The only place from which to begin.
I'd say there are many things to master in walking the path, but perhaps nothing so important as profound self honesty. If we can be totally honest with ourselves about our true motivations for action, then we are continually presented with the starting point for change. But without that, we never really have that authentic platform from which to begin, and all kinds of illusionary realities can get created. And it doesn't matter even if we don't follow our highest truth, as long as we're honest about why...

The Spanish Inquisition
Self introspection has always come naturally for some reason. My father was quite a controlling guy so I'd continually be presented the 'Spanish Inquisition' about why I did certain things and not others. In my teenage years, it seemed like a curse, the mind playing endless strategic games always to stay one step ahead.

When I awakened, the divine feminine unfolded pretty rapidly. To be perfectly frank, that side of me had been buried and underactive for ages. Now total self acceptance happened practically over-night. I no longer had the need for people to think of me in this light or that. What a liberating blessing!

What I also found, was that the years of 'Spanish Inquisition' also became a blessing, because I was totally used to watching my motivations for action - why was I really doing this or that? But stripped of the external (indeed internal) judge, I discovered I could be honest about what was going on, yet accepting of why I was doing it.

Emulating spiritual identity
I'd say one of the key problems facing evolving people right now, is the projection of how we should be - many have recognised great spiritual traits to master (like empathy for example), but then the mind goes into over-drive trying to create that external projection. We can so easily get caught in trying to emulate another.

I remember feeling a powerfully strong sense of the Christ Consciousness flowing through me at one point. This consciousness flowed into mind, but then the mind owned it. I wanted to behave how I thought that consciousness was. I found myself trying to uplift, motivate and heal everyone who came across my path. Pretty soon, I found myself contracted down with the false profit 'do-good-burden'.

But just as soon as I recongised it by being honest with myself, refreshingly the yoke fell quickly from my shoulders, and once more I found myself in the place of pure presence, where how I was feeling to be, was simply allowed to happen.

"Over the four years that I was teaching, I found that rarely someone wanted to hear the truth. Many people come to this type of satsang because they want to be told that there are shortcuts and often they want to adore someone. Not many want to hear about the painstaking work of purifying our minds and healing our pains. In fact, in the satsangs, the jokes about working on yourself are plentiful....We realize that the freedom we thought we had found in the bliss and joy of the Enlightenment high is not the real freedom at all. It is much deeper. It is truly accepting what IS.
~ Rani

Digging deeper
When we're being honest with ourselves, it means we can dig deeper. So for example, we may have some kind of attachment: perhaps to particular food, to a relationship or to external pleasure distractions. If we're honest about our attachment to these, then it means when they kick in, we can be much more sensitive to what's really going on.

And sensitivity is a powerful tool. Because within the attachment will be some kind of blind spot - there always is. A critical edge where presence is lost, the switch is thrown and we fall over into the conditioned behaviour. But with sensitivity on that edge, then we can be deeply honest with the feeling until it no longer owns or defines us.

Take distraction for example. How many of us are really content with the peace of absolutely nothing? There's no blame for the condition of course - take a look at just how distracting society is! But if we can be honest with ourselves about this, then rather than skipping over the sycnhronistic messages from the universe, we can allow them to direct our attention to where it really needs to be.

In that moment immediately before you switch on the TV, or pick up the computer, the mobile phone or the newspaper, instead, can we feel the programmed stimulation activating yet resist the conditioning to follow it? Can we watch the inner contraction starting to happen and just feel it? Here's where mastery is being offered on an empty plate. To feel the pain of the contraction, but choose instead to eat it up and soften into it, letting the emptiness fill your belly. It is right at this point that liberation presents itself, together with a profound gift - one of authentic beingness.

The ultimate liberation of 'no-blame'
That's what I just love about this video clip below from "Good Will Hunting" - it's not your fault. His 'facilitator' doesn't allow him simply to skip over self judgment at a surface intellectual level - which so frequently happens. Instead, he keeps bringing him right back to the point - Will's own sense of self worth, upon which it can simply explode into softness and expressed sensuality...

Here's to profound self honesty and acceptance of the moment, how ever it is presenting itself!

Chris