Is spirituality necessarily challenging or hard?

Must the spiritual journey be difficult?

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Is an ascetic life a necessary component of enlightenment?

If not, what is the value of asceticism?

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My will is strong. My personality, my ideas – they can consume me.

I remember when I first learned about the Law of Attraction my response was: “finally, I can have everything exactly as I want.”

You know what’s funny? It is. But the journey from there to here is nothing like I could have ever predicted nor consciously claimed as my own. I didn’t even know that I had a spiritual gift. I had no way of understanding where my life was heading much less how I’d get there.

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Yet my soul called out, drawing me closer to purpose, to resonance.

Is your soul calling you?

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The doorway through which you can fully listen to your soul’s calling has one label: surrender.

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Herein lies one of the values of asceticism. A conscious choice to simplify or deny can open the door to the discipline of surrender.

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So it is with challenges.

The challenges I am living right now – that I have transcended – and that I will face in my life to come, are all my creation.

This doesn’t necessarily mean that I have constructed them from thin air (though it could – isn’t that an interesting idea?). Instead, it points to how I respond or react – those are my creation, my responsibility.

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Do you resonate with this perspective?

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The paradox of transcending victim consciousness is accepting complete responsibility for everything – especially those things for which we feel as though we have no control.

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The paradox of transcending manifestor/controlling consciousness is completely surrendering… the final act prior to complete surrender: accepting complete responsibility for EVERYTHING – including the fact that you don’t have the answer to whatever you’re trying to fix … and surrendering it to the Divine.

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The close of this quarter, especially the last two or three weeks have been especially compressed and full of clarify around issues of control. You’re not alone if these amplified experiences have brought a special level of awareness (and perhaps frustration!).

The compression is pointing the way to surrender … to any and every point of tension in your life.

Remember: there’s a Divine masterpiece waiting to express itself in your life. So majestic that you are literally incapable of perceiving the true nature of the masterpiece – perhaps even any of the particulars. Those are only revealed to those who surrender.

It’s the price of moving forward on your spiritual journey.

Unlike any other “price” you may have encountered in your life, this one doesn’t actually cost you anything … other than continuing to hold onto the illusion of control.

It’s the most magnificent thing to give up … but until you do, it will feel like a price you’re unwilling to pay (even one that will cause your demise).

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Is surrender a way station on the highway of life? Something visited once, and then we move past it – never to revisit it again?

No. Not as long as we continue to exert control.

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As I’m writing this I’m reflecting on the myriad opportunities for me to surrender in my life right now.

Each opportunity is like a neon sign with an arrow pointing towards a lightness that is available to be integrated into my life. The lightness is Divine resonance – of what form I don’t know. It’s the absence of resistance in my life.

What would your life be like if all resistance were gone?

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We’re on the eve of a new opening with the spring/fall equinox. How will you take advantage of this opening to integrate and open to the as yet unknown beauty that is waiting to express more fully in your life?

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

Thanks for including me on your spiritual journey. I’m grateful we’re connected in this way.

Peace,

Ken

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