Reflections, pt. 1: Spiritual Journey

By now, my spiritual journey has been well-documented over the past two years. From discovering concepts to even opening up about my own triumphs and downfalls, I think I pretty much covered the basics in terms of speaking out about my experiences. However, I think it is time to do some even deeper reflecting since I am at the beginning phases of yet another transition in my life. In just two short days, I will close the long chapter of my childhood and rebirth myself as an adult. And before you ask: Yes! I am nervous as hell. Yes! I am excited as hell. Yes! I know that being an adult is difficult. Yes! I am ready (and somewhat not ready) to face the obstacles that will come my way. Struggle and suffering in life is inevitable, and I feel that the only way to come to terms with these things is to face it. Well, enough of the rambling already! Let's get to down to both the positive (and negative) aspects of my journey thus far.

First of all, I must say that I am proud of the progress that I have made thus far in my spiritual journey. Since my awakening two years ago, I have noticed shifts in the way I think and the way I react to situations. For example, my mind does not fixate itself on limiting possibilities. I understand that there are many possibilities that life can bring, and what stands before me today may not be what defines my tomorrow. In regards to the way I react to things, I am understanding that I am processing the possibilities more efficiently than previously. I am also noticing that I am welcoming uncertainty, and understanding that life itself is a gray area. A major element of the spiritual journey to openly acknowledge both the positive and negative aspects of yourself. Throughout my journey thus far, I am noticing that I am being more self-reflecting, which can be seen as another positive aspect of my journey, no matter how grand or small the discoveries about myself maybe. In regards to self-reflection, one thing I have observed that self-reflection is a critical part of self-analysis, which in turn is an important part of a spiritual journey. For me personally, being able to acknowledge many aspects of my life help me come to terms with what I can do to better myself as a person.

Self-analysis can be either your sweetest dream or worst nightmare. There is no (or should not be) in-between when it comes to self-analysis. You are either commending yourself for your positive traits or you are calling yourself out on your own shit. We as humans tend to stray away from self-analysis, because we may find out that we are not all that we claim to be. I will be discussing self-analysis in a future blog post (stay tuned!). From my experience, a major negative aspect about myself that I have discovered is that I do not take rejection very well. If anything, I tend to internalize the rejection and later explode on those who do not necessarily deserve the anger. I would go as far as to say that this can be pretty toxic. A few months ago, I got rejected from the Peace Corps due to my past mental health issues (I was diagnosed with Anxiety prior to this incident). The mental health counselors felt that I was mentally equipped enough to work abroad. At that time, I felt that I was fully capable of taking on the job, as it has always been my life goal to travel the world (it still is, by the way). I remember causing a scene in front of the career counselors, and it got to point where campus police were called.

To continue the story, the female security officer came to my dorm room to check up on me. She was a young Black woman like me and she talked some sense into me. One thing that she said that stuck with me six months later is: "We are Black women, every day is a fight, every day is a battle." And this is the truth. Life is not peaches and cream. Every day is a battle. You're either fighting for what you believe in, you're fighting for your health and well-being, you're fighting to keep a roof over your head. Life is a battle! However, these battle offer life lessons that we can all learn from. My demons of rejections helped me understand that there is still a lot for me to work on within myself. You tend to learn more at your lowest points of anger, sadness, despair than your high points of happiness, joy and all that jazz. Furthermore, I learned that I do not need to have it all together at once! I have a whole life ahead of me, and there is so much to be learned in life. The final thing I took from this situation is that if it is meant to happen, then it will happen. Looking back at this situation, it just was not my time to join the Peace Corps as I was not in the mental state to do so.

"You have to have a good and bad side to be whole." This is something that has been resonating with me a lot here lately. What I have noticed along my spiritual journey is that some people tend to emphasize the positive and stray away from negative aspects of the spiritual journey. What we must understand is that the spiritual journey is meant to have low and murky points for us. As I said earlier, you tend to learn more at your lower points than your higher points. With that being said, I tend to cringe at things such as "Good Vibes Only", toxic positivity (this is for a future blog post), among other things. We have to acknowledge that we will have our triumphs and failures, ups and downs, etc. Also, no matter how much we want to stray from it, we eventually have to come to terms with our own bullshit and address our own problematic behaviors. In the end, the spiritual journey is the reflection of our own experiences and you ultimately create our own reality.

Phew! That's enough for today. Until next time, folks. As your journies progress, let's gain a better understanding of ourselves, and others. And as the picture askes, "Everything is gonna be okay, isn't it?" I can confidently answer with a resounding, "Yes."

End of Blog Song for today is "W Ing W Ing" by awesome South Korean indie band, Hyukoh!