Don't Turn out the Light Just yet

I haven't written anything for the world to read in a very long time. I seemed to have gone through block after block. One thing following another, I couldn't write the words. They all existed in my mind, swirling and swooping like a cool winter breeze. Refreshing my soul and giving me an extra breath to breathe. But no matter how hard I tried, I just could not get them to stick on paper. Not in anyway that made sense. Until the concept of healing was reborn into my life, once more. Until I had something worth screaming to the world.

Healing is something I know well. Like tennis or chess, I have scored some decent shots and won a few games against some worthy apponents. I have healed through phases, losses, and dissapointments. Injuries, accidents, and mishaps that left me weak and near hopelessness. I have pulled myself out of the darkest of depths, nursed myself back to health, and found joy in this life, once more. Yes, healing is something I know... but I am not quite sure that I understood all that it requires, all that it entails, and all that it begs of me until this very moment in time.

I used to believe you needed three things for healing: time, money, and opportunity. Boy, was I wrong! Healing can happen for a penny or less, in 15 years or the snap of a finger. Opportunity, however, is a different story. No, you don't need a spiritual medium, a reiki healer, or a million bucks to heal. You don't need to leave work on an extended sick leave or sabbatical. You don't need to fly to europe or sail the carribean (although healing adventures are never a bad thing). You don't need anything but your true and honest self, the tools and support you require to feel safe, and the opportunity to dive within.

Back to this opportunity thing. I don't mean a golden ticket or a fairy god mother. No, no, no you see, what you truly need is the opportunity to rise. But before you can rise, my dear, you must burn. Like my favorite idea of a being, the Phoenix, you must answer the call from the bottom of your soul to burn and rise from your ashes. A new being, entirely. A new perspective, a new idea of what is needed, a new sense of hope to pull through and RISE! It is okay to burn to ashes. To hit the ground so hard you feel the vibrations of every single hurt and every single failure you have experienced. It is okay to fail. To fall. To burst into flames and want to forget everything that you were before this moment. As long as you rise. As long as you show up for yourself and rise.

It takes a courageous heart to lift up from the ashes and continue forward, knowing nothing is the same and everything you know could evaporate into the dream that it was. It takes a bright, brave being of love to rise for themself and know that they might lose some of those that were flying with them. But that is what healing is! To shine the brightest light you can find within yourself, onto the dark shadows that have been lurking below, forgotten and allowed to run amuck, festering and destroying what is trying to grow. But those monsters have no place here. They have no home within me, within us all. They are meant to be seen, no matter how scary or startling. They are meant to be broken up through all of the words you can muster up and out of your straining, screaming throat. They are meant to dissolve into the atmosphere, leaving you just as you always were before they took up an unfair residence in your soul.

The shadow's last effect on you should be the warm feeling of love and hope that fills your body, once you release. Once you finally say it outloud, whether it is witnessed by yourself or a friend, once you finally let it exist and move out into the world, you may discover so much that was darkened by these shadows. Yes, that is right! The last thing the shadow does to your pained and broken self is give it the gift of hope. The gift of peace. The gift of lightness and freedom. Then, maybe, just maybe, you may see that you were never broken. You were healing.

Let it Break Your Heart

Life and people have the annoying habit of breaking your heart. Things are sad, your chest stretches open revealing a big, bleeding, beating heart. Animals die, people hurt, places are destroyed. There is so much destruction in this world, so much to cry over. To lose. To let go of. They never tell you how sad life truly is because who wants to tell the smiling, joyful child that things crumble and fall apart? No one. But it's nature. It's a part of life and a very important part it is.

So you move yourself to a place where you can accept the destruction. The crumbling, the dying, the old, and the lost. You understand that destruction serves its purpose in many ways and if you allow yourself to observe those purposes, you will learn. You will learn that death is a part of life in the most extraordinary of ways. Death ushers in life, transformation, and growth. It sets the table for wisdom to be gained, knots to be loosened, and big, boisterous messes to be cleaned. Without death, we would be surrounded by stale misfortunes that linger and weigh us down, entirely. Death and destruction are meant to be a catalyst, not an end.

