A journal blog post from early 2011, which was on blogger and easily accessible to everyone online.
I was given a job recently, a caregiving position for three young girls - I believe their ages are 9, 12 and 14. Caregiving for children is one of my favourite things to do and one of the things that comes most naturally to me. I was slated to begin today. However, upon waking this morning and checking my e-mail, I saw awaiting in my inbox a message from the mother beginning with, “Sorry, this is not going to work out.” I immediately assumed that she no longer had any need for me or something just as impersonal like that. I was unprepared for what was actually there.
The mother, let’s call her Marsh, said she had discovered this blog, this memoir, this online journal - the one you are reading right now. She said that she was sorry, but this was way too much information for her. She said she is an ‘incredibly open-minded person’, having lived all over the world, particularily in Africa where, when she was in school, she had Out-Of-Body Experiences (OBEs or OOBEs), which she found to be profound and mystical. But now she is a mother and there is, “just no way [she] wants to have somebody looking after [her] kids who thinks that publicizing these stories online is a good idea.” So, she does not want me to look after her kids anymore.
I have spent weeks sitting on this egg of potential, not searching for any other jobs as I thought I had this one. Then she comes across this blog and our entire world and how we interact with one another changes based upon an honest Kundalini experience.
I have spent weeks sitting on this egg of potential, not searching for any other jobs as I thought I had this one. Then she comes across this blog and our entire world and how we interact with one another changes based upon an honest Kundalini experience.
Why?
This is where I take the deepest breath I can muster as I am about to plunge into one of the scariest subjects in all of history: Spirituality or Religion and the way people feel about it. Please forgive me if I skirt the edge a bit.
I have touched on this subject before in my writings on how Kundalini will, for better or for worse, affect your relationships with the people in your life. Family, friends, lovers and co-workers alike. But let me simplify ‘Kundalini’ to ‘spirituality’ in general, and let me put religion in under the grand umbrella of spirituality as well for the sake of understanding.
If you are a Christian, an Atheist, a Buddhist, a Pantheist, Scientologist, a Hippy who believes in Prana to be the source of all things, if you have Kundalini, see Orbs, have had an experience with UFOs or are completely certain that NO God, spirit or source exists you are going to have people who disagree with you.
One of the most prime examples of this kind of argument is about whether God exists or not. Another could be about people’s differing ideas of what happens after you die. Heaven, Hell, Dante’s Inferno, angels, demons, ghosts, if Jesus is up there in the sky…the list goes on. Often, as a friend of mine said in relation to this news about my job, “Some people seem to believe that their point of view is the only one that’s valid, and that what they’re experiencing is the only reality there is.”
In the same vein of thought, people also have opposing ideas on the various ways in which spirituality expresses itself in the human form. I have been challenged countless times by people who urge me to believe that I have not had a Kundalini Awakening. And these people are not necessarily always being malicious! When we identify with something, whether it is a religious icon or a specific type of energetic expression (as despite its essence coming from the same source as everything else, Kundalini is a separate kind of expression than, let’s say, an OBE) we, if we’re not careful, can automatically seperate ourselves from other people in our perspectives.
In the same vein of thought, people also have opposing ideas on the various ways in which spirituality expresses itself in the human form. I have been challenged countless times by people who urge me to believe that I have not had a Kundalini Awakening. And these people are not necessarily always being malicious! When we identify with something, whether it is a religious icon or a specific type of energetic expression (as despite its essence coming from the same source as everything else, Kundalini is a separate kind of expression than, let’s say, an OBE) we, if we’re not careful, can automatically seperate ourselves from other people in our perspectives.
We could also venture to have superiority complexes about our enriched states of being, which of course also creates schisms between ‘us’ and ‘them.’ Born Again Christians, for example, are notorious for upholding this kind of ‘holier than thou’ perspective over others, and people who have no specific religious background yet have special abilities and/or contact with the source may just as easily do this. There is a new term rolling around the tongues of many these days, ’spiritual narcissism’, and there are articles about it popping up all over the internet. Essentially what I am writing about in regards to Marsh is spiritual narcissism, or perhaps more accurately, ‘spirituality-killing narcissism,’ as the narcissism here is killing any notion of true spirituality that may once have existed.
