Have you heard the one about the spiritual teacher who still thought he was in control?  LOL!!

***

Have I ever told you that I’m a recovering Type-A control freak?

It’s true.

My natural tendency to control EVERYTHING has made the move from mortgage lender (where I thought I could control everything) to spiritual teacher and healer (where I know I can control nothing) an interesting journey.

However, there are juuuust a few lessons that keep repeating themselves … 🙂

***

Have you ever thought: “There’s something more I can or need to do to make this better.”

Or

“There’s a right (or better or more effective) way to do this, and I have to figure that out so I can do this the right way.”

***

It’s easy for me to get caught in these, and other thoughts whose foundation is separation and the illusion of control.

They are especially prevalent in my life when it comes to writing and other creative activities – the “pure expressions” of my soul

***

One of my hobbies is woodworking.

A number of years ago I got my first several significant pieces of woodworking equipment: a table saw, a jointer, and a planer.

I found a coffee table design that I loved, bought the plans and started making it.

I milled up rough-cut bird’s eye maple for the table top, rock maple for the rest.

My grandfather Stone (for whom I am named) was a woodworker. I share his love of bird’s eye. And I love mission style furniture – certainly not a conventional combination, but I’m unconventional on so many levels, LOL!

I worked fairly quickly at the beginning – within a couple of weeks all the parts were ready to be assembled.

This must have been somewhere in the 1999 to 2000 timeframe.

I remember telling one of my clients at the time about my project.

Several years later he bought another house. When he was in my office getting his mortgage paperwork in order he asked how my coffee table was progressing.

The answer: it’s still in pieces waiting to be assembled.

The problem: I couldn’t get the parts to fit together exactly perfectly. So I decided to wait until a day when I knew how to mill them perfectly – had better equipment to do the job – or some combination of the two.

Guess what? It’s still in the barn in the same state of ready-to-assemble, waiting for better equipment, better knowledge, or both.

***

There’s another iteration of control:

“I know I can figure out how to solve this challenge.  I’ve got all the answers.”

***

About a month back, the theme for our weekly group session in The Sanctuary was: Transmission Tower.

It must have been two or three years back when I first saw this truth in such a powerful way.

The brief summary is that we are all transmission towers for our Divine purpose/message. What’s interesting is that the “work” is not in fine tuning the transmission tower or the message – they are already perfect (they are of the Divine, after all).

The work is in stepping in fully to one’s purpose, resonance, light – we could call this “inhabiting the transmission tower.”

What’s so extraordinary about this awareness is that when we get clear about it, we realize that the transmission tower is already erected – and the message is being broadcast.  Further it’s already being received by your tribe all around the world!

Now to step into your power and resonance – and inhabit the tower. Once you’re on the air so to speak, your people can find you because you’re now resonating with your purpose/message – and the transmission tower.

This is what the session was focused on.

As with any group session, words and pictures and ideas came through as we were getting started and I reflected out loud on what I was seeing.

Then it was time to start the session proper. As always, I extended an invitation for permission to plug in – and away we went.

***

The day after I received this email from a member of The Sanctuary:

“My experience last night with the Transmission Tower session was very weird, not anything like I expected, and certainly not like the oneness and peace that I had experienced with the recorded sessions I had listened to so far. But I’m not complaining – what a fantastic result I got!”

I’ll admit I was curious to continue reading!

“I did the practice you have on The Sanctuary website for us to do before each session, but when the session actually began my mind became extremely “busy” and was difficult to quiet down. I hadn’t ever had that experience with the recorded sessions. But it did finally quiet down. Then, further into the session, I had the sensation of being buried deep under smothering tons of dark heavy sludge, which I feel I have been under for a long long time, and I saw myself struggling up out of it and finally getting completely dug out.  But then I immediately began sobbing from deep in the depths of my being, for what seemed a long time.  Then suddenly the sobbing turned into laughing. Happy delighted light-hearted laughing like I haven’t done for many years. The laughter just kept bubbling up from inside me for almost all the rest of the session.”

The practice she’s talking about is Divine Connecting Breath – and coming into the body – as a single 20-minute practice.  When members of The Sanctuary complete this first, we’re able to jump straight into depth nearly immediately.  It’s also a very powerful method for “tuning up” your intuitive guidance system – so you are aware of resonance or dissonance with whatever I’m reflecting on (after all – we all have our own truth and it’s important to be tuned in to that!).

“After the session was over I realized that the depression, a depression deep in my core that I had been trying to “solve” for years with no success, was gone. Years of studying countless stacks of books, and meditating, and brainwave entraining, and working with spiritual teachers and counselors, and trying all sorts of things that other people said had helped them, but none of which helped me. None of which had budged the depression. In fact, doing all that just made the depression worse.  Then one group session with you and the depression was suddenly, inexplicably, amazingly gone.”

