“She’s not broken. She’s just a baby.
But her boyfriend’s like her dad, just like a dad.”
– Alejandro by Lady Gaga
This song found me one day. I flipped to a station I rarely listen to and felt compelled to keep it on. I have always admired Lady Gaga’s voice, but something else hooked me. Once I heard the lines above, I knew what it was. A message from Spirit. Spirit, the formless, the creative realm, the higher self, the universe – whatever you call guidance from the spiritual/formless dimension – this consciousness gave me my next assignment. This piece.
Once upon a time, I used to judge myself harshly for “doing my 20s and 30s wrong.” Like I was one of the very few who missed the proverbial boat. I had no idea what this boat looked like or where it went, but I was absolutely sure I did not encounter it. I believed no good would come from missing this elusive vessel. I did not have my entire life sorted out and felt I somehow destroyed the rest of my days with the less than stellar choices I made (or did not make). I thought I could never “catch up” to all the others in my age group; and if I could, then I couldn’t ever be in the same league.
I look around at young people today and see the lost, confused, and insecure parts that take center stage. I see the desperate need for others to validate them. The part chained to the ego, thinking it matters in the great scope of life that outfits match or outer appearances look perfect. I sense the feeling of being less than for not having the worldliness they assume others their age have. I feel the belief they are the only ones drifting without an anchor to a slippery purpose. And the belief that work and popularity are everything. They are not. Sadly, what I sense in a number of young adults is the thought of them being broken or damaged beyond repair. I see rigid ideas of being unworthy and perhaps being hopeless. I recognize these things in them as they once were in me.
I now know I was not broken. I was normal.
Growing up and into the bigness of your soul is a process taken one step at a time. You do not have access to certain levels of clarity that come with the gift of time, so stumbles and falls are bound to happen on your life’s path. A quote I like is one attributed to Dr. Kerr L. White. “Good judgment comes from experience. And experience? Well that comes from poor judgment.”
Instead of considering experience coming from poor judgment, I prefer to think of it as the result of figuring things out as best you know with the resources available to you. Experience comes from showing up and participating in life; you gain experience by living your story. Risks were taken that may or may not have worked out in your favor. Instead of focusing on the results, focus on the courage it took to put yourself out there.
Your 20s are for learning about the world and relationships. For a number of people in their 30s, it is about juggling work, family, and the idea of perfection. Many still hold onto the belief that a person can be Superwoman or Superman. They can’t. There are factors in society that perpetuate the myth that perfection is attainable. They insinuate it is the end result of buying X, doing Y, or watching Z. Whoever tells you these things is feeding you lies. When writing this piece, I heard Gregg Braden summarize something I was thinking: “Many in the world, this commercialized society, deliberately keep others focused outside themselves, away from their divinity.”
Regrets are encouraged. Problems are encouraged. Comparison is encouraged. “First world” societies set you up to fail and feel less than. They scream that the answer is outside of you. This is a booby trap. These external forces insert programs in society to keep control over others. People fall for it, partly to avoid looking at their own pain. I did. It is so insidious many do not realize they are hooked into a program or two (or ten).
People are kept in chaos, kept off balance, and kept in physiological states that wire them for addiction. Living in harmony with the earth is severely frowned upon. After all, there is the societal program that says only “dirty hippies,” losers, radical (read: untrustworthy and ignorant) environmentalists, and societal drop-outs waste their days in the woods. This program says these folks do not fulfill their duty of being responsible citizens, and instead drain the taxpayers’ coffers with their “communing with nature” shenanigans. Nature takes people away from the bottom line. Their “communing” antics cannot be monetized, and are therefore deemed pointless to society. Don’t these irresponsible folks know that good citizens spend all their time (and sanity) bolstering shareholders’ portfolios?
