Mothering yourself to the next evolution of your life’s work. What does this mean? It means that as you follow your Soul’s guidance to the next phase of your life’s work, you treat yourself like a good mother would.
Following your Soul’s guidance is not for the faint of heart. Many different fears come up, and it truly takes courage to put your Soul’s guidance above other people’s demands and expectations. When you commit to allowing your career to evolve, you are doing it, not only for you, but for everyone who will benefit from what only you can offer. This path calls you to be truly authentic, to embody your Soul’s light for everyone to see. This is a radical act and it brings up a lot of fears.
When I first left my career as a teacher, and embarked on this new chapter of my life’s work, I was “shaking in my boots”. Back then, I was embarrassed to talk to my former colleagues about Reiki (I would cringe every time they asked me about it). I was sure they were going to think it was “woo woo” nonsense.
And I also had a lot of insecurities about actually doing Reiki on others. I wondered if I really could channel healing energy. I imagined clients lying on my Reiki table wondering what the heck they’d gotten themselves into.
Then, as I was led to write my book, other fears came up,
Would people read my book?
Did the world really need another book about connecting with your Soul?
And now, as I “take the show on the road”, and do book talks throughout the city, other insecurities come up. Sharing my teachings with my clients and my meditation students felt safe. These were people that knew me and already had trust in my work. But now, I was going to be presenting to new people, and I wondered if they would benefit from my teachings as well and, as silly as it may sound, I wondered if they would like me.
As you see, following your Soul’s guidance requires courage, and I absolutely needed to mother myself in order to keep moving forward. A good mother is tender, and kind. She is loving and wise. And when she sees that her daughter is selling herself short, she reminds her to keep her standards high. A good mother sees when her kids are self-sabotaging, and she gently and firmly reminds them of their commitments to themselves. And a good mother lets you feel your feelings without demeaning you or trying to fix them. So mothering yourself means treating yourself in this way too.
However, this is often very hard to do, especially if your relationship with your own mother was complicated or difficult. My own mother struggled greatly with being emotionally available to me. Although, I have a lot of for compassion her–I understand that her own mother was unavailable to her and so she repeated that pattern with me– this created a lot of wounds that I continue to heal.
One of the gifts from this experience, however, is that it led me to forge a strong connection to Spirit. In fact, I often think that my Soul chose my mother because my unmet longing for a deep connection with her, pushed me to seek a deep connection with the Divine Mother. For me, the Divine Mother energy is expressed through Mother Mary, Our Lady of Guadalupe, Kuan Yin, Ma Kali, Bridget and many other forms.
As an adult, through all of my most frightening journeys –my divorce, my career transition, my daughter’s illness–the Divine Mother was there. Although Her voice was always tender (and firm when needed), encouraging, and unconditionally loving my inner voices were not. Those inner critics could be relentless with their berating, criticism and even shaming.
As I’ve evolved many of my inner critics have evolved too, generally their voices are not as loud or as cruel. As their voices have softened, my ability to hear the loving voice of the Divine Mother has increased. But I have to make the space for this.
In my meditations, during my “*interrupter rituals”, as I pray, and take walks in nature, as I do housework I allow myself to hear Her voice of encouragement and slowly my own inner voice is starting to sound like her.
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Follow Up
As you follow your Soul’s guidance to evolve your career, what courageous things are you doing? Take a moment right now and stop and think about that, reflect. It might be things that seem small but are actually pretty significant, like giving yourself time to meditate, to be in nature, or saying no to other people’s demands. Perhaps you’re starting to show people your creative work, or starting to work on that blog you’ve always wanted to do. Maybe you’re just at the point when you are admitting to yourself that yes, you are ready to evolve your career. All of these take courage.
Now talk to yourself (in your mind) as a good mother would. Use encouraging loving words, and notice all of the progress, big and small, that you are making. If you have fears about your career that’s ok. Remember a good mother lets you feel your feelings.
If mothering yourself feels too hard to do right now imagine the Divine Mother is talking to you. Visualize her in front of you in whatever form feels right. Whether it’s mother Mary or Kuan yin or any other form. Listen to Her beautiful voice as she mothers you. If you feel any challenging emotions feel Her warm embrace as she comforts you. Let her bless you, just receive her blessing, and then then thank her and thank your own inner mother.
Do a version of this practice daily. Try it for a month and see what a difference it makes.
*See blog post, Slowing Down to Speed Up to read more about Interrupter rituals
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