Hello Everyone,

I was watching the movie, The Beaver, with Mel Gibson and Jodi Foster. If you haven’t seen it, do. This is not going to be a film review. It was simply the catalyst for my epiphany…which didn’t come until the very last part of the movie with the phrase, “You don’t have to be alone.”

This was a big one for me. All too often we think we have to be alone whilst we do this “spiritual” work and inner growth.

After the movie, I went for a walk under the night skies with all the stars twinkling at me whilst I pondered this, because I could FEEL its importance to me. I thought about how we, as humanoids, are conditioned as we grow up. We are told to leave the best parts of us at home. Don’t be too exuberant. Don’t shine too brightly. Be who we want you to be; not who you are….you get the drift. Well after enough of this, we either distance ourselves from others (physically) or we put a big armor around our hearts so they can’t hurt us anymore. Most likely we do both. This is how the ego mind endeavors to ‘protect’ us; and this is the very stuff that we have to dismantle as we choose to awaken and become more fully ourSelf. This is the ordinary heroes journey stuff.

I personally distanced myself from the rest of humanity. I moved into the back country up in the mountains where I could feel unmolested by the world. Not a bad move nor a wrong move, just what I did. However, I took it to the extreme. I moved even further away from ‘the things of man’ until one night in Nye, Montana I realized that I could turn 360 degrees and not see one light…and more significantly, I felt excruciatingly lonely.

So I moved back to San Diego. However, the “protective” armor I now used was in by way of keeping people at a distance – emotionally. Not too close! That’s far enough! I picked relationships that were long distance and which appeared to give me my “freedom”. I declined to say how I felt in a relationship, not telling my truth. I kept the gap wide and broad even though I was physically present. A good start to moving back into civilization, but obviously I had much more unlayering to do before I was ready for community.

Then 2 years ago I decided to leave the back country and move to Ohio – to a city. Holy smokes! However, the Universe is benevolent and gave me a home facing a wild preserve so that I could feel like I was in the country, although I am definitely in the midst of an urban setting. After awhile I could “see” that I was still isolating myself. All around me people were engaged in life, and I was spending most of my days either alone or in anonymity.

It’s been a herky jerky kind of motion re-entering community. The watching The Beaver, I put it together for myself. I write this because I know I’m not the only one who has tried isolation as a means of getting though life. It doesn’t work well for a being of Love.

It works for awhile, until you can sort out what is yours and what is theirs. It works when you really need to be alone with your own Voice. It does not work as a way of life. It’s unbalanced for beings who are Love, who are Source Energy and who came to play with each other on the planet, which is each and everyone of us.

So here’s what I recommend as a recovering Light Being isolationist :

1. Carve into your daily practice time to be alone with yourSelf. Make some part of each day your special quiet time with just You. Honor that and never give it up – for anyone. Perhaps it’s an hour in the morning or a couple of hours in the evening, but devote that time to You, for You, with You selfishly. If you’d done this in the first place, you’d never have had to choose isolation in the first place.

2. Find community. This is not as hard as you might think. It doesn’t mean settling for any consciousness that comes down the pike. It is rather consciously choosing to become engaged in something that you enjoy that get’s you out from in front of the television or the computer and into face to face real interactions. Maybe you work at Starbucks instead of alone at home. Perhaps you join a writers group, or a photography club, a book club, a bowling league. It doesn’t matter what you join, as long as it is SOMETHING YOU LOVE or it seems interesting or intriguing to you. It must feel Good. That’s the only guideline. Go!

3. As you choose friends and they you, be honest about who you are and what you’re up to. You have to be vulnerable. Tell these friends as far as you know about yourself..your dreams, hopes, aspirations and what you’re ‘working on’ within yourself. You tell them you’re enlisting cheerleaders for yourself. You don’t expect them to do your inner work for you; but they can lift you up, dust you off, and remind you of Who You Are and What You Are Up To when you forget. And of course, you must be up to doing the same for them.

4. Play with these people. By ‘play’ I mean exchange the flow of Source Energy with them, much like a game of catch. It takes a pitcher and a catcher to complete the equation of Love. These exchanges look like and sound like encouragement, great conversation, laughter, jokes, fun, affection, caring, kindness, and outright support as in, “I believe in you and I hold the space for you.” They are your spiritual community. They can be online; or they can be right next door as I found.

Years ago a friend gave me a little slogan which said, “People of the same family rarely grow up in the same household.”

That’s the funny thing about a spiritual path. You learn that Love is matter of the heart, a feeling place and it can be found anywhere – in your birth family, online clear across the globe or right in your neighborhood.

Oh, one more thing. Don’t try to make everyone you meet your “spiritual family”. Let the Law of Attraction bring them to you at just the right moment; but in the meantime, get out there and play with humanity and have fun. You do not have to be alone.

Go on now! Get out there and smile at someone! Take that first little step. It’s a new adventure in your continuing expansion. The real fun of it is that you never know what gift is right there in front of you until you see it.