Bridgitte Jackson-Buckley's Blog, page 7

The Direction of “Yes”

The Direction of ‘Yes’Photo by Ian Schneider on Unsplash

A few years ago, during the peak of the economic downturn, I was laid off from work.

Seeing that I had unemployment benefits to (slightly) contribute something on behalf of my lost income, my plan was to utilize the time off to pursue my writing.

For years, I harbored a secret desire to earn a living as a writer. However, as quickly as I would tell myself I could actually bring this vision to life, self-sabotage would inevitably chime in and respond to my encouraging voice with, “You can’t write. You don’t have anything to talk about.”

I began to write and submit articles for online spiritual and personal growth platforms.

However despite my enthusiasm, building readership, while trying to establish my writing voice under the time constraint of unemployment benefits running out, was not a recipe for instant success.

The disappointing reality was the writing income I naively anticipated I could create within a matter of months, would take longer than I thought. After having made $55.00 over the course of the year, discouragement quietly settled in underneath the weight of living expenses, bills and five mouths to feed…including my own.

Photo by Uroš Jovičić on Unsplash

With no other perceived option in sight, I decided to let go of any hopes I held for writing and I began to apply for work.

I decided I would try to find a job that was meaningful and contributed something useful to society.

I didn’t know where to search online, or which search terms to use to “find” fulfilling work.

After months of empty searching and feeling the panic of no job offers on the table, I responded by trying to make myself small.

Despite the yearning to be a part of something great, I began to apply for positions that appeared to be “within reach” of my degree. I applied to positions that paid lower than I normally would have accepted, and positions in which I held no interest.

I thought maybe, just maybe I could be happy with the right administrative job.

So many times prior to this when I have felt anxiety surrounding the outcome of a situation, I utilized my spiritual practice for a “save me please” answer. I wanted someone, something, anything to tell me what to do, to whom I should speak and what I should say.

And this time, I didn’t want anything vague. I wanted the final answer in the form of a deeply fulfilling (and immediate) job.

However, that’s not how this works. That’s not how any of this works.

This was the time to employ the spiritual practices I read so much about, and approach this situation from a completely different perspective.

I meditated to calm myself and the anxiety-ridden thoughts that propelled me.

I knew that I could either continue to do things as I always have, or take a chance on actually trusting my intuition and absorbing what the moment was trying to teach me.

Life is not always linear, pretty and clear.

Sometimes you just have to step outside of the box, especially when you realize you’re being pulled out of the box.

So, I stopped submitting my resume into the “black hole” of internet job postings. I decided to pay attention to my intuitive prompt to volunteer with an organization.

Why I felt this tremendous urge to volunteer was beyond me. It made absolutely no sense. However, the feeling was so strong that I couldn’t ignore it.

I found an organization in alignment with my spiritual interests and within two days, I was placed as a volunteer office assistant. Effective immediately.

A few months passed and I was asked to work as an assistant on a temporary basis.

This would later become my permanent full-time position, which contributed to my professional and personal growth in ways I could not have anticipated.

The position I was hired to fill was not something I would have ever chosen for myself. However, I can now see the divine plan is imperfectly perfect in that we get what we need precisely when we need it.

The professional insights I gained by working in a position that was outside of my comfort zone ushered in a level of growth I usually avoided. In previous employment, I stayed in the background and did not pursue major responsibility.

I did just enough to sleep well at night, but not enough to risk failure.

The professional encouragement I received from my immediate supervisor served to push me beyond the small perceptions I held of myself because, “What you call to you is always a reflection of what you believe should be. And every time you say who you are, your world confirms.” If I didn’t truly believe I could be more than an assistant…well, how would I ever be more than an assistant?

And if I wasn’t willing to be seen, then how could I ever be a writer?

Lastly, I acknowledged that no matter how hard I tried to make myself comfortable with remaining in an administrative position, the urge to write continuously drifted in and out of my awareness.

It simply wouldn’t go away.

Little by little, I grew comfortable with being seen and being heard, and I gently moved myself to the forefront of my own life.

In doing so, I continued to write.

Instead of listening to the voice that said, “You can’t write. You don’t have anything to talk about,” I began to listen to a different small voice within…the voice that said:

“And why not you, too?!”

The yearning to “being a part of something great”, that I could never seem to find through job boards, prompted me to see that the path unfolds as we attend to the yearning.