Alongside destruction floats pain. You cannot escape the hurt that is forever glued to your painful experiences, no matter how ugly or believable they are. No matter how much you accept and embrace the change that flows with death, it always leaves a scar. Even when the shock has passed, a slow, lingering sting tends to remain for quite some time. For most people, this is one of the most uncomfortable places on the human journey. It's the place where movement seems daunting but stagnation seems disastrous. You either move or get moved. There is an attachment to what was and a fear of what will be once you take steps forward. The intensity of this experience is exacerbated by the fact that you can experience this cycle from losing almost anything. A person, a relationship, a job, a home, a pet, a car, an arm, an eyeball, a kidney, a perspective, a belief, an idea, a dream, etc. Even from the simple destruction of a belief, you had to the most important piece of who you are. When anything changes from what you know to what you don't, you experience loss. It doesn't even have to be necessarily destructive. There doesn't need to be explosions or funerals, goodbyes or farewells. All there needs to be is a shift from what you know and where you stand to what you don't and where you haven't. That's it.

There are so many things in life that can break your heart. Anything can go from one state to another and just rip you apart inside. You can lose precious things or let go of things that were never too precious, to begin with. Either way, you experience the pain of letting go of something. Anything that breaks your heart is avoided or approached with reluctance. It makes sense, though! Why would you want to feel the heaviness of something when joy and love exist in life? I am someone who tends to wear rose-colored glasses with the best intentions. Unfortunately, I do not always take into account how things might look when the glasses are removed or broken. I see the beautiful, the valuable, the importance in all that I meet. But sometimes, what I see is affected by the love in my eyes. There is almost always a letdown. Not all are as painful as some can be, but almost every single time my lenses change, my heart breaks just a little, tiny bit. 

Today I heard a song that preached not letting things break your heart. For a short moment, I absolutely agreed! Shit happens, things take a turn down a different path, sometimes when you are least expecting it. Just because it hurts like hell doesn't mean you should let it break your heart, right? Right! You have the power to not let your heartbreak and that feels like strength. But think about this: what if true strength was allowing something to break your heart, just a little bit, and feeling every inch of it until you've given it the care it needs and it patches itself up once more? How full, how enriched, how incredibly powerful our hearts would be, if only we let them break. 

My heart breaks constantly. Whether it's a sad story I read, a shattered person I meet, or an old belief that turned out not to exist outside of my mind. My. Heart. Breaks. It breaks for animals, for people, for ideas and dreams that turn out disappointing. My heart breaks when I lose a friend or a lover, a favorite necklace or a charm. My heart breaks when I get my hopes up and my expectations were more than my reality. My heart breaks when I make choices that hurt myself or others. My heart breaks when others make choices that hurt themselves or me. My heart is constantly breaking, over the smallest most weightless things. Things that I could easily ignore, turn my head and walk away from. But they are there for a most important, sacred purpose. These things that have the power to make us hurt more than we would like to, also have the power to open us up to love and joy that we could never even dream of feeling. 

The pathway from pain to love, you may wonder, is, in fact, a very bumpy and rough one, but one that is so amazing, so beautiful and so very worth the trouble. The path is through a broken heart. Just one small crack or one shallow hole, allowing yourself to bleed just a small amount to release what is sure to eventually fester if the crack does not allow it to make its great escape. The breaks in our hearts may fill us with pain and sorrow, but it is the chance we have to fill those cracks with love after letting out what needs to be freed, which gives us the key to experiencing pure joy and happiness on the deepest levels possible. For after the pain and the blood has leaked out from the depths, pure love and light can fill those wounds, and reach all the way down to the very bottom. So, let it break your heart. Let it all break your heart. Let it break over, and over, and over again until there is no blood left to leak. But only let it break a little bit. Find the light that follows and tend to your gentle wound with the love that you wish to fill it with. Let the world and all it contains break your heart in the smallest ways, and watch as the very world that broke it supports you in washing it out but pumping it full of life and love. May your hearts all beat strong with the cracks and the glue, the holes and the bridges, the rough and the smooth surfaces. May your heartbreak just enough with all that seeks to breathe life into your lungs. May your heart live on to discover just how beautiful and incredible this life can be and may you always, always, always know that even the largest most excruciating break can and will be mended. After all, it is your nature to love and it is your nature to be filled with it, entirely. 

