14/07/2021
Always ❤
MONDAY MUSINGS: External success as a measure of value.
First up, I want to get one thing straight - YOU ARE WORTHY BECAUSE YOU EXIST. PERIOD!!! Success in the world makes no difference to the truth of who you are - you are a spark of creation, nothing more nothing less.
Each week before I post the Monday Musings I receive the energetic imprint of what I will be writing about. Usually it comes the week or a few days before. This week however it ALL came through today. It showed up as a building frustration due to the stillness and inactivity of those around me and my own inability to action things that I had wanted to do - like this post for example! It also showed up as frustrations and judgements around how I perceived the actions of others around me, particularly around the idea of celebrating people's external successes, and being chosen because of it. Successful business people, people with large followings, people making an 'impact', people with nice clothes, car's and houses, wealth, good relationships, large social circles - but more than that - people that present a persona that is 'put together' - the image. Even in spiritual circles, external success is often seen as a measure of internal success.
I started out quite externally successful in my youth. School was easy, Uni was easy, I never had to work hard to achieve good results, I got jobs easily and always got promoted quickly. I was earning good money and would have continued to rise up the ranks if I had stayed on that path. I was quite attached to the idea that I was intelligent. If I wanted to I could achieve excellence and put my mind to almost any task. I could easily make friends if I wanted to. The problem was that I wasn't actually happy and I couldn't see any examples of people of positions that inspired me in the world around me. I would always be asked - where do you see yourself in 5 years as part of job interviews and I really had no answer for that! And I didn't have many close friends that shared these same interests.
Around the same time opportunities for my spiritual awakening began to appear, and I began to question everything I had been taught about life. I desired to know the truth of life - why are we here, what's the point of life, where did we come from? And so life showed my a completely different perspective to what I had experienced up until that point. Overseas, I met and fell in love with a man with undiagnosed bi-polar. We got married and began having children. And, over the course of the next 10 years I was unceremoniously stripped of all of my previous life style and privileges. All sense of safety in my external circumstances vanished. My life began to be a constant living crisis. My intelligence meant nothing. I could excel at nothing. Homelessness, isolation, eating from community kitchens with our young child, public humiliation, racism, repeated dealings with the mental health, police, the courts, incarceration and immigration systems.
I lost all sense of self-worth within the community, and within myself - for a time. And I gained a deep appreciation for what it means to be privileged due to your external circumstances. And what it truly means to be humble. And what it means to surrender to life itself. Given all of that, my experience was only a tiny slice compared to many many people out there. I am still so privileged in my circumstances and I am fortunate that I have a family that could help me to dig myself out of this experience.
There most definitely are so many people in the world that will never reach the level of external success that is currently celebrated and flaunted in the world. This is not due to their worth as people, but due to their circumstances in life - whether it is skin colour, place of birth, mental or physical disabilities, traumas, gender identity, housing and more. I am so very passionate about the idea that ALL people deserve to be celebrated regardless of their perceived external success or failures. And I want to bust some myths:
Hard work DOES NOT = Success
Spiritually aware and awake DOES NOT = No challenges
Intelligence DOES NOT = Better
External Success DOES NOT = Value
Image DOES NOT = Perfection
Perfection DOES NOT exist.
Everyone is doing their absolute best in each moment given their experiences and circumstances, and the more I can remember that the happier and peaceful I, and the people around me, are. There is no striving to be an image of something to others for external validation. Simply a sinking into the perfection of everything exactly as it is now.
Every now and then I need to be reminded of this fact to keep me in a space of grace, compassion and humility and to remember that we are all in this together and inextricably linked. I am worthy because you are worthy, and you are worthy because I am worthy.
In Service Always,
Ele NI