Another no-so-subtle message from God: Ken – you are a conduit!! All you need to do is get out of the way. What needs to be done, will be done. Don’t even try to control that.

Message received!

Also notice the other message: You can try to solve the problem – and it may even get worse.  Sink into your wholeness – and everything – exactly what you need – will be taken care of.

“The whole experience was wild and totally unexpected, and all day today I’ve been checking back to see if that deep down all-the-way-to-the-core depression is still really gone because I can’t believe it is. It makes no sense to me – you weren’t even working on anything remotely related to depression. And with all that craziness going on, I missed a lot of the things you were actually covering, so I need to go back and do the session again to get what was really covered. But I’m absolutely delighted with the crazy unexpected result.

I can’t thank you enough.”

I emailed her back:

“WOW – what an experience!!!

And a powerful reinforcement that while I can try to make a session about something in particular, it’s all about what needs and wants to happen in the Divine flow!!

Congratulations on showing up and being present to your wholeness – and for the transformation you’ve experienced!!

I’m very interested in writing about this in one of my From My Heart emails. If I leave it anonymous – would it be OK with you if I utilized your reflections of the experience intertwined with my commentary in some future email?”

She returned:

“Yes, you definitely have my OK to write about my experience in a From My Heart email. I’m still continuing checking back in deep inside myself to see if the depression is really gone and it still keeps being gone and I’m still amazed.
 
I listened to the recording of the Divine Transmission Tower session this evening and no wild crazy ride this time 🙂 Instead, there was that wonderful indescribable oneness experience, like I’ve had with those of your other recorded sessions I’ve listened to so far. I especially loved, and felt, when you said “Notice how when we reflect on the words ‘The river is flowing’ from our perspective right now, we’re not only in flow with the river, we ARE the river that is flowing.” What a feeling. The experience gets deeper with each session. I know this sounds overly dramatic, but I feel that experience is what I’ve been yearning, searching, aching for for so long I can’t remember. What a gift you are.
 
Thank you for you.”

You’re welcome (and thank you!).

I’ve been working on being me and loving myself exactly as I am. It is wonderful to be seen.

***

Thank you, God, for reminding me of these simple, profound truths through your messenger.

Thank you, God, for giving me these gifts and the opportunity to serve and witness others as they uncover and deepen their relationship with you, within their bodies, their minds, their experience.

I am humbled. I am in awe.

***

I am also reminded of a basic truth: I am a transmission tower (you too, BTW).

Whether I am facilitating a group session (where it seems so clear to me that I am indeed a transmission tower for something far greater than me – nothing like the exchange above to drive that point home).

Or writing a From My Heart.

Or working on my book.

Or building a coffee table.

I resolve to not get in the way – and more to the point, to get even further out of the way. And let the Divine mystery/masterpiece express itself in all areas of my life.

Join me as I surrender more completely?

Opening up to a deeper experience of who we really are …

***

I will finish my book, without worrying about how I can make it better and more refined – more acceptable to a publisher or an agent or the book reading public.

I will finish my website project, without worrying that I need to refine my copy to make it more appealing to those who will visit the site, whose lives could be transformed if only they sign up for the course I’ll be offering.

I will trust.

***

God, you put me here, so I’m going to turn it all over to you and trust that you’ll take care of things from here on out.

***

Somewhere along the way I fell in love with turning wood on a lathe. You start with an “ugly”, unrefined block of wood.

Then you begin removing the extra – the parts of the block of wood that have been obscuring the beautiful vessel within.

A new shape – and new form reveals itself.

That which looked like a check (a big ugly crack) on the outside, turns out to be the most beautiful feature of the vessel.

The inside is excavated – and before long it’s time to start polishing.

Each pass with finer and finer sand paper and buffing compounds reveals more beauty.

Until you are left with something so perfect it defies words.

You may have thought you knew were you were headed and what you would end up with when you started, but it’s always so different and so much more beautiful than anything you could have imagined.

Sounds a little like the process of uncovering your inner beauty, wholeness, and Divinity, doesn’t it?

***

Here’s to your art, however it flows through you.

That’s it for this week … From My Heart.

Thank you for including me in your life.  I know you have a choice of which spiritual newsletters to subscribe to, and which ones you read.  I’m honored to have made your list.

I promise to keep it real. And I invite you to do the same. Hit reply and let me know what’s on your mind.

Peace,

Ken

Ken W Stone
“The Soul Archaeologist”
Experience the Divine Within
www.KenWStone.com