Sarcasm aside, these nefarious programs keep people away from Mother Earth, as well as from the balanced state nature encourages. A state that alleviates stress as it promotes health and wellness. The world’s citizens are pumped full of chemicals that promote disturbed states in the body and mind, which keeps them in the sympathetic nervous state (i.e. the fight or flight state) and in perpetual stress. This produces fear. Those in fear can be controlled. People in fear will submit to mindless consumerism. Products and experiences are then purchased out of fear and desperation.
Attention is a commodity; fear is a commodity. When the two go together, all hell breaks loose. Society disintegrates when the individuals in that society become unbalanced and fragmented. Many lose connection to their joys, to love, to kindness, and to their divinity. These folks are kept away from knowing the true power all hold within.
Maybe it is time to disengage from the proverbial matrix, step off the samsara hamster wheel, and move towards nirvana. This world is not set up to help you. If anything, it is set up for failure. You can throw in the towel and accept perpetual sorrow and loss, or you can decide to look at things with different eyes. Choose to see the world (and your life) with a kinder perspective.
I will give a personal example. My path led me to study and practice the concepts of A Course in Miracles (ACIM). ACIM might not be your path, but that does not mean something from my experience with it cannot inspire your unique path. A main teaching in this spiritual text is to become aware of your focus. It asks if you focus on what it calls the ego (i.e. fear) or what it calls the Holy Spirit (i.e. love). Another teaching is that only love is real and nothing unreal exists. So, anything that is not love is an illusion. ACIM teaches that choosing to look through the eyes of fear (or acting on that fear) is a mistake, not a sin. And you are not damned to live in an eternal hell for making mistakes. This text shows another way to approach the world; it invites all to see the world through eyes of love and kindness, through the eyes of Spirit.
The spiritual teaching of original blessing says something similar to ACIM’s message. Spiritual theologian Matthew Fox wrote the concept of original blessing is that all creation is inherently good and within each person exists innate worth and blessing. It states all humans are born without flaws and without sin, that all are connected to the divine and possess a capacity for goodness. Both ACIM and the teaching of original blessing say the same thing: Love is at our core.
Over time, I became willing to consider that this teaching might be true. A still and quiet voice within encouraged me to look through the eyes of Spirit, through the eyes of love, to see the innate goodness and innocence at my center. When I heard those lyrics sung by Lady Gaga, “She’s not broken – she’s just a baby,” these teachings immediately came to mind. In other words, she is innocent – and we are all innocent. Innocent meaning without sin. Maybe mistakes were made, but our original goodness and original blessing are still intact within. And this goodness can be remembered and called to the forefront. How do you do this? By being determined to see the love, kindness, and blessings at your core.
Spirit showed me another way to look at my story. In the past, I saw who I was in my 20’s as unaware and lacking focus in life. However, when I look at “past me” with kinder eyes, eyes focused on seeing love, I see this young woman as being very present with her job, with day-to-day errands, and (paradoxically) with anxiety. I was focused, but just focused differently. I was immersed in experiencing confusion and priorities that no longer call me. I had more of a narrow-world, narrow-picture focus. Everything centered around work, and a need to fit into society and with my peers.
Since this time, and with the help of my spiritual practices, I see how vision gets squeezed less as you move through life. It isn’t guaranteed, but there is greater potential for widening vision as you gather years under your belt. I eventually realized that work and ego are only part of a person’s world, not the totality.
As I practiced ACIM’s lessons of extending love and kindness through me and into the world, I realized I did have some wisdom at these earlier ages. As an example, I remember looking at rows of tabloids and understanding that if people cared as much about their own lives and issues as they did about those of celebrities, we’d be living in a much better kind of society. I saw how these publications perpetuated a gossip culture that worships a cult of personality.
I recently read about someone who changed her flight plans so she could listen to a live interview of a favorite singer. An interview that would be recorded and blasted around many media channels as soon as it was done – available for listening after her originally scheduled plane trip. It’s great to show support to those whose work inspires and uplifts you, but do not stop your life to watch others live their lives. Especially if these others are strangers who do not know you. Instead, live your own life and do not revolve it around strangers.
