We should not strive to be perfect; we should strive to be whole.

Namaste everyone,

Blessings to you all this evening. It has been some time since my last post. A great number of events have occurred in my life which have caused me to reflect this week on where I find myself in my personal alignment with Source.

The Gift of Remembrance

This weekend was a time to reflect upon the sacrifice of those members of the Canadian Armed Forces (and from around the World) who fought for our right and freedoms 100 years ago in the First World War. Watching the coverage on the television screen, I could not help but feel incredibly grateful to those men and women who I’ve never met take up the call and risk their lives to protect what we all cherish today as our common values of peace, freedom, and tolerance.

This was also a time to reflect on the transition that we find ourselves in at this period in the year. Energetically, we all have likely felt the shift in terms of the reduced number of hours of daylight, and the tendency to retreat into a place of hibernation, contemplation and silence. This is our body’s way of telling us to slow down, to recognize the shift that is happening is not just physical in nature, but emotionally and mentally.

This is a time of remembrance, of reflection regarding the conscious choices we have made in service of our highest intention, indeed our Soul’s journey. Similarly, it is a time to reflect upon the unconscious choices we have made which have served to impede us from pursuing the path of our dharma, our Soul’s path.

Gary Zukav’s The Seat of the Soul

In this period of remembrance and reflection, I found myself drawn to Gary Zukav’s transformative mind-body work, The Seat of the Soul. For those who are familiar with Zukav’s text, you will recall his appeal to the reader’s authentic intention; that is to say, the proposition that one’s “personality” is but a tool in service of an individual’s larger Soul journey. The metaphor that Zukav once used when describing this truth to Oprah Winfrey, one of Zukav’s biggest proponents, was that of a mothership. As Zukav eloquently explains - and I am paraphrasing here - is that when we are born, we are born as individual ships that are left to navigate the stormy waters of life. The goal of every ship is the same: to eventually return to the mothership, which has been ahead of us, leading us home, our whole lives. The mothership represents the seat of the Soul, the place of remembrance that is our true compass. One’s individual personality is what causes our little ship to veer “off course”; it is what causes us to be diverted from our true path to our Soul and afflicts our earthly experience with daily challenges in body, breath, and mind. Our Soul craves authentic intention; it yearns for us to let go of that which clouds our path so that we are always moving forward in light, in peace and freedom towards the seat of our highest Self. This is where the seat of the Soul resides and has always resided, even before we were born into this earthly world.

Zukav expounds upon the importance of authentic intention in this way (at p. 23):

“Every action, thought, and feeling is motivated by an intention, and that intention is a cause that exists as one with an effect. If we participate in the cause, it is not possible for us not to participate in the effect. In this most profound way, we are held responsible for our every action, thought and feeling, which is to say, for our every intention. We ourselves, shall partake of the fruit of our every intention. It is, therefore, wise for us to become aware of the many intentions that inform our experience, to sort out which intentions produce which effects, and to choose our intentions according to the effects that we desire to produce.”

Zukav’s words here are timely and instructive. It is wise for us to become aware of the many intentions that inform our experience. Those intentions can either be authentic or inauthentic. Zukav is suggesting that we “sort out” which intentions result in which kinds of effects - that is to say, what effects arise from our inauthentic intentions as opposed to our authentic intentions. One need only turn to one’s daily routine as an example of whether the “routine” of one’s day is lived with authentic intention or not. Zukav then asks us to choose our intentions according to the effects that we desire to produce. This statement is one that indicates that we are in the driver’s seat; we are the ones who consciously cause the desired outcome of our experience based on which intentions we consciously choose to manifest in our daily lives.

In past posts, I have commented on the fact that the practice of mindfulness and yoga equip the practitioner with a conscious ability to discern a place of “equanimity”, a place of balance at all times, no matter what storm may rage at sea. Zukav’s conception of the Soul as the mothership and our individual personalities as the little ships seeking to return home to the mothership is quite compatible with the yogic concept of equanimity as a tool deployed in service of one’s true calling or dharmic path.

One need not be perfect; only whole

So, where am I going with this, you might task? For me, the lesson that I learned this weekend after sitting for a time in remembrance and reflection is that none of us are perfect beings. We are all afflicted by any number of deficiencies and faults. The desire to look a certain way, or to avoid conflict, or to make others happy because you believe that is the right thing to do, or to have this or that particular thing because we believe it will bring us genuine happiness. Those who claim these things because they claim to be in pursuit of perfection are likely the ones who have and will continue to suffer the most from their imperfections. The seat of our highest Self, our Soul, cares not whether we achieve perfection in this life; it already knows who we are completely and utterly. What is, instead, vital is that we accept ourselves not as a perfect being, but as a whole being by living our lives with an intention that serves our highest Self. In this place of acceptance, the Soul’s essence can reside freely and peacefully, unimpeded from the expectations, demands or pressures of the external world. In other words, a person who is whole always lives their authentic intention.

As we continue to dive deeper into our personal state of reflection and remembrance in this time of transition, may we always be guided by the wisdom of our Spiritual Guides and Teachers who have illuminated the path for all of us to follow. May we always choose the path of authentic intention and purpose, and consciously reject the path of the shadow. And may we always follow the path back to the seat of our Soul, our mothership, who has never left our side, and will be with us all the days of our life.

I wish you abundant light, peace and freedom, now and always.

Hari Om,

Alex