Keep on Climbing

 

Higher Ground

“If you lose direction, go to a higher ground.”

Toba Beta (My Ancestor Was an Ancient Astronaut)

I dreamed this morning just before waking that someone said to me, “Move to higher ground.” There was an image with the dream of standing alone on the flat top of a rock, arms spread wide, above a deep green valley. That image and the words that came with it have so many possible interpretations. I thought, of course, of Michelle Obama’s famous quote, “When they go low, we go high.” And of the 1973 Stevie Wonder song, “Higher Ground”:

“…I’m so glad he let me try it again/ ‘cause the last time on earth, I lived a whole world of sin/ I’m so glad that I know more than I knew then/ Gonna keep on trying ‘til I reach my highest ground.”

And of the traditional Christian hymn written by Johnson Oatman:

“Lord, lift me up and let me stand/ by faith, on Heaven’s tableland/ a higher plane than I have found/ ‘Lord, plant my feet on higher ground.’”

I think of the metaphor for the spiritual journey, climbing the mountain—the struggle of climbing up; how many don’t make it; and the expanded view for those who do. There is a quote from Debbie Ford that seems to fit this: “We must risk the journey to higher ground where there is freedom from the gravitational pull of our stories, the pull that comes from years of trying to prove that the stories we tell ourselves, the ones we’ve made up, are the truth.”

There is a time in our life’s journey when we must change perspectives, or we simply can’t go any further—the gravitational pull of all that has happened in our past is strong enough to keep us stuck. If we want to go further, we must jettison everything that’s holding us back—everything that might keep us tethered to the lower planes of our past. We told ourselves the story we had to at the time to be able to do what was necessary, or what we truly wanted to do—most of the time that story exempted us from responsibility for whatever happened because of our actions. Eventually, we allow the reality to sink in that it does, in fact, take two to tango, and we experience the lightness of forgiving—ourselves and others.

Higher ground is an inner destination—one only arrived at by letting go, letting God, and standing naked and alone, arms outstretched above the deep green valley of expanded consciousness. Then, you understand once and for all that everything happens for a reason, that all is one, and that your soul craves the freedom to spread its wings and fly—and, since it’s now light as a feather, it can fly. Such a sacred journey!

                                        In the Spirit,

                                        Jane