All That You'll Ever Need

For quite some time now, I have been searching tirelessly for love. For the meaning of love, the feeling of love, people to love, and much more. Love was something I took for granted growing up. It was also the source of my deepest wounds, although that wouldn't be discovered until I was much older. Until now.

Love was something that I always believed in but never understood. I knew that I craved it, I also knew that I deserved more of it. I searched in each and every person I met for love that I might be able to fill myself with. I am a very loving and friendly person. I don't like to hurt others and my favorite thing about myself is the love that I can give. But with those positive parts of who I am also come the challenges: being slow to distinguish myself and my feelings from that of those around me, constantly feeling deprived of love compared to the love that I give so freely, feeling disappointed and short of the love and attention that I felt was so desperately needed.

Feeling deprived of love is such a lonely feeling. It leaves you with only yourself, which I always resisted, leading me to invest more of myself and my love in others in the hopes that I would feel whole one day. However giving love away without expecting anything specific (or anything at all) in return is not a bad thing. In fact that is the holiest, purest form of love. Unconditional. No, my problem didn't lie in my ability to give love away, it was the love that I wasn't giving myself that wounded me the most. The irony lies in the observation that the more love I gave, the emptier I felt. That is NOT how it is supposed to be, my people. The more love you give, the more love you receive. It's a law of the universe. It cannot fail. I gave so much love because I knew deep down in my soul, that's what would bring me into a higher state of being. A state of real love. But I never felt the love that I was receiving because it didn't feel like enough. I didn't feel like enough. I never felt like enough. I felt this way because I never took the time to truly, deeply, and honestly love myself. Therefore I cannot recognize or feel the love that I receive because I don't know what it truly feels like to feel love. My love to myself is the only thing that can cure this sad deficit. The only real and true love that can program me to feel all of the love for the rest of my existence.

My point here is this: I have known love, I have fallen in love, I have been loved, and I have lost love. But I have never given myself the love that I deserve and because of this, I have never truly felt love. See the key to figuring out love and how to fill your life with it is the love that you hold deep within yourself, for you. Take a deeper look at it, honestly and openly. Look at the wounds and the breaks, the parts that have healed and the parts that have festered. Don't be afraid or overwhelmed to examine how you feel about yourself as denial will do you know good in this journey. It will only delay you tremendously, from the clarity and the love that you deserve. Take a deep breath and see it all as it truly is. Only then can you begin to heal the shattered relationship you have with yourself.

For those of you reading this that have done this work, I commend you for your efforts and I ask for you to do this: never stop. Never stop bringing awareness and light to the fractured pieces that lie within, however far away from the surface they hide you can heal them. The light that you constantly shine on your shadow parts and the love that radiates back out from them once they are loved, will help others around you find their way into the deeper parts of their soul that they may have been too afraid or stuck to see. The more shadows we expose, the more love we give to them, the more love we are showing ourselves. The more love we will be shown by the world. This idea is bullet proof and eternal, as love will never cease to work in this way. The only thing you have to do is work with yourself compassionately to cultivate the love you have long been waiting, deserving, searching for. All you need for this task is conveniently located directly within you and will never fall away. Decide what it feels like to be loved, decide you are worth experiencing that feeling, knowing that feeling, and then allow yourself to witness it growing within you each and every day.


As I wrap this up, I ask for you to consider this metaphor as a way of understanding what it is you feel the world falls short on giving you. A man lost his key and was searching around for it under the street light in front of his home. A passerby stopped and asked if he remembered the last place he saw the key. The man searching replied that he had lost his key inside his home but inside it was dark and the streetlight was bright, so surely he could find the key underneath it. Obviously that is a ridiculous idea and we can all see that, but think of the love, the happiness, the answers that you spend so much time searching for outside of yourself (your dark home). Everything you have lost or cannot find can be found within you. All you need to do is move your attention to yourself, turn on some lights, put on a good song, and find what it is you need within yourself. I promise it is there.

