*Permission to share was granted for this story.
My client had come to me a few years before depressed, angry, and ready to change. I knew when I saw her the first time that my teacher had just presented herself to me, but per our soul agreement, I would have to help her remember her Highest Self, her essence.
Over the years, she took many small, calculated risks, some of which to her felt huge. She began turning to a more spiritual path, exploring various modalities and divination’s. She started to discover her gifts. Though a talented artist, writer and healer, she struggled to ever show up fully. One day she shared with me that while she was starting to like who she was becoming, she never felt okay to show anyone all of her.
We began to explore why. I asked, “what are you afraid of happening if you showed up fully?” She paused and thought for awhile. “That I’d be hurt.” I dug a little deeper and she uncovered that she didn’t feel worthy and if other people saw that, they’d take advantage of her. I leaned into my intuition to get a sense of what part of her was telling me this story. As I asked her who was it that convinced her of these beliefs when she was about nine years old, she looked at me with a flash of anger and said, “My father.”
As we processed some more, I asked if what he said were true? “No.” I asked her why she thought he might have said those things. “They’re just the kinds of things you say when you’re angry.” I asked if she thought the anger was because of her or something else. “Something else.” She had internalized his hurtful words said in a moment of anger into a belief that stopped her short from stepping into the fullest version of herself for almost two decades!
I asked her what she thought would happen if she slowly and tenderly starting to show herself to the people around her in order to test if her fathers words had any truth or if they could be let go for good. She agreed to try. I knew she had to start building trust in herself and her gifts. I knew she had to build some esteem to be able to feel powerful enough to take the big leap into her Highest Self.
A little less than a week later, she wrote me:
“Today when I walked into work, my manager immediately told me, ‘This place has bad energy and I need you to fix it right now.’ I looked at him and asked if he were serious. I felt like his request was unreal. When he told me that he was serious, I asked what had happened. He told he didn’t know what was up or if he was just tired, but to walk around and feel it out.
It was busy, so I walked around, asking how people’s days were going, helped around, and heard that customers were being cranky. I placed some angel beams in every entrance (the way I’d do distance energy healing), called upon Archangel Michael, Jesus Christ, and Mother Mary to help me clear out all unnecessary energy and balance the environment. Then, I connected with the higher self of the guy who was singing, and asked if he would be willing to work with me to spread ease and joy through his voice and his music. I got an immediate ‘yes’, and even a sense of cheerfulness. About three hours later, my manager thanked me for ‘fixing the energy’ he said, ‘I don’t know if you did anything, but I think you did. Thank you, the energy was getting real funky in here.’ Today, was the first day where I feel I showed up as a whole, all parts of myself. It was great! “
There are moments of revolution when we realized the beliefs, thoughts, and actions of those surrounding us is not congruent with our soul. We have to start taking action of being true to ourselves and that’s not always easy. Yet, the outcome is typically an increase in our personal power.
The power drives us deeper into what else we have been thinking, believing and reacting to subconsciously that has kept us stuck in a smaller version of ourselves. As we explore consciously, we start moving into a place of healthy selfishness. We stop looking outside of ourselves of safety, acceptance and love and start offering it to ourselves. We stop tolerating the unhealthy actions and attitudes of others and start creating healthy boundaries. We take bigger risks by standing up for ourselves. Along the way, some relationships and jobs end. At first it may be shocking or scary, but soon enough you realize that what you lost was like a favorite pair of shoes you’d outgrown a long, long time ago. Finally free of trying to force your foot into such a painful place, you experience freedom, lightness, even joy.
It took years for my client to be able to say “Today was the first day where I feel I showed up whole.” She won’t be able to go back to that old, outgrown version anymore. Now she knows how good it feels, how free and open, expansive it is to show up fully. It takes time to build the esteem, but once it’s there, it becomes the foundation you build your life on. You evolve.