These ideas around celebrity gossip and celebrity worship have remained with me in my life. I did not look at tabloids or get caught up in cults of celebrity, but I did base my life around outside circumstances. This focus kept me unbalanced and anxious. Then ACIM came in to highlight the truth of the answer never being out there. The answer is within – it is always an inside job.
Going within to focus on your happiness and wellness can be tricky. Many have guilt around feeling good, like they should feel shame if they do not suffer as others do. Some are encouraged to keep themselves small so as not to “inconvenience” others with their needs – or with their joys. They are guilted into keeping their happiness and balance to themselves to prevent others from being envious or intimidated by their joy.
You are not responsible for the reactions of others, yet this is contrary to what is commonly taught in the world. Society gives subtle permission to make fun of others who are happy or in their joy – to call them out as being silly, childish, or selfish. There is an ostracization of sorts. We are social creatures; the person who feels ostracized for being in joy will sometimes repress their happiness in order to have community. This need for connection is in our DNA. For thousands of years, physical survival meant being part of a community. We are in different times, though, and this type of peer pressure no longer serves the collective.
What the collective needs now are leaders and wayshowers of other ways to be. Society needs to see that happiness, joy, love, and connection are possible; and that all in the community have access and a right to these states of being. Maybe you will be one of these folks who leads by example, a person who shows courage in the face of cultural indoctrination to ostracize and exclude those who dare find balance and joy.
Make time to focus on your innate capacity for love, balance, and joy. Crack open restraints that keep you down. And also be aware there might be some backlash if or when you exert great force in this process, especially if you’ve been taught to hold yourself back. Let this be okay as it is nothing personal. If others attempt to make you feel less than or stupid for reaching inward for love and balance, understand they are operating from antiquated programs they sincerely believe empower or protect them. Programs that condition people to look outside of themselves for ways to feel better. Programs that encourage power over rather than power with others. Programs that say the outer world holds authority over their disposition and actions. Programs that instruct the citizens of the world to look for a savior to rescue them from their sins and misery – a savior who will fix their broken selves.
These programs operate off of fallacies. They are based on misconceptions of people being broken, sinful, and needing external saviors. The savior does not come from outside, as it lives within each and every one of us. The savior is the connection to the Oneness all have. Many do not know this and continue to look for saviors or surrogate parents to tell them the way. Hence the lyrics that opened this essay, “But her boyfriend’s like her dad, just like a dad.”
Parents were original gods to our younger selves. They were perfect – until they weren’t. But our survival depended on them, so we had to stick around and absorb the various energies they directed at us. Many of our parents were confused and passed down confusion – injured folks teaching other folks how to be injured. They, too, probably believed they were broken on some deep level and passed down this belief.
You might have separated yourself physically from your original caregivers; however, that does not mean you’ve separated from negative programming passed down in your lineage. Energies are still enmeshed to some degree – some entanglement is healthy, while much might not be. Life is often a process of sorting your energy from others, but not for all. It’s been really interesting to observe those in the world who are happy to give up their power to another. I have seen this quite a bit on the spiritual path, with boatloads of people abdicating authority over their lives to spiritual gurus, leaders, teachers, or writers.
Many believe these people or their teachings “complete” them instead of complementing their wholeness. Telling others outright or energetically that they “complete you” or are “your other (or better) half” perpetuates the damaging programs that state people are broken, damaged, or not enough just as they are.
There is no person – or parent – who will magically take away illusions of imperfection and brokenness; they cannot bestow peace and joy upon us. We must do this ourselves. There is support in the world for ways to do this, but control is in our hands. No one will complete us – complement, yes; complete, no. Guide, yes; but the final choice in how we respond to the world is up to each of us. We have to decide for love and wholeness ourselves. Looking for saviors outside of ourselves brings disillusionment and disappointment. All humans are on their own journeys, and no one has all the answers. They definitely do not have YOUR answers, as others are not you. They do not have your experiences or knowledge of your soul path. Only you – and your spirit guides – are privy to those details.