Photo by Dawid Zawiła on Unsplash

The vision for my life continues to call to me because it is mine to create. Even though there were certain actions I needed to take to serve other purposes, I simultaneously received what I needed. Despite everything, I continued to move in the direction of what never stopped calling to me.

Now, this fall, I will finally be the author of my first published book.

The non-linear path I have been on reminds me to not only trust the process of life, but to also remember the spiritual responsibility we all hold is to keep walking in the direction of “yes”.

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The Direction of “Yes” was originally published in The Writing Cooperative on Medium, where people are continuing the conversation by highlighting and responding to this story.

Change

Change: The idea whose time has comeSapan Patel

Whether it is a series of repetitive doomed-from-the-beginning relationships, perpetual financial despair, or chronic health problems, everything in our life is a clear reflection of what we believe we are worthy of having.

Unfortunately, because the majority of deeply held beliefs are below our level of conscious awareness, we tend to not realize how much we’re actually sabotaging ourselves.

Most people usually choose to follow the common ways of thinking — those used by the majority. This is a possible reason why problems tend to remain unsolved for a long time, and their solutions are usually sluggish processes.

It is easy for people to get used to things — even when it may be something completely unwanted.

According to Socrates, “An unexamined life is not worth living.” We now know such a bold statement could be made because he believed the purpose of life was personal and spiritual growth.

However, in today’s society amidst a weekly cycle of work and consumption which keeps us too busy to slow down, it would appear as though self-awareness is highly discouraged.

When we make time to examine our life, patterns of behavior can be revealed. And deeper contemplation can yield understanding of the subconscious programming, the powerful mental software that can run our life. Unless we become aware of these below-the-surface programmed patterns, much of our life can remain in a cycle of unconscious repetition.

Within the repetition, it is easy to assume if an unwanted, or problematic pattern has existed for some time, a solution would be impossible to find.

However, the greatest difficulty is not related to the implementation of the solution, but instead to transition your mind from the old ways of thinking into new ways of thinking:

Change is not just about you, it’s about every single one of us

Necessity of present day times reiterates that not one of us can continue to remain underneath the weight of outdated beliefs, perceptions and actions that serve only a few.

“It is important for each of us to step out of the world that appears to be crumbling, and step into a new world to offer the vision and the consciousness that can take us from this unsustainable place where we are now.”

We can begin to to move our individual awareness toward ideas and values that can actively guide the processes of change. And with personal capability, each of us can choose to be an individual who is willing to bring forth change — the idea that calls to each one of us, the idea whose time has come.

Doors, Doorways, Beginnings, and Endings

As the Roman Emperor Julius Cesar introduced the Julian calendar in 46 B.C., January was established as the first month of each New Year. January was named in honor of Janus, the mythical Roman god of gates, doors, doorways, beginnings, endings and time.

Janus had two faces — one to look back at the past and one to look forward.

Learning to live with the unrelenting constant of change, realizing that even the good things won’t last forever, and accepting that change is just the way it is, challenges us to welcome this New Year with a new way of being “groundless.”

“Life now insists that we encounter groundlessness.”

“Systems and ideas that seemed reliable and solid are dissolving at an increasing rate. People who asked for our trust betray or abandon us. Strategies that worked suddenly don’t. Groundlessness is a frightening place, at least at first, but as the old turns to mush, we would feel stronger if we stopped searching for ground, if we sought only to locate ourselves in the present and do our work from here.”

Whether we like it or not, life beckons to be a process in motion. Without motion, there is no movement; without movement there is no change, and without change well, there is only more of the same.

“Those who endure, who have stamina for the long haul and become wiser in their actions over time, are those who are not attached to outcomes. They exchange certainty for curiosity, fear for generosity and treat their attempts for something new as experiments.”

They learn as they go, and they learn as they let go because groundlessness calls for the willingness to feel insecure, while harboring the courage that is necessary to let go; to figure out what works and what doesn’t work.

As we embark upon the release and welcome of another year, and stand at the opening and closing of doors, doorways, beginning and endings, this brings about an opportunity for reflection, and re-evaluation, to consciously decide what to keep and what to let go.

Instead of merely hoping for something different, you can decide what will be different.

You can decide what to keep with you and what you can leave behind.

It is precisely at this moment of beginnings and endings that we must know “the secret of letting go is knowing that life will give you something better than it asks you to give up.”