The Point of Reflection

We all reach a point in our confused adolescence where we grow into an adult and attempt to make sense of who we are and what we want from life. We spend the better years of our innocence picking through our mind and heart, sorting out truth from illusion. We work towards uncovering our truest self, our real identity, only to discover that we will spend the rest of our lives on that very journey. Although we may not be able to discover ourselves in one single moment, something greater is at play and will happen. An epiphany so profound and healing will one day begin to flow into our life, unexpected and possibly even unwelcomed at first. We may spend our youth wearing the skin of someone we are not so that we may have these moments one day and transition into who we really are.

All of what I have said may seem normal, that this discovery of our truest, purest self comes from living through our innocence and being who we are not. However if you dig a little deeper, you will find there is much more to it. The irony of it all comes in the form of those we choose to undo ourselves with. Who we choose to search with, to fail with, to learn with, to break ourselves down and apart with. We find the souls that we choose to implode with, to break through the barriers of our own vulnerability with. A group of kindred spirits, our closest pals, our tightest buddies. We are so young at this point in our life, so innocent and void of responsibility. To ourselves and to the world. We should feel carefree yet we are constantly carrying around a bag filled with insecurities, disappointments, doubts, and fears about the future and what it holds. We are just old enough to decide who we want to be, but not quite old enough to understand who we truly are. We are ready to go off into the world and be a part of something bigger than just a sheltered high school's graduating class. We have the freedom and the choice to go in so many different directions, yet we are too immature and shallow and have yet to dig deep enough within ourselves. We are still trying to dig our way out of all of the things we have believed, all of the things we held back from being. We can't hear our calling quite yet. But that is why we have our best friends, our people. They aren't just the fillers or the backdrop for our teenage experience. They aren't just the memories or the experiences that remind us how young we were. They aren't just the catalysts for our major life transitions or the recipients of our emotional tantrums that eventually split you up. They mean so much more than you may ever know. It's not everyday that we connect on such a deep level with others, especially when we are blind to what lies within us, blind to who we are deep down inside.

Looking back on my young and misguided self I see a girl who had so much love, so much opportunity for opening herself up fully yet painfully confused as to why her authentic self was much harder to find than the person she could sculpt herself to be. I see a girl who didn't understand the first thing about emotions, where they come from and how you can project them on others when you don't face them within yourself. I see a girl that took a lot for granted, including her own sense of morality. Now all I feel is blame and guilt for denying myself the love and depth that I needed to see things just a little bit deeper than I thought I was. But I know that I can't truly blame myself for I was just a child then. No matter how much freedom I had, I was still just a child with hardly any life experience to go from. I was a child who had no idea who she was, to myself or to the world.

As I sit here in my apartment reflecting on how I got to be who and where I am, I can't help but to see faces moving gently through my mind. Picture after picture. High school dances, beach trips, sleepovers, Halloween parties, late summer nights. The faces that come through bring me to many places within my heart, reminding me of all the things I've been trying to forget. The truth is, the girl I see looking back at me in all of those pictures, tangled up with her friends, smile on her face, love surrounding her completely, she is exactly who I am today, only she couldn't see it in herself. I can't hate her for being naive, I can't blame her for not understanding anything about herself or about being whole. I can't blame her because without her, I wouldn't be who I am today. And without the beautiful souls that I chose to help me break away all of the parts of me that didn't belong, I wouldn't be standing here ready to build something amazing.

Those faces, those hearts that I spent my most blind days singing and dancing to the music of life with, well they are never too far away from my heart. The girl that tossed them away dramatically is learning and healing each and every day, closer to understanding herself and her emotions for it, closer to being the person that will soon have a family and life of her own to build upon. And while my heart may feel a tug from a photo, a memory, or a name, I am truly grateful for the people who saw me before I could see myself. Before they could see themselves. I wish them the best on their journey in self discovery and I end this piece with lots of peace and with my favorite Hawaiian saying, Ho'oponopono:

I love you
I'm sorry
Please forgive me
Thank you

Before You May Love Me

You can love me, but first you must know just a few things about me:

I've bent so far that I am still confused as to if I have broken or not. Some days I catch myself feeling like pieces of a whole. Other days I know that no one can break me but myself, therefore I am not broken. I wonder if I'll ever figure out how my heart works, if it will always be one or if it has split into many. I know that I may never understand my heart, so first you must know that you might not, either. At least, not until I do.