In order to connect with one another through our differing opinions and overcome spirituality-killing narcissism (let’s say SKN for short) on any of these subjects we must have an open mind, right? Sounds easy enough, and many people, including Marsh, will venture to say that they do have an open mind as they too have experienced mystical states of being. But there is one huge difference between her version of having an open mind and her actually having one: that she has judged my abilities to be an excellent caregiver to her children based upon my honest spirituality story, and how I arrived here. She acted one way before reading my blog, and now is acting entirely differently afterwards. Hot and cold. White and black.
It was an open attack on my character. She was not necessarily going so far as to say that one who has Kundalini should not be taking care of (her) children, (she may have had her reservations about crossing that line - I can see why, my fangs are out already and she received a very heartfelt and strong reply to her condescension) but the fact that I am so open about publishing my tale that makes me unfit, as someday down the road the virgin eyes of one of her daughters may come across this memoir and see that I was once a crazy punk who did a lot of drugs and was suddenly bathed in the light of the Serpent Fire.
But to me, this seems a little silly. There are ways to block websites from virgin eyes, and ultimately if it were just a matter of a discomfort with the potential of her daughters witnessing the blog, and she wasactually comfortable with the spiritual content itself, there would be no issue. No, of course it goes much deeper than that, and if she had the balls to truly say what she meant then she would have included her discomfort with my open spirituality, and how, despite her experiences in school, her perspectives greatly differ from mine.
But what about the bottom line, what about what is actually important here: which is that despite what you or I believe about Heaven and Hell, despite the fact that I have Kundalini and you may have had a UFO encounter, we are all human, and thus do not need to alienate one another based upon our perspectives and experiences? The fact is that I had a wonderful initial meeting with Marsh prior to this breakdown. She was enamoured by me and so was her, as Marsh proclaimed, ‘most difficult daughter.’ We were both excited to see how this would go, and she said she just knew that the girls would all love me.
But what about the bottom line, what about what is actually important here: which is that despite what you or I believe about Heaven and Hell, despite the fact that I have Kundalini and you may have had a UFO encounter, we are all human, and thus do not need to alienate one another based upon our perspectives and experiences? The fact is that I had a wonderful initial meeting with Marsh prior to this breakdown. She was enamoured by me and so was her, as Marsh proclaimed, ‘most difficult daughter.’ We were both excited to see how this would go, and she said she just knew that the girls would all love me.
I didn’t mention the fact that I have Kundalini upon meeting her because I didn’t need to. It is me, it is one with me, and to a lesser extent so are my beliefs about it. But it does not need to be a badge that I wear upon my forehead as a forewarning to people nor is it an agenda that I push on other people. It simply lives in me, breathes through me and touches everything I touch.
Does that mean had I not ever mentioned it and she never stumbled upon my blog, that she would have still subconciously perceived this Kundalini presence in me, creating this immense tension between us? Tension that would inevitably crash into the wall of spiritual opposition, where I would have to tell her, weeping: “Yes, I have Kundalini! It is that which you detected! I am so sorry that I did not tell you before!”
I think not. I think that she and her daughters would have seen that they were in loving, capable hands and wonderful relationships would have blossomed between us because that is my bottom line as a human being. But she saw this and chose to judge me through it instead.
Her loss.
But may this be a lesson to all of us about dealing out judgement based upon our spiritual experiences and beliefs. We are all entitled to our adventures into the realm of Spirit and Religion, and it is folly to hold opinions of others in the home of spirituality-killing narcissism.
I think not. I think that she and her daughters would have seen that they were in loving, capable hands and wonderful relationships would have blossomed between us because that is my bottom line as a human being. But she saw this and chose to judge me through it instead.
Her loss.
But may this be a lesson to all of us about dealing out judgement based upon our spiritual experiences and beliefs. We are all entitled to our adventures into the realm of Spirit and Religion, and it is folly to hold opinions of others in the home of spirituality-killing narcissism.
© Shannon Naithair Teine, 2011
For some further reading on this subject check out: http://www.elcollie.com/html/Issue6b.html - an article written by El Collie called “Losing Friends”.
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