I will share a tale from my personal saga. When I was a young mother, I had a job that paid well and had awesome benefits, but was filled with dysfunction. I thought the entire departmental disease stemmed from one jealous and angry co-worker, so I turned to a supervisor for support. Little did I know this so-called leader was chained to egotistical demons that called the shots in their world.
This person had a very cerebral intelligence and used it to manipulate others. They had their staff take psychological tests in order to know how to control and/or exploit them. After turning to this person several times for support in navigating toxicity in the work environment, I realized they lacked spiritual and emotional intelligence. They could not comprehend that others were motivated by things other than money, status, drama, fear, and ego. When it registered that chaos and toxicity rather than support came from many on the outside, including this supervisor, I turned within and turned towards love.
I started to focus on supporting my sweet little boy and, for the most part, left the drama at the office. I did not want to infect the time with my child with work toxicity. My little baby loved to laugh, loved to smile, and he just loved being in a state of love. His energy was such a blessing to be around, and it started to heal me. It inspired me to think about what I really desired. At this time, I wished to be a full-time mom and be with my child more during those early years. A quiet and still internal voice whispered to turn to my spiritual practices for support. It guided me to engage manifestation teachings that promoted staying in a state of joy and connection to my heart for longer periods of time. I did just that, and the negative approach I had to my days began to shift.
The more I practiced this appreciative state of being, the easier it became to maintain the vibrations of love and joy. It was challenging at first, but I was determined to find more peace in my days. I focused on the love in my world. I focused on the joy that was my little boy. Thoughts of my child and his sweetness filled my heart; they strengthened the magnetic waves emanating from my being. My focus on love exponentially intensified these waves.
Something within started to grow warmer, more radiant, and joyous. Hope became more prominent in my days. A bright light began to emerge from within me; this spread outwards and formed a bubble of protection. The focus on love created this force field around me that repelled negativity. Without being conscious of it at first, I started to take this force field, this bubble of love, with me to the office.
I became aware of this force field one day in the midst of a project I enjoyed. My supervisor came marching purposefully towards me, their energetic space dripping with drama and divisive intentions, spreading formless filth in their wake. I was in a “flow” state and saw them approach from my peripheral vision. I stayed in this neutral state as they came close, and then observed how they “bounced” off this bubble and were diverted away from me. They looked dazed and confused by whatever stopped them, seemed to forget why they were in the area, and then proceeded to turn and stumble away from me.
I thought, “Huh? That was interesting.” I remained in that flowing meditative state and heard a quiet voice within whisper. It said this just happened because my love bubble was in place. The frequency of this bubbled space was very strong, and things with weaker frequencies could not exist in the same area. I witnessed how love prevented hate and fear from landing in my space; love’s energy is way too intense for hate to handle. Hate – rather fear, since hate is a by-product of fear – vibrationally cannot exist in the same plane of existence as love. The two states of being repel one another.
I began to play with this energy in earnest after this episode and then experienced how my supervisor hardly ever came around me. I couldn’t seem to connect my timing with theirs and had to manage my time and space myself; I essentially became my own boss. This was wonderful! My inner voice then reminded me of another situation a few months before the bubble bounce event. I had taken a vacation day for my son’s first birthday and experienced an amazing time with my family. When I returned the next day, still in a high vibrational state of joy from the previous day, the original toxic co-worker disappeared from the department as if by magic – and they did not return during the rest of my time at that job.
