A Call to the Heart: Shifting out of Ego into Spirit

The Practical Mindset

May 2001

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I was twenty-two years old feeling my plan had been executed perfectly. Life was on track and it was great. For as long as I could remember, I knew that I would go to a university away from home and I would finish, within four years. I never really questioned this vision, nor did I spend much time agonizing over what I would study. My criteria were simple and straightforward and had absolutely nothing to do with my heart. Of course, I did not know I was excluding that, at the time. At the time, my mindset was completely ruled by practicality. This is how my decision process went, when it came time to choose a major: I figured I was of average intelligence so engineering and any higher profession like medical school or becoming a lawyer were out. I, then, thought to myself, Hmm, a business degree is practical, and of the business degrees, accounting seems to be the most challenging, but it still appears to be within reach for me. Accounting it was (yawn!).

I plugged away over the next four years to attain my good degree, in the prescribed amount of time, just like I had always envisioned. I was so adamant about sticking to my plan that the sheer difficulty and dullness of my accounting classes never registered long enough for me to consider changing majors. My thoughts, at the time, went like this:

If I change my major that will totally set me back from finishing in four years, per the plan. Oh sure, I really enjoy my psychology classes, but to really do anything with that degree, I would need to go on and get my masters and doctorate degrees. That would mean taking the GMAT. But I’m terrible at standardized tests, so that won’t work. And just because I enjoy my psychology classes, doesn’t mean that I will enjoy this as a career. I don’t really want to set up the studies and carry out the research; I just enjoy reading about it. Okay, stick to accounting. Gosh accounting is hard. It’s really not a natural fit for me, at all. No, I can do this, just keep plugging along.

Four years on time, per my plan, I graduated with a degree in accounting and a job at one of the Big 5 accounting firms. There I was, twenty-two years old, having completed the only vision I had ever held for myself. Never question the power of intention! It works whether you are conscious of it or not! Work was exciting for maybe about three months before I started feeling an emptiness that I had never previously felt. I really should have considered interning, and, then, maybe I would have known that I ultimately was not meant to be doing that.

Needless to say, I was completely identified with my ego (versus spirit). I had no sense of how to connect or listen to anything that came from within (or that I should do so). I was completely identified with external directives for determining my life course. I made decisions based on what made sense to society (versus what I felt inside). I could not even pause long enough to explore my hesitations. Any hesitation was quickly covered with practical reasons as to why they should not be seriously explored. My life had been shaped from the outside in (versus the inside out). Fortunately, I would experience a rude awakening that would work to reshape and redirect the direction that my life had been taking.

The Emergence of a New Mindset

I would not say I was egoic in the general sense of the term. I did not force myself to be recognized by needing to be the center of attention. I did not consciously seek opportunities to make my accomplishments known. I did not carry myself with an I deserve or demand to be recognized attitude. That just was not me. However, inwardly, I was still very much defined by my ego. I was proud of the fact that I had graduated, in four years, with my bachelor’s degree, in a time when most people were taking five years or more. I was proud that I had an accounting degree and that I had landed a pretty good job. It felt good to have done those things and I based who I was on those attributes and accomplishments.

During college, if I met someone who was getting what I considered an artsy fartsy degree, I secretly wondered what they were going to do with that degree. The idea of a liberal arts degree was silly and impractical to me, but, of course, I never showed those feelings outwardly. Liberal arts just did not fit my practical mindset. It would not be until after college that I truly understood why someone would pursue such a degree. My realization would come after trying to figure out why I was feeling a deep emptiness after landing a job that fit my plan. It would come when I was trying to understand why, for the first time in my life, I felt apathetic, unengaged, and unmotivated. It would be when I started to wonder why the hours in the day ticked by so slowly. It would be when I felt that the exciting part of my day began at five o’clock, when the workday was finally over. It would be when, for the first time in my life, I started living for the two precious days in every week, Saturday and Sunday. It would be when I felt a heaviness that I had never known. It would be when I experienced frustration, anger, and a general up and down of emotions, that was so uncommon to my temperament, that I was ready to do anything to figure out how to get my normal emotions back. I wondered what I had done to create this mess of emotions. I wondered how my fool-proof plan had come to this. Some people said it was just my first experience with the real world and I should suck it up and get used to it. What do you mean, suck it up and get used to it, I thought to myself. How could I go on for the next thirty years living with frustration, apathy, and anger?

