve won the lottery and let’s say it’s really big, let’s say it’s 40 billion dollars. What would you do with it first? Very commonly, I get something like, “I’d pay off my debts, buy a new house, travel, make sure my kids are taken care of for the rest of their lives, give large sums to charities of my choice and invest large sums.” Okay, let’s say that you’ve done that, now, what have you given yourself? The answer is “Peace of mind.” Well, I say, then that’s what you really wanted all along. You just thought that the lottery was how you would get it. We often get the method mixed up with the outcome.
Actually, our peace lives within us 24-7. It is never apart from us. Often, however, we just don’t live from our peace; instead we live toward all of the externals that we think will finally bring us peace. When we go to the beach for vacation we think that it is going to the beach that gives us a modicum of peace. Then we leave the beach and we think that we won’t have peace now, because we have to return to real life. But the beach does not give us peace. The beach has no peace to give. We just decide to become conscious of our peace when we go to the beach and allow ourselves to become more relaxed and more internally reflective. Peace is an inside job.
But then so is turmoil. In sitting with the turmoil within us, we begin to listen to the emotions swirling around in there. Some of these emotions may be difficult to feel. But we sit with them to hear their messages. By doing this kind of work, we discover, under the turmoil, our own peace. We discover that even in the midst of a difficult emotion, which is allowed to deliver its message to our consciousness, there comes with it a profound sense of peace. The peace is a signal to us that the message we just heard is correct—which when followed leads to further peace.
Good guys often continuously bargain with their peace by thinking that IF they just do that external thing that guilt tells them to do, THEN they will feel some peace afterward. But guilt not only wants us to do what it says, it also wants to own us, holding us hostage to its power to manage our choices. I have yet to locate a single person who, upon doing what guilt demands, finds peace upon the delivery of the deed. No guilt, perhaps, but not peace.
Peace will only be found when we sit down with what is inside of us, refuse to judge it, and just let it tell us the truth. It will be found when we begin to see our desires as sacred guidance. It will be found when we use intuition and discernment as guides. It will be found when we learn to walk into the inner terrain and receive from its amazing gifts. If we stay with this process, we begin to get little glimmers of our peace. Those little glimmers lead to longer and longer periods of peace.
This peace is not just a sense that things are okay and we are fairly secure. That’s what most people think peace feels like. No. This peace is the stillness and silence of the depths of the ocean, the whisper of the wind, the sound of a distant wood thrush. It is the pink sunrise gently awakening the dewy world. It is the silent moon rising above the horizon of thought. It is all of this and more—the metaphors of our internal peace.
This peace is a deep, round opening within that seems to have its own sound, its own presence. It can literally paralyze us with its power to make us still. For a few moments we just cannot move, so deep and so overpowering is this peace that momentarily takes the entire body/mind. Even in the midst of outer chaos, if we look deep within, we can feel this peace. It can carry the weight of the ocean and yet be as light as fire. This peace, like all of the other emotions inside of us, can guide us. Its message is a simple round and open “Yes.” “Yes,” it says, “you have found the truth. Yes, do this more, this is authentic, you have found Self.”
Once we have had such an encounter with peace, we want only to have more of it. And we will have more by allowing whatever is inside of us to tell its truth, to deliver its message, for as the message reveals so does our peace. When we allow the internal messaging system to express more regularly, the peace becomes rounder and fuller. As that happens we can begin to make decisions to manifest the messages that we are given. From there, we allow peace to guide us into making the external world come into alignment with the internal world. That inner peace wants to create a life that matches it, so that we may live outside what is inside of us. This is finally authentic living.
The journey to this peace, the opening to the Self, is not easy. But it is worth it. And at every juncture along the way, as we dialogue with difficult emotions, speak up to people who make us quake in our boots, and live from our personal powers, we find more and more of the power of I AM within us. More and more of the psyche will begin to be owned and cherished by the authentic Self along the way, until one day we will look back over the hills and valleys of our journey and say that we have come a very long way, indeed. We have finally found peace.