The Honest Inner Journey of Spiritual Progress

One of the hesitations that often surfaces when we’re doing honest inner work is, “But I don’t want to be negative. Do I really want to focus on this stuff?”

I know, I’ve asked these questions myself. I’m with you!

Most of us want to be positive…grateful…encouraging. These are beautiful, empowering ways to be. They’re a gift to others as well. And many of us are able to maintain a genuine, expectant focus in life.

It takes honesty, openness, and for me, a consistent spiritual life, to maintain this outlook with authenticity.

Thing is, so many of us have been programmed to ignore limited, nagging beliefs that hold us back from honest interactions. We’ve been taught to say, “All is well” and sweep any negative thought that we’re feeling under the rug. 

Maybe our parents, in their desire to be good and to do what’s accepted, modeled this for us. Maybe, in our efforts to meet the cultural expectations of our faith or family communities, we smile and play along to fit in. 

We see the masculine model of gritting it out, sucking it up, pushing through, as a sign of strength. 

But is it really? 

Do we live with genuine freedom if we’re not aligned and intune with our center and fully aware and present in the present?

Are we truly at peace if we turn our head the other way and hope that regrets about the past or worries about the future subside?

During a recent HHJ Saturday Conversation, What is it to Lead from the Feminine?, author Laurie Benson shared the work of Dr. Masaru Emoto. In his book The Hidden Messages in Water, Emoto writes about the impact of thought and prayer on the condition of water crystals.

He believed that “water could react to positive thoughts and words and that polluted water could be cleansed through prayer and positive visualization.”

Observing clear and muddy water samples that were focused on with both negative and positive thought, and then one sample that was ignored, Emoto saw that the sample that became most polluted was the one that hadn’t received any attention.

Ignoring something isn’t healthy. 

We don’t just think thoughts; they come to us. Our job is to choose what we do with them. 

How can we become more intune with the thoughts that come to us – positive or negative – with the intent to give them awareness, resolve them when needed, and move forward with full, clear focus? 

If we don’t, thoughts become beliefs that keep us captive, leaving us to ruminate over and imagine their intent.

I’m not suggesting we wallow in self pity, complaint, or being a victim. I’m talking about identifying a thought that comes to us, asking questions that give it a thorough investigation, and then releasing its effect on us. 

Bring a thought into the light, let it turn in all directions and show itself, then allow it to walk away no longer needy, and we are no longer unsettled.

At this point, a thought that has been allowed to become a scary and oversized belief is now done. Finished. Caput. Hopefully heard and healed.

It makes me think of the biblical parable of putting new wine into new bottles. We have to keep the bottles clean so that the content is pure. 

The tools for observation and growth offered by facilitators within our HHJ community have taken me on an inner journey.

In recent months, I’ve waded into doing The Work of Byron Katie with Aileen Cheatham. I can’t tell you how much I look forward to having the time and space to dive deep into it, unplugged from everyday “priorities,” when we walk the Camino with HHJ this fall!

I’ve also discovered and embraced the unique core values that naturally guide me through working with Clifton Strengths coach Deborah Anderson. 

Laurie Benson just led us through an exercise in somatic awareness that helped us explore where we feel emotions, both negative and positive. While somatic practice is new to me, I appreciate how it asks me to just observe, and not project, and to be in tune with every part of me. To not judge, but just become aware.

To me, living is FEELING, fully. To me, it’s about letting go of controlled thinking and allowing consciousness to breathe through me.

Heather Barron’s message from a couple of months ago of “You belong here. You are ready. You are not alone” opened my heart to my innate worth as a child of God. It reminds me, in what feel like wilderness moments, that I am whole and have within all that I need, now and always. There’s nothing that I need to do or be to earn the love of Love. Nor can I lose this love. It just IS…eternally, God’s gift to Her beloved child.

These inner journeys have prompted me to ask questions – to not just accept the limited circumstances, assumptions, and flawed personality of an outer me. Instead, I can listen for and sense the thoughts that come to me, and to discern their origin. 

Are they peaceful intuitions, directions that resonate within my heart and align me with Source, God, good, and bring clarity about who I am?

Or are they fears, doubts, frustrations, resentments, suggestions of not-enough, that dart and race within thought and distract me from focusing within the present?

By practicing The Work of Byron Katie, I can identify someone who’s offended me and how it makes me feel, put it through Inquiry, and recognize for the first time my own perspective or bias within the situation. I’ve been so busy pointing the finger at another that I haven’t been in tune with my own actions, and the emotions that have prompted them. 

Or, I’ve created a false impression and allowed it to grow into something entirely different from reality. It’s not that different from the “Telephone” game we played as kids; by the end of making its rounds, the message usually emerges unrecognizable!

Doing a simple worksheet facilitation of The Work, I can see something I’ve held onto for years literally dissolve…if I’m thorough and genuinely open to new insight within the process of inquiry.

The inner journey is a process of honest reflection, releasing beliefs that have hidden feelings of clarity and freedom, and restoring the peace of my wholeness. This brings me pure joy!

What I know is that, as I’ve taken this journey, my inner world has both expanded and settled. And my outer world has responded to this.

I’m discovering that the most important part of honest inner work is celebrating and protecting my growth. I’m learning to release guilt, shame, regret, or self-condemnation – about myself, or others – that I’ve given the spotlight to. 

I focus on moving forward, grateful for what I’ve learned. The past is done, and I can embrace the present with full attention.

This journey doesn’t happen overnight. It's a patient, trusting, constant walk of compassion – beginning with oneself. It is honest and thorough, and full of grace.

I’m like a mother protecting her child - a pure, innocent new idea.

I like to think of myself as a wisdom nomad on a journey to fully unearth and honor the lessons of my stories. Not bury them. Some of them may have begun as ugly, even hideous, experiences or thoughts. But, as I’ve given them healing attention, they’ve become radiant lights guiding me forward. 

"Your task is not to
seek love, but merely
to seek and find all the
barriers within
yourself that
you have built against it."
- Rumi