November: Emergence
Phase 11: Letting Go
In Phase 11, something in you ends but there is an emergence of a replacement. Your heart’s mind, as a reliable self-adjusting system, restores your equilibrium by taking a benefit out of change and nurturing it like a seed. Phase by phase, from 1 through 12, the benefit grows into a permanent good, added to you at your core. This is growth; it is the development of your unique person.
We near the end of the process as we count the months of this year as each phase. If you journal or make notes on your phone's calendar, you can look back and see the changes in circumstances. Compare the change inside you, from how you felt in January compared to how you feel now. See the growth?
Phase 11 can be felt two ways: one way is a feeling of loss. The other feeling - if you look away from what feels like loss - is a sense of something new. At first, years ago, the feeling of loss made me sad. As it persisted in Phase 11, it occurred to me that, since the phases end in good, maybe I was missing something. If my life at that time was a sea of rubble and dust, looking through it, I could see a vague shape of a figure, standing in the haze. In my mind it was Christ, who is unaffected by my life’s troubles and represents God's love.
Letting go of what has been a part of you all your life can certainly feel like loss; in fact, it is loss. But just as scaffolding around the restoration of a building comes down, what you lose is a temporary thing that served you well - until now. Now, as you grow in strength and maturity, gaining knowledge and wisdom about life, better understanding replaces what you knew as a child. What is revealed in Phase 12 is the finished good, subtle but strong and permanent.
The Importance of Death in Life
What comes after death we won’t know until we get there. There is a part of us that lives here, now, and exists beyond the body. Even if you don’t believe in the afterlife, you want your life to mean something to others. This desire has the force of life for you, as an individual, keeping you moving forward.
On November 1, still mourning my sister's death on October 20, I hear that my brother has two unexplained seizures. This continued to happen, without warning, through November. None of his doctors, including a neurologist, found any cause. By November 30th, I realized that we may lose him, too. It's too much, him being just one year younger than our dear sister.
I’m having to grow up pretty fast. I’m next in line and the healthiest—so far. I have barely adjusted to being the next oldest woman in the family; the thought of being the oldest is a shock. My position in the family has been obscure, and my life is uniquely meaningful, only to me.
Distance from my original family for most of my adult life left me with little understanding of the others. I am basically stoic; they are mostly emotional. Although I have learned a strength in intuition, I learned how insensitive I am, normally. I have offended my sisters often in ignoring their feeling reactions in situations. Now, regardless of my intuition of sensitivity around the loss of my sister, while being in her house, I acted by habit.
I let go of my good intuition too soon because I had no connection to the emotion felt by my sister's daughter. It never occurred to me that she would want the smell of her mother and I ignorantly washed the sheets to make up the bed. Calmly updating her about only making the bed, she said, "You didn't wash the sheets, did you?" She was devastated when I admitted that I had.
I tripped over a boundary. Now I know.
This mistake caused a tremor through me, core to skin, and I realized there's no more hiding out. It is necessary for me to accept the place of authority I have been given. To have peace with it, I have to allow myself to be myself - and be observed, in truth. All that I do privately, exposed.
The eyes of my heart opened. A new respect began to rise, a respect for others. I can look at their lives and know that they work hard, according to their lives. I don’t have to be ‘better’ than everyone else, constantly working hard to stay ahead. It’s an illusion. I am one among all of them. The individual value is the advantage of seeing individual lives by their separate histories.
Meanwhile...
I listen to physicist Sean Carrol’s podcasts, called “Mindscapes.” In one, his expert guest shared how children engage freely and randomly with what life presents, just to see what will happen. They interact to see what reaction they get. Adults do well that way too, she said. This is a sign of being right in the world.
Unconsciously, I heard my heart notice that, despite the mistakes, my integrated intuition did not fail, it just needed to move into this next circumstance—that of the new position of authority. The reason for what you’re feeling is not what you think. You learn as you move, no judgment then, no judgment after. Just learn and grow.
Two books:
Travel light: Spiritual minimalism to live a more fulfilled life by Light Watkins
In this book, the author describes the experience of living beyond the physical in the way that I experience it. His is based on meditation habits, mine on the life system. The Phases enable me to experience life freely and also to judge the external as being in or out of connection with the heartbeat of life. This puts me in close touch with my own development and its pace. Life has meaning as I watch the direction of my development.
Success is for You: Using heart-centered power principles for lasting abundance and fulfillment by David R. Hawkins
I learned more about David Hawkins, why he is considered such a great influence. His language in this book revolves around timeless principles, from the inside out. Reading the book makes his mind a collection of simplicity: points easily recognizable and profound.
For example (p. 98):
"ABC is what is “in here” (inner organization that is nonlinear)
A ➡️ B ➡️ C is what is “out there” (linear, logical, sequential)
…if we change ABC—that is, our inner intention , conviction, motive, principle, goal, purpose, meaning, or alignment—the whole sequence in the world A ➡️ B ➡️ C will automatically be changed as a consequence without our having to do anything about it…"
And this (p. 153):
"Once we understand the universe, we realize that nothing is accidental. Absolutely everything is related to absolutely everything else. If we don’t think so, it is because we are not coming from a big enough perspective to see what that relationship is…"
… after
In an after-Thanksgiving dinner conversation, I had an opportunity to share my thoughts. This is a first for me, openly speaking my thoughts, willing to be judged. In summary, I shared these thoughts about the ways people rise above their real-life difficulties:
In Travel Light, the author could live from meaning after years practicing and teaching meditation.
In Success is for You, Richard Hawkins could share a deep understanding of practicing a life based on principles, rather than external goals.
In religious faith, many people go to biblical explanations of life and reach into their hearts for what they believe God is ‘doing’.
The Universe is a word we often use for the way life seems to urge us to look in a positive direction in circumstances.
In the Twelve Phases
Nature’s way is to ensure your survival, which is inherently a positive direction. The twelve phases phenomenon describes how human survival happens in a particular way for you as a unique individual. Now that I learned to live my life with this additional information, I have found that it enables me to move in sync with the way life is; I let go of what I expect life to be.
This perspective can help you attain your life purpose—what you were born to become. The Phases are intrinsic to you. They continually build you up—with a knowing that life teaches you about Life as a system. Life is a system with a greater ability than whatever you do to maintain your personal energy.
Few of us are motivated to look deep into our lives, to look into what truly motivates us, from inside to the outside. Seeing the rhythm of the Phases, and how life builds out of them, can put you in space of life wisdom. The moments of the unexpected are managed in the Phases—to your good. Managing the downs by the ups keeps you up!
Looking away from what was ‘mine’ or ‘me’ was a way of letting go of the old and accepting the new. These inner feelings and your choices in responding are the evidence of your heart’s mind. You may not always associate your internal feelings directly with circumstances but with the Phases, you can learn the timing of your personal development.
In Phase 12, the new good is complete and forms a permanent asset of maturity and authority. As the Phases repeat, Phase 12 forms a basis of additional strength that supports your ability to respond with life knowledge to new situations. Begin to expect the quiet subtle work of good accomplished in you by the Phases.