Becoming a Phoenix Rising After Your Spiritual Awakening

In my most recent blog post, I talked about the potential outcomes of neglecting, avoiding, or ignoring a spiritual awakening. Today, I’d like to go in the opposite direction and talk about what can arise when you embrace your awakening in the metaphor of the phoenix.

For those who are unfamiliar with this myth, the phoenix is a mythical bird that dies and is reborn again and again. We can let go of an old identity and emerge renewed.

When someone awakens, the dying has begun. Most people confuse the initial parts of a spiritual awakening as the end of all pain, especially if there’s a bliss phase. But for most people, a spiritual awakening is the start of the dying. It’s the start of the fiery crash-landing that the phoenix does. It is not yet the re-emergence. This can sound strange, and for the ego-self that is still intact, this sounds quite scary. But there are lots of pain and unhealthy patterns that need to be illuminated, and all of this is accessible for you.

Through embracing this shift, you begin to grow. You begin to arise. You become this magnificent being arising from the ashes full of light and beauty undimmed. But what does this mean in the human world? Let me talk about that today.

After the Night, the Dawn’s Fire Emerges

The dispelling the darkness phase–when people are typically thrust into their pain for the first time in a conscious way–can feel endless. But as someone progresses, they often realize how much better they feel for facing pain. So they choose to face more, and in this way, the intensity of the work often grows. But as the intensity of the work grows, the person’s ability to do that work grows with it. They refine their awareness; they sharpen that blade of their bright awareness so that they can cut through even the darkest night inside of them. That leads to greater freedom and the space to emerge naturally into their lives as they choose.

This dawn starts to arise as a product of this work. Possibilities in life often expand further–perhaps past what the person thought was possible in the initial awakening. I know that for myself my initial awakened self pales in comparison to the level of awareness I operate from now. That is the gift of embracing my awakening and which I share with all of you through my words and my work. And many of you will find that of the infinite possibilities on this planet that you may want to share your wisdom and love. As you arise in full bloom, this is a great time to begin healing and teaching. Too often people rush to do those things and become wounded healers–exhausted and frustrated in attempting to heal others. But the fiery demise of your old ego self cracks open the healing and teaching abilities that you most need. From this death, you rebirth yourself into this role, and you start growing into this specialty.

Nothing Special for you to do

However, there’s nothing special that you need to do. If something calls to you as you arise, then you do it. If nothing particular calls to you, you may find yourself doing very little except living in the wonderful existence and love that you are.

Presence requires no purpose.

The damaged ego is obsessed with purpose, which is why many people in your life may not understand your “laziness.” Rumi often points to the inactivity of the awakened as a sign of wisdom because they aren’t caught up in the obsessive activities with which people clutter their lives. The awakened person understands that life takes care of us with only a little of our energy when we flow in conjunction with the divine plan.

“Mystics are experts in laziness.” — Rumi

So many of you will arise in grandeur in laziness–lazy grandeur. And this may upset people around you. You stop taking so many things so seriously, but this is often because what people focus on is not important or serious at all. Most people are obsessed with useless stuff, and so it is easy for a stabilized awakened person or one who is rising up into their light to have little to no interest in doing anything special.

Moving Towards Causes and Compassion

There are also phases in life. We go through phases of greater creativity and then less. So for awhile there may be nothing special to do, and then there may be something that catches your passion. It seems to be relatively common for the awakened to move towards causes and things that alleviate suffering. So working on atrocity mitigation, offering meditation to juvenile delinquents, addressing alcoholism, helping find cures for diseases, protecting the environment, and so forth often call to an awakened person. It doesn’t have to be so life or death, but a lot of awakened people aren’t necessarily interested in matters like creating the latest app. It’s not that they couldn’t be, but it’s also kind of like giving a master surfer a small little wave to ride. The master surfer is built and able to handle the huge curls crashing on the shore. Sure they can surf the little ones, and if they find delight in it, then they’ll continue to do that. But hitting those massive swells is often where the person will find themselves thriving, and it’s really where we thrive that we’re most drawn after awakening.

Nourishing Your Self and Thriving

As I’ve mentioned in past spiritual awakening blog posts, that food is foundational to our clarity. If the human body is not doing well, that inhibits a lot of clarity. That’s one of many core things that truly nourishes a human being, and that theme of finding “nourishment” is central to many people who awaken. Refining our intuitive abilities also helps us to stay in tune with what is nourishing and what is not. Life isn’t always easy. But where we can make things easier on ourselves, we do. In this way, we also look for a different kind of comfort.

Most people seek the comfort of familiarity. So people eat lots of junk food to “feel good,” but it doesn’t make the body feel good. Junk food, in this example, is familiar, and so there is an emotional trigger that gets ignited so that we think we’re being taken care of and/or are safe. Familiarity and safety are deeply intertwined in the human psyche.

After a spiritual awakening and the subsequent years of growth, we tend to seek the comfort of things that flow. Even if the flow in life is rocky and difficult, we know when we are being nourished. We know when our soul is growing. We know when our light and fire is expanding. Thus, where we find nourishment may surprise many other people. Some people may go into very difficult situations, and because they are built for those situations (like doing diplomacy in a war torn area), they thrive. Their work nourishes them, and they thrive.

The Discontent of Others in Your Light

As I often remind people, spirituality doesn’t make you popular. Many of you will find a lot of old friends and family who actively resist your growth. It seems to be as someone expands into greater light that it illuminates greater darkness in others. This can elicit a great deal of darkness in them, and because it is uncomfortable for people to feel their own darkness, they may project their pain and discontent at you. It cannot be helped, although there is a question as to who you choose to have in your life. Just because an awakened person can be at peace with everyone (at least when they’re really relaxed in their inner connection and peace) doesn’t mean you want to be around all types of people. I can be at peace with alcoholics, but it doesn’t mean I want to have lots of alcoholic friends.

The main point of this is that lots of things get attracted to light. Moths, parasites, gawkers and bystanders, users, and other bright lights will see you and come to you in a variety of manners. Don’t be too concerned by any of this attention. Allow your growth to continue.

Keep rising.

People are only responding to you from their program even if they are praising you, and if you have a few people that support you in your light, it becomes pretty much a no-brainer to include them in your lives.

The Peace of Solitary Life

When we are fully connected to ourselves, we are fully connected to all of life. Thus, an individual is in the greatest company possible–oneness. To everyone else, this looks lonely, but that is their programming speaking in the language of their feelings of disconnection. The main point here is that a solitary life may call to many of you as you rise into your light. That is just fine. There is no need to join in a community if you don’t want to although certain geo-political illusions often require our respect (like paying taxes in the country that we’re living). But by and large, most interpersonal connection is part of the ego’s needs to feel good about itself and to know who it is.

When you are by yourself, the ego loses power because you don’t have others reflecting back an idea of who you are. For many awakened people, they are more than happy to not have these projections or to connect with people who need them to interact in a certain way. It’s true that most people aren’t comfortable with a free/awakened person because that person can do or say anything. It’s very rarely mean, although another’s ego self often will feel threatened by the truth that flows from an awakened person. Such is how it is with most of humanity; they are lost defending their unconscious egos.

But when you are awake, you don’t need to do that. You can live your life quietly on your own or in large groups. It is entirely up to you. You can really do anything, but as you arise in this new form and leave the ashes and dust behind, you will invariably know where your light wants to shine. And you’ll simply shine as you are.