I ended staying maybe about a year after becoming conscious of my love bubble, slowly coming to terms with needing to leave the job. Being in that unhealthy environment drained my vitality and produced great stress, which impacted my immunity. I also missed my little boy tremendously. I crunched some numbers and saw that if my family stayed at our small apartment and tightened our budget, we could (barely) survive on one salary. That little voice said that whatever I decided, to line up with love instead of focusing on fear. To run towards love as opposed to running away from negativity. After much contemplation, I knew I had to follow my heart and focus on what really mattered to me – being there for my little boy as much as I could.
I knew at a deep level I no longer belonged in that work environment. The woman who accepted the job did not exist anymore. And the woman in her place did not align with the position or the people. I committed to having more love in my life, which changed my vibration and point of attraction. The bubble of love that bounced the supervisor away was also bouncing me away from that job. When I finally walked out the door on my last day of employment, I walked out alone. No warm wishes were spoken by my supervisor, a person who repeatedly told me for almost two years I was awesome and was the best thing that ever happened to the department. I felt a few other folks throw energetic knives at me after they heard I resigned – people whom I was always kind and respectful to at this office. My crime? I had the gall to choose happiness and positive change. I did what these people wished they could do themselves. Somehow they thought it was my responsibility to stay in misery with them, and they resented me and my decision to leave.
At this point in time, I had enough spiritual experience under my belt to realize the lack of care around my exit wasn’t because of me. It was not because I was undeserving of kindness, or because I was a broken person or a bad worker. It wasn’t a “me problem” at all. I was simply no longer a vibrational match to the position, people, or work culture of that job. Choosing more love in life can bring about massive change, and things “falling apart” in your world does not mean you did anything wrong. It could be you are doing things right for your soul, that you are actually upgrading your life and bringing more balance into your world.
I never second-guessed my decision to leave that position, even though things were tricky on one income. I trusted I was on purpose and on my soul’s path. The more I stayed in a state of love and appreciation, the more things seemed to work out for me and my family. My bubble of love stayed with me and attracted solutions. I kept turning within and growing the love at my core. This helped me see that I was not broken, but evolving.
If you have thoughts about you being broken or damaged, I encourage you to develop your own bubble of love. I won’t advise on ways to do this as you must go within and ask yourself. A love bubble helps you see that you are not broken either. You are constantly evolving and shedding skin that no longer fits you. You are growing inward and upward. It is not a linear process: you go inward and through an interdimensional portal to emerge outward into the next stage of your life. Like a tube torus or spiral swirling upward, revisiting certain elements in your life, but from a higher and more refined place of perception.
Your path is uniquely crafted with your soul. Judging yourself is pointless and counterproductive. Comparing yourself to others is useless. Others do not have your energetic infrastructure; they do not have your experiences, your lineage, or your outlook. They do not have your gifts; they do not have your challenges. You came here to experience your version of cosmic consciousness in human form, so get on with that soul directive. You are here to manifest your interpretation of joy, of sadness, of passion, of confusion, or of whatever other state of being exists in this multiverse.
Something that can help to engage and embrace your distinct path is to become conscious of how you view yourself and the world. Become conscious of how you speak about yourself and the world. The words you use matter. How you frame things directly impacts how you interact with them. Choose to see yourself as whole, not broken or damaged. Declare that you are in a process of transmuting energy patterns and transforming into the next incarnation of yourself. Remind yourself this world is a place to explore contrast so you know on a body level what you do and do not prefer; and the exploration of duality can get funky at times. This funkiness is built into the program of the earthly dimension; it is part of duality’s design. One other thing to keep in mind is the path to wisdom contains experiences that teach discernment, persistence in the face of challenges, and compassion. To embody any form of wisdom, one must have compassion for its opposite. In the words of Charles Dickens, “A loving heart is the truest wisdom.”
You might need mending for scrapes and skewed parts, but you are not broken. Maybe you are a little imbalanced or confused, but you are not broken. You are human. Being human and authentically you is being whole. When you genuinely feel broken, paradoxically that is when you are experiencing wholeness. You are recognizing and feeling the emotions coursing through you – that is not being broken. It is being healthy. Sometimes the path to health and wellness has discomfort, and that is what these episodes are: growing pains that come from rearranging yourself back into balance. These happen as you do your best to mend yourself when you feel you are broken. The intention to mend and find balance is what keeps you whole. It keeps you connected to your real self – the consciousness that exists outside of time and space.
