Re-membering the Authentic Self, or Self-Crafting
Lately, with the move to new land and place, with it's so much effect on the constantly unfolding process of Self blossoming, I've found great clarity in solace. My dissection room has been opened and used and cleaned out and used again and again, so that there are more parts falling away than being put together. In this process of Self Crafting I am aware more than ever of not needing anything, anyone, anywhere, and that the choices I make are mine.
Whoah back, what's a dissection room?
In my shamanic journey I've learned that traversing the spaces within takes time. Our internal landscapes are filled with many hidden pieces that can be searched out, displayed, interrogated, then put back together again, or thrown away. These pieces may be clashing realities, or points of view, picked up from many different times and places. They may be old stories or distant awareness hidden behind shoulds and sorrys, so that we don't even know are there.
The shamanic process is that of Re-membering these parts, and by doing so we take a sharp knife and fillet the everything that you may have become, to the slick truth of your very actual Real and authentic Self. That which you are here to truly Be.
In the shamanic work as I was taught, there is a World Tree, and within that tree there are levels and spaces inside. In those spaces there are all manner of special places. Some open up to forever! One, of your very own choosing, leads to the dissection room. It's not quite the same as your Sacred Place, although it shares similarities. Indeed, it is a safe and secure place in the non-ordinary reality that you may inhabit whenever you wish. However, this dissection room has a very succinct purpose - whereby you may lay yourself on a table, and pull apart all that you have been being, in order to clean the bones, re attach the flesh and put yourself together in the way that allows you to truly Be You.
Okay, so that's kind of gross and un-beautiful. "Hollie, I ain't skinning and fleshing and sewing myself back up again!" Is there a nicer, cleaner, prettier way to do this stuff?
We're getting to that, and truly, it is ALL about the beauty.
In truth, the dissection room is not so much a visual directive (although you can totally use it that way if it works for you) as an instruction to explore oneself in our vulnerability, so that we may build ourselves in actual strength. Strength does not hold vulnerability, it is the vulnerability that comes from the deep, known parts of the Self, that defines the power of the individual. That beauty-full, multi-coloured spectrum of the many places within, that is the most authentic reality you have! We become strong by revealing our vulnerability, first to ourself then to others. That is the work of Self Crafting.
Over the years I've participated in a whole lot of therapy and ritual. Ceremony that works at finding the light inside the shadows is my "thing". I've re-birthed, re-treated, re-created, re-wilded, re-homed and re-(in)novated parts of mySelf. I've Re-belled, and Re-d Tented and re-cognised who I am. I am not the person of the stories that come before. Through Self Crafting, over and over again, I've stripped back all the parts that aren't, never were to begin with, mine, and I choose to become the me I was always meant to contribute to this world.
If you're reading this, you are probably choosing the work of Self Crafting too. I promise you it is worthwhile, not easy, and possibly never ending - but oh so worthwhile! Who you are becoming is so much more comfortable than who you have been trying to Be. You don't have to have anyone else's point of view to be of value here. The authentic You is all the contribution the world actually needs. Will you simply Be that?
The deconstruction of the points of view you've been having (that aren't yours!!) can be tears and trauma and self judgement (pretending to be reflection) and really really dark places. It's difficult to give up that which you already decided is Right and Good. And why did you decide it? Because you believed that other people's point of view must be correct, so you have aligned with those, perhaps because you thought that was the way you were meant to Be in this world. Poo poo! You only have to Be You.
The acknowledgement that you know, that you Be all you need, that you are perfect just as you are, isn't usual in the everyday reality. The everyday reality is much better aligned to keep us believing we are wrong. Does that reality feel heavy to you? That's because it's not true for you. So THIS is why you have a dissection room - in the non-ordinary reality, where other points of view don't matter, you can get in there and do whatever it takes to Be You.
I once asked a friend why it is that those who are awere and soul-full and choose change seem to have the most shit sent their way? My friend said "The Gods find those with the broadest shoulders, because they know you can bear it."I think about this a lot. Like, a lot.It's not that we are thrown anymore shit than anyone else. It is simply that those who are aware, who are seekers, shamans and Self Crafters; feel the "heaviness" more readily. It weighs us down because our authentic Self knows "This is not true for me, there has to be a better way."
Self Crafting is a process of re-membering the entire Self. Without judgement (how can you truly be aware of what you know, when you're in judgement of you??) and with open-ness to change.
For me, it's the pieces of stories that help that process. Revisiting stories and defining their meaning in context with Being me. "Ahh, that's where that point of view comes from! Well, it's not even mine, and look how it has been shaping the creation of my life until now. Time to get rid of it!"
Piecing the stories together allows me to find the points of view I have developed within them, so that I can UNcreate them. So you see, Self Crafting isn't about making new, it's about pulling apart what's there, cleaning out between the cogs and gears and all the bearings, and then putting it back together in a more beauty-full way.
It's all about the beauty. That's why it's Self CRAFTING. Dissecting, Deconstructing, Re-membering ; these are processes, important and useful processes that are necessary in the Be-coming of Self, yet without the careful Crafting of the Self, where is the beauty?
So dearest heart, what is heavy on your shoulders right now? Is it yours? Do you need it? If you pulled it apart from you, and started creating your life from the different perspective you would have without the old judgments that don't serve you, from your places of vulnerability without the barriers and limits that the rest of the world has set, what beauty will you create for your Self today? What will you do to Self Craft the You you came here to truly Be?