There was no way I could accept that. I had always told myself that I would never settle, in life, and I realized that accepting a path that came with such a prevalence of these emotions would be settling (of course, I previously thought settling was relegated to marrying the wrong guy). I never saw this curve ball coming. How did I miss this?!? What had I not accounted for? It seems laughable, now, thinking that an accounting degree was going to fulfill me. All the signs were there, throughout college, pointing to the fact that accounting was not a natural fit for me. To cut myself some slack, I did not even know what it meant to feel fulfilled. I was quickly learning what it felt like to feel unfulfilled, though! So there I was, at the end of my completed vision, recognizing the gaping hole in the entire plan–I had not even asked myself what I was passionate about! I realized all those liberal arts majors had figured out something really important, way earlier than I had!

The liberal arts majors knew to lead with their hearts, not the fear of needing to find a good, safe, secure job. Now I wanted what they had, passion…but I had no clue regarding how to go about discovering that for myself. I was so engulfed in a mindset that prided itself on practicality, safety, and security that I had completely overridden anything that remotely resembled passion. I had buried it somewhere, in me, and had no clue as to how to uncover it. I did know one thing for sure, there was absolutely no way that I was going to turn my back on trying to figure it out. I just could not accept the emotions that I was feeling as the course for the rest of my life.

How hard could it be to figure out what I was passionate about? I quickly learned not to underestimate the power of my practical mindset. Every decision that I had made, up until that point, had been unconsciously churned through an effective and efficient practicality barometer. My mindset was so effective at keeping, what it considered, nonsensical things at bay, that I did not even know how many things had been kept from my conscious awareness. I started to fight practicality with anger. I could not stand when co-workers started talking about their 401(k)s, or pretty much anything else that represented safety and security. I started to become repulsed by practicality. I wanted to get as far away from it, in my thinking, as I could. Now, I realize that I was fighting what Martha Beck calls our conditioned self, in her book, Finding Your North Star.

Seriously, how hard could it be to figure out what I loved?!? I started to open myself up to anything and everything that interested me. I thought to myself, I like hiking and the outdoors. Okay, hiking…the outdoors…A park ranger? Yeah, yeah, yeah! No, I do not want to live that remotely. Plus, the uniforms are terrible.

My boyfriend, at the time, found all of this craziness laughable, which, of course, sent me over the edge. As I fought against my old thinking, I clawed, with everything I had, to break through to another way of thinking. The poor guy took the brunt of this outward manifestation of my inner struggle. He endured my harsh words as I fought back, with tooth and nail, every time I perceived him to cut me off at the knees, regarding my new way of thinking. Looking back, I now realize he represented my fight against my conditioned self (or my old mindset) that Martha Beck speaks to, in her book.

It was the emergence of two very different ways of thinking. I just could not go back to my old mindset, and because my initial reaction was to despise it, my relationship with my boyfriend was no longer healthy. I sincerely regret my fighting words. They were laced with every ounce of anger and frustration that I felt towards my old way of thinking, and were projected onto him. He was kind enough to never stoop to my level of angry word play, remaining ever so calm through my raging war. Of course at the time I had no such insight. All I knew was that I needed to move on from my old thinking and that included surrounding myself with people who were more understanding and supportive of the new direction that I was headed.