This is when I love to return to the teachings of ACIM that state we have done nothing wrong. Our experiences are real, but our “sinfulness” is not. Belief in sin comes from fear; it does not emanate from the core of love that is our true being. This world is a dream – possibly a nightmare to a few. Some say it is a computer simulation. I do not; rather, I believe it is a distraction from true life. ACIM says only love is real and everything else is not, and that nothing real dies. If you think you are broken, remind yourself this is not the truth. You just made a mistake in believing that nonsense. It is not a sin to forget your wholeness; it is simply a mistake. And you can choose to think another way. You can choose softer, kinder, and gentler thoughts about yourself, your choices, and your experiences. The past is gone, but you are still here.
Maybe it is time to break away from the illusion (and delusion) of this world. To listen to the quiet voices that are kind, compassionate, and comforting. You might not believe them, but how does believing the opposite really serve you? Seriously. How does being jaded and resentful lead to a full and happy heart? Vibrationally, it is not possible to have a happy ending to an unhappy journey. What you put into the cake of life is what gets taken out of the oven. When you fill a mixing bowl with substandard ingredients (i.e. hate, anger, fear), the baked creation will not be delicious (or good for your health). If what you are cooking up in life won’t taste good, maybe it is time to switch your recipe.
I’ll wrap up this piece with a few questions that feel more complete than anything else I can offer to counteract feelings of brokenness. What if? “What if it is true that I am innocent? What if I have done nothing wrong? What if I am not broken? What if I can be happy, be at peace, and know that I am loved?” What then? What would that look like to you? These questions are so opposite the prevalent culture of fear that it seems one must be insane to consider them.
ACIM counters that what is actually insane is believing the ultimate answers to life’s mysteries come from the physical world, from chaotic and fearful beliefs that keep people disconnected from love. Instead, take the riskless risk of believing in your goodness. And then partner with whatever you call Spirit to restore your faith in your wholeness and in the original blessing of your innate innocence.
The truth is we are not broken. We have our innocence. We did nothing wrong. Many people on this planet work from a false premise that states this world leads to happiness and perfection. This is not true, has never been true, and will never be true.
So you made mistakes – so what? That’s the epitome of being human. Maybe you had to grow up too soon or too fast, or had human guides that unknowingly worshipped fear. What are you going to do with the results of these experiences? Like I wrote, they are gone, but you are still here. These episodes have the potential to bring forth things other than scars. Scars validate your engagement with the physical realm, but they are not your entirety. You have something bigger than your human side – your spiritual consciousness that lives forever in the formless realm. This consciousness wastes nothing and will transform every experience to your advantage – as long as you decide for love.
Love might suggest focusing on the discernment you gained from your past. How experiences brought forth your soul’s compassion, complexity, and depth. And that despite all of your scars, you are still choosing life. You are still here to love another day.
Love declares you are not broken; you are not less than. It says it is time to see yourself the way Spirit sees you: as a complete being of love and light. The formless realm will assist you in accessing this vision. Whether you engage with what you call the universe, the Oneness, ascended masters, guides, angels, dragons, etc. – all are part of the collective consciousness that resides outside the physical dimension, and all will work with you. All have great intelligence that supports your path.
You will be sent the appropriate helpers that will whisper sweet somethings to you. Somethings such as how a belief in brokenness does not honor your brilliance, or how following fear’s sketchy counsel reinforces mistakes in this world. Instead, decide for Love. Love tells whoever listens that you are and will forever be complete. And Love says your real mission on earth is to remember this eternal truth.
If this style of writing speaks to you, please check out my other essays.
