The chaos of The Spiritual Journey
“I once asked a bird, how is it that you fly in this gravity of darkness, The bird responded, “love lifts me.”- RUMI
I listened to an audio message from a good friend of mine that lives in Guam and she light heartedly said, “I love that you are on your spiritual fairy girly grind right now.” And that’s just it.
On July 27th, 2024 I was in a life altering car accident that has changed the direction of my life forever. Sometimes when we experience a traumatic event, we label times in our life as “before the ____” and “after the ____.” I feel like I lived one life before the accident and now I am entering into my second. During the accident there was a very brief but very powerful time where I thought to myself, “I may die.” For those of you that have experienced a near death experience, you might resonate with this feeling that I experienced of a fluctuation between the greatest fear that I have ever felt and also the greatest moment of surrender possible.
We are born, we live, and we die. These are biological facts. But there are moments where we experience in between phases. This was one of them for me. I had flashes of my life, sure, but it was so fast and I truly felt like this wasn’t “it” for me. The crash happened at a time in my life where I was continually feeling disconnected from myself, my purpose, and my soul. Sure I experience the usual depression and anxiety symptoms that I have struggled with my entire life, but this past year felt different for me. I quit my career as a therapist in 2022, and moved to a remote island in the Caribbean where I pursued scuba diving as a full time career path. I thought that this was my new journey, and I felt the urge to push myself into something and be “successful” at it. I could not justify quitting my career which I spent years and thousands of dollars on only to feel like this is not what I wanted to do with my life anymore. It was a huge wake up call, and I struggled to forgive myself for this for a long time.
It wasn’t until this crash that I experienced an awakening. A spiritual reckoning. The pits of the pits. The lowest of the low. I reached a point of exhaustion and burnout before the accident even happened, that when it did occur I literally had no other choice but to sit with myself and rest. I had no other choice but to take a good look at myself and realize how awful I have been treating the central person in my life-me.
We all have that little voice in our heads that is a critic, constantly judging, analyzing, worrying, etc. It is helpful and useful to a certain extent. I did not realize just how loud and controlling this inner voice of mine was until I was met with the most physically altering situation I have ever been in. It felt like this voice worked so very hard for me to prepare me for this moment. Its strength kept me alive, it helped me to literally push my door open and get myself out of my vehicle as fast as humanly possible. The adrenaline coursing through my veins made it possible for me to continuously joke and laugh with every medical worked I interacted with. My coping mechanism is humor. I think unconsciously I could not face the gravity of the situation so I was trying to do anything possible to take my mind out of it.
I am still coming to terms with the fact that I very well could have died in this crash. There are those split seconds where I could have been distracted, not paying attention, not able to react as fast as I could, etc etc…where I could have lost control of my car and died. There wasn’t a feeling beforehand like something bad was going to happen. I did feel overwhelmed and stressed the week leading up to it, where I felt like giving up. It’s strange that this accident occurred during a time where I felt so lost and confused about my soul’s purpose. It brought me back to myself. It brought me closer to myself and closer to Spirit, the universe, my angels, whatever you want to call it.
While I was driving my car that day I just so happened to have my oracle deck with me. I rarely if ever have my deck in my possession out in the world, it is usually in my room on my altar. This day in particular, I was driving to my friend’s niece’s Harry Potter themed birthday party and I was asked to dress up as Professor Trelawney (the psychic) and do a little reading for the kids at the party with the oracle cards. I just so happened to remove the “dark” or scary cards from the deck before I left my house. I still get weird chills thinking and writing about this. The coincedence is too strong for me not to really believe that my guardian angels or spirit guides were literally in the car with me that day, protecting me.
People that I have spoken about the accident with have also agreed with me that this feeling I had feels spot on. I struggled for about 3 weeks after the accident to fully understand why this happened to me. On a walk recently, I kept having this message come up for me that said “It wasn’t your time, it wasn’t your time, it wasn’t your time.” Over and over again. It feels like I have been saved and protected for a reason. That this accident is fueling a new purpose in my life that I am slowly uncovering, piece by piece.
I feel like the first piece has been the spiritual reckoning. The absolute shit show, the lowest of the low, the darkness in the night, the clusterfuck, whatever you want to call it. Being exposed to this darkness and shadow can be fucking overwhelming. It was for me. I did not want to look at it. The critical voice inside my head was still so loud and in survival mode, saying things to me like this accident was my fault, that I wanted it to happen, I deserved it, I would never amount to anything, I would never be successful, I will be depressed for the rest of my life. It took recognition and courage and a lot of conversations with my therapist and spiritual practitioners to dismantle these awful beliefs. It felt like a constant battle internally with myself. I think that the accident was the pinnacle of this fight. It was the plateau point of continuing to not trust myself, to even at times hate who I was. I think that a large reason why I was struggling to trust and love myself for so long is because of the last romantic situation that I was in that was extremely abusive, toxic, and life altering. I allowed someone to push their darkness and shadows onto me and make me heal them. I was involved in a situation that I morally did not want to be in, but I felt like I had to for some reason. The fruit that they promised me was rotten. It did not get better, it took a toll on me that I feel up until the car accident I had been carrying on my shoulders. My guides and whoever the heck is out there protecting me loudly and firmly told me, “It is time to put it down.” So that’s what I did.