I am so thankful for the crack in my awareness that allowed for the initial emergence of this new mindset. It set me on a path that has completely transformed my life. The years following the emergence of this new mindset were slow going (though I did not realize this at the time) relative to what I have experienced in this past year, but they were also necessary to position me to continue to receive information that served to further my awareness of truth. I would suggest that if you begin to feel a pull in a new direction that feels right for you, to not let the constraints of your old identity (or the people who want to keep you bound to that identity) keep you from exploring further. If you feel yourself drawn to something, but quickly discount it as "being cool or interesting, but not for you, consider dropping the old aspect of your identity that is holding you back. Ask yourself, If I was not constrained by my old identity, would I pursue this further"? The constraints of identity can act as illusions that mask our ability to know our true nature. Work through those illusions, so that you do not remain unnecessarily bound by them. Your true essence is at the root of your being, and within that essence, are the plans that have been laid on your heart to carry out in your Earthly experience of life. Begin to allow your true essence to be the guiding force in your life. With time, it can become the barometer by which to direct your life. Your life will spring from this essence in the manner in which it is supposed to.

Synchronicity

For me, synchronicity is synonymous with destiny (or living in flow), as determined by a higher power (God), through the seeds of a plan that were placed in our individual hearts. It occurs when you recognize the events in your life as a part of a destined plan. Common thoughts and attitudes from someone with a synchronistic view of life include thoughts like, people are put in your life (or path) for a reason, or things happen for a reason. It is the idea that a greater intelligence (Divine Intelligence) is constantly guiding you. Prior to writing this essay, I did not feel or recognize synchronicity in my life (nor did I have the awareness or attitudes that tune one into these guiding forces). It was revealed, to me, through the unfolding of this essay. The seemingly disconnected events that had occurred in my life jumped into my awareness, such that there was a pattern of Divine Intelligence at play. I recognized that I had always been where I was supposed to be and that it was all a matter of the divine timing, in my life, unfolding as it was supposed to. I used to kick myself for not having things figured out earlier (e.g., not knowing to listen to my heart when I was in college), but this revelation freed me from that thinking. It was and always will be just as it is supposed to be.

Synchronicity is a wake-up call, an intrusion of another plane into the everyday existential mess, a momentary reminder of perfection, a signal that everything is inextricably connected in the One. It is the manifestation of grace.

–Ram Dass, Be Love Now

I know God put my friend, Lindsey, in my path for many reasons, but one, in particular, was to help me reconcile the faith connection that I viewed possible from religious institutions and the one that I sought through the metaphysical world. I never felt a calling to go to church, but up until my early twenties, I did feel that it was somehow wrong or embarrassing that I did not know biblical references. I felt as if everyone but me knew this information, as some sort of fundamental knowledge for being in this world, and that it was wrong of me not to miraculously know this information. Again, it was not enough of a reason for me to find a way to attain this knowledge, instead, it just sort of became an insecurity that I started to live with.

In college, my gnawing insecurity, regarding the fact that I had never been baptized, was finally such that I was motivated to attend church. Oddly enough, my college roommate was in a similar situation. She had grown up without attending church and, to my disbelief, she too, had not been baptized. I had no idea anyone else out there was even in the same boat as me! For so long I had felt as if I was the outsider, for having not properly attended church. Looking back, that seems quite synchronistic that the Universe would have paired me with her, in that moment. We started going to church and eventually were baptized. At that point in my life, I felt that I was finally doing what I thought I maybe should have done when I was growing up. I still felt awkward at church. When it came time to look something up in the Bible, I was always nervous that I would not know how to find it. I would nervously thumb through the pages hoping to find the right page in adequate time. Half of the time, the Reverend had already begun reading from the passage by the time I found the page, so I found myself spending more time trying to figure out where we were, than actually hearing what was being read. I did find the sermons to be the best part of the church service. I felt that the point to attending church was to gain information and the sermon seemed to be the vehicle for that, so the rest, in my eyes, seemed to be fluff. I was not into the singing or any of the other ritualistic processes, like communion. I really just enjoyed listening to the sermon and, fortunately, the Reverend was a very engaging speaker, so he held my attention. Shortly after we were baptized, we received a new Reverend and I remember finding it difficult to stay engaged when he was speaking, so I eventually quit going to church and never felt motivated to look for another one.

