Personality
or Soul
“Your
soul knows the geography of your destiny. Your soul alone has the map
of your future, therefore you can trust this indirect, oblique side
of yourself. If you do, it will take you where you need to go, but
more important it will teach you a kindness of rhythm in your
journey.”
John
O'Donohue (To Bless the Space Between Us)
I don't know about you,
but within me there is a constant wrestling match for control. It is
between my personality and my soul—some would say, my daemons and
my angels. Most of us have personalities that want—they want what
they want, they want is now, and they want it to be exactly the way
they want it. In other words, there's a toddler within who never
grows up. Also, there's a soul of endless patience. It waits for
openings, and then inserts destiny. It has in its hands the story of
my life; it knows what comes next. It is not perturbed by my
difficult personality, only sometimes delayed by it. In moments when
the personality wears itself out with its wanting and not getting,
the soul steps in and executes a quarter turn in the right direction.
It sets me back on the proper path. Perhaps you recognize these
characters within yourself, too.
We can learn to recognize
these two parts of ourselves. We can learn to listen to the soul more
than we listen to the personality. But it takes work. For one thing,
the personality is the part we identify with—we think, “That's
just who I am.” Some of us find that to be enough. We can engage in
the wrestling match from birth to death, and believe “That's just
the way it is.” “I am who I am.” “A leopard doesn't change
its spots.” “I am the master of my fate!” That's
fine—exhausting, but fine. I can personally testify to the
exhausting part.
But we have the option
of being more allied with our soul—of patiently waiting for our
life to reveal what comes next, of paying attention to spontaneous
events, and synchronicity. We can ask within, and receive guidance.
Sometimes soul speaks to us through other people, sometimes in
dreams, sometimes in sudden insights or happenstance, or through
books that we read. And sometimes the soul speaks through slow and
steady revelation. We may only see it in the rear-view mirror.
However the soul's wisdom
comes to us, we should be tuned to its channel so we will hear it,
and recognize it. The personality will stomp its feet and pout like
any other toddler, but the soul is a wise parent and knows how to
comfort. You can trust it.
In the Spirit,
Jane
No comments:
Post a Comment