Quit Playing Small And Insignificant

I am blessed to be able to participate in the "Communicating with Our Spirit Guides---Workshop" that Slade Roberson is hosting for the month of June. Thank you Slade for putting yourself out there to do this workshop. As usual, when you and I communicate, I learn about myself.

For awhile, I have been butting my head up against a wall of my own resistance to growth and searching out new terrritory in my spiritual journey. I recently told Slade that I was being a rebel and rebelling against structure in all forms. The little kid in me (the two-year-old) is in full tantrum mode and has been for awhile. She is always afraid of moving forward, especially spiritually. She is the one who still feels shame and worthlessness. Sometimes, I ignore her tantrums and sometimes, I face them head on and move forward anyway. Sometimes, like the past few months, I just let her throw her tantrum and wait for it to be over. She has strong lungs, like most two-year-olds.

I have waited and waited and waited. Now it is time to move forward again after reassuring her that her fears are unfounded. They are just leftovers from my childhood that need to be let go of. No one is going to hurt her. No one is going to make her life nearly impossible. I will protect her.

In Slade's class, we are learning different ways to get in touch with our spirit guides and to use the information that we get from them. We all get this information in various ways. Most of us ignore the majority of the information and if we do admit to receiving it, we blow it off to imagination or wishful thinking. Slade is teaching us how to know the difference between wishful thinking and the real thing---intuition. Most of the time, our guides use our intuition to speak to us.

Last week's assignment from Slade was to tell us to ask a question of our guides, out loud, and then follow that with the statement, "And my guides say _________." My rebellious two-year-old doesn't like being told what or how to do things. She was afraid.

One of the ways that I have learned to face my fears is to voice it so I did that in an email to the workshop group. Here is part of email that I sent them:

"Slade, I haven't played with the assignment of talking out loud to my guides and asking questions and then saying, 'And then my guides say . . .' I think that I haven't because of the answers that I might get. Am I ready for those answers? Am I ready to accept that much responsibility for my own life and actions and moving forward. Are any of the others in the group feeling what I am or am I just being a coward? . . ."

I got back several wonderful responses from group members that just added to the information that started coming to me from my guides almost immediately after sending the email on its way. Thanks to those who responded, if you are reading this. It made a big difference. Almost as soon as the email hit the air waves, my fear was gone. I have discovered, as I said above, that sometimes just voicing my fears is enough to make them disappear. I have also learned that voicing our own emotions can sometimes be a spur for someone else who may be feeling the same way to voice their feelings as well. We do all like company when we are feeling fear, anger, sadness or happiness.

About two days after sending out the above email, I received a message that loudly said, "Quit playing small and insignificant. It isn't you." I received the message and very quietly to myself say, "Oh, ok, is that way I am doing, again."

Then the articles started coming in from other bloggers telling me the same thing, just in a different format. The first of several came from my daily "Today's Heartfelt Blessing" which you can find at http://www.bettertobless.com/ . I love the messages that I receive daily from Kate. They are always uplifting and full of wisdom given out with humility.

The next article that came to me was from Albert of "Personal Development - The Urban Monk." Albert's article is entitled "The Power of Being You" which you will find at http://www.urbanmonk.net/318/the-power-of-being-yourself/ which starts out with saying, "Each individual brings a uniques light into the world, however, often that light remains buried below the surface of the person others see in us. Discovering that light and letting it shine is one of the fundamental steps each individual must take to become a more whole person." This was an article written by a guest author---Alexander De Foe. Thank you Alexander and Albert for this article.

At this point in my week, I started to realize how determined my guides were that I get the meaning of their information. Then I got the following article from the blog "6 WEEKS" written by Brett and found at http://6weeks.ca/?p=215 . What Brett told me came to him from Battlestar Galactica and was that "God loves you because you are perfect, just the way that you are." Then Brett went on to quote my favorite Marianne Williamson saying:

"Our deepest fear is not that we are inadequate. Our deepest fear is that we are powerful beyond measure. It is our light, not our darkness that most frightens us. We ask ourselves, Who am I to be brilliant, gorgeous, talented, fabulous? Actually, who are you not to be? You are a child of God. Your playing small does not serve the world. There is nothing enlightened about shrinking so that other people won't feel insecure around you. We are all meant to shine, as children do. We were born to make manifest the glory of God that is within us. It's not just in some of us; it's in everyone. And as we let our own light shine, we unconsciously give other people permission to do the same. As we are liberated from our own fear, our presence automatically liberates others." - Marianne Williamson

By the time that I finished reading Brett's article, I was laughing and told my guides, out loud so they would know I was serious, "Ok, I get the message." I do love what Marianne says and I guess I needed to be reminded of it. So, okay, people, quit playing small and insignificant. It isn't you and it doesn't suit you or anyone else for you to do it. Let your Light shine for all of the world to see. You never know who may be watching and learning from you about how to let their Light shine too. Isn't this world and time a glorious place to be? Can you tell that "glorious" is my favorite word. It has such a wonderful feel. One of these days, my two-year-old inner child might just reach out and grab onto that glory herself.

Patricia