My actual spiritual journey did not begin for a few more years. I now realize that my wanting to attend church was motivated by an expectation that I felt society had for me, versus an inner calling to God. I had no idea what it meant to be connected to God, in that way, nor did I know that I was missing that connection. I said I believed in God because I thought we were all supposed to believe in God, but I had a very limited understanding of what that meant. At the time, I thought believing in God meant that I prayed for safety, asked for forgiveness for my sins, and asked for Him to help me become a better person. I then went on living my life without thinking much else about it. I did not really feel a connection to God communicating to me, because I was not looking for it. I did not even have the frame of mind to think I was supposed to be feeling Him communicating with me. I treated the relationship like a one way street of communication. The things I prayed about were very general, so I was not connecting whatever was happening in my life to my prayers. I never even thought to ask Him for guidance regarding major life choices. I thought I was supposed to make those choices. I was so clueless about this connection.

What I thought was that I was a good person, but to be a good person I should believe in God and people who believe in God pray, so I should pray. I had no idea what a relationship with God was really supposed to be, or how amazing it could be. So I went on with my life thinking that I believed in God and that I had a sufficient relationship with Him. I also thought this relationship was working fine without going to church, so I never really considered returning.

It would still be a while before I thought to consult God regarding the direction of my life. In following my plan, regarding college and career, I ended up feeling an emptiness that I had never known. In scrambling to rectify the emptiness, I was being turned towards a completely new path. I did not know that, then. All I knew was that I was at a loss regarding what to do. I had created a life that felt mediocre, in my eyes. I never intended it to be mediocre. I really thought I was aiming for something that I could feel proud of, and because it was something I could feel proud of, I thought that automatically meant that it would be satisfying. I was anything but satisfied.

While all of this was happening, my mom was simultaneously becoming friends with a woman who would become a major influence, in my life. I was drowning in mediocrity, and along came Charlene. She would become the person who planted the seed of possibility, in my mind. Make no mistake about it, I was extremely grateful to have Charlene enter my life, but I did not necessarily connect the dots that God put her there. I did not even know what synchronicity was, at that time. She opened me up to the Holy Grail of information through books, books, and more books. I had never read such empowering books, in my life. She also believed in me, more than I believed in myself. I was limited by what I knew, and thought to be possible, but she saw no such limits and neither did the books that I was reading. I was quickly reconstructing my self-concept to one that believed my life could be much bigger than it currently was…one that believed in endless possibilities.

A whole new world was opening up, before me. There were lots of shiny things to chase after and I did not know how to ground myself in a specific direction. I still did not understand that I could ask God for guidance, in deciding which direction I should go, so I just started making my own plans. I thought becoming an entrepreneur would be a good plan, because entrepreneurs are not capped by a salary. I figured if I had a large amount of disposable income, I could experience some really cool things. I discovered vehicles to make money, in an entrepreneurial capacity, but I could not stick to them. My reason for doing them was not strong enough to keep me going and I wondered why. Thankfully, I did not become a jaded pipe-dreamer who threw in the towel and relegated herself back to the old, safe plan. I actually never felt that I had failed; instead, I just felt that pursuing those things had not been right, for me. I was beginning to feel that I needed a bigger reason than money to hold my interest. I was beginning to feel that I needed to be passionately engaged in what I was doing.

I was excited about the information that I was absorbing from the books that Charlene had introduced me to, so much that I thought I should somehow find a way to share this information with others. The books had been so empowering, for me, that I just thought everyone should know about this information! I felt passionate about the information. I also felt that I was extremely lucky and fortunate to have stumbled upon it. Up until that point in my life, I had grown accustomed to thinking I was average, but I was quickly learning to think in a much more empowered way. I could not believe how many limiting beliefs had kept me from ever dreaming big. I was also kicking myself for not having figured out this information sooner. I could not believe how important it was to be passionate about what you were doing, with your life, and the fact that I had completely missed that, in deciding what to choose as a career. I just wanted to stop, what I considered, were floods of people making the same mistake that I had!

My friend, Shanda, and I were so excited about sharing this information that we thought it would be a great idea to write a book about it. It felt so perfect that we jumped in with both feet. Our excitement was premature, because we had not learned or experienced enough, in our lives, to show that we had done anything with the empowering concepts that we wanted to share with others. We were basically regurgitating the same information that we had already read, so the book was not to