I have an irrational need to be strong. Strength is good, but I am addicted. My head is hard and I won't let you help me without putting up a fight for myself. Your intentions may temporarily be lost in my war against dependence, but I'll eventually decide to allow myself to lean on others, for I am only human. That's what teams are for. But you might have to remind me as we open up our eyes to a new day, that although I can do this life on my own, I don't have to.

Sometimes, emotions can overwhelm me. I can get as existential as Sartre without batting an eye. But the homeless person on the corner begging for another chance, the dirty street cat with no one to love, or a gesture of true selflessness done out of love for me, may leave me feeling winded and uncertain for a moment or two. Although powerful feelings can shake things up, there's a certain curiosity in the beauty of it all that I can't let go of. And that is what's truly in my heart, no matter the fear that steps in momentarily.

There is a constant conversation occurring in my mind, that rarely leaves me silent. I must take time to myself, to sort through all that is my thoughts. Moments of stillness are imperative for my sanity and functionality. Quieting my thoughts is wellness, withdrawing into myself is medicinal. My healing is my own. But after I emerge from my brief hibernation, I delight in sharing my revelations with all who will listen.

All of these parts, you see, make me who I am, and I have been me long before your heart tasted mine. These things that sound like warnings, are actually testaments. Requiring review for your essential understanding. Everything listed before this line and an infinity more, creates a soul who loves unconditionally, with every drop of self. A love so pure and extraordinary, that it will slice through to your core. So before you can love me, truly and really love me, you must first love yourself and all that you are. For love travels most beautifully from the inside, out, and I'll have it no other way.

We Are What We Eat

Courage is not something that comes easily. It doesn't just flow through you like the thick blood that keeps your body going. It is discovered. Through the choices you make, the places you go, the people you meet. Courage exists within you but it isn't you. It asks to be summoned, like a deep breath before a high jump. It needs to be called forth and you have to want it.

I've realized lately that I do this thing where I plan something so far in advance, I'm not afraid to dream it. I know how much I want it, how much I need it, how it is truly meant to be because I'm not distracted by my own doubts or discomfort. Whatever it is, is so far away that my ego-driven mind doesn't take over to tell me I can't do it just yet. So I plan. I set a goal, speak it into existence, determine that it's happening, and talk about it like so. I plan the details of what it will be like, imagine the beauty, the luxury, the adventure. I go on with my days, seeking this dream that I hold in such golden light. I know how happy it will make me and at this point, it's so far away, that I don't feel any of the burdens. Just the joy that I know is coming. I don't feel the anxiety, the fear, I don't hear the voice in my head telling me I can't do it because it isn't time to think about that yet. It's only time to dream, it's only time to imagine the beauty of what I am moving towards. No fears or worries are aloud to enter because I'm not worried about how my dream will come to be. I am solely focused on the amazing, crazy happiness that lies ahead.

It's so important to have a period to dream. If you don't have time to live in the excitement of it all, to bathe in the joy of what you want to experience, to use your imagination to create the most beautiful picture in your mind and then immerse yourself in it, then you will never have the attitude needed to manifest the picture inside of your mind. Manifesting is all about living in the now. Living in the present moment, seeing the future moment in your mind, and allowing yourself to feel what that picture makes you feel. None of the burden of how you will get there, none of the fear of lack or loss, none of the worry of if you will make it, only the parts that make your stomach flutter in the most thrilling, magical way. Only the plans and the visions that bring your soul to a total state of bliss and fulfillment.

To manifest what it is you want to experience, you must decide to experience it. Decide you deserve it, decide it can happen. Choose what you want from life, tell the universe that you want it. Then tell yourself that you deserve it. Over and over. Because you do. There is no method of manifestation until you truly, absolutely believe you deserve what it is you want. That is the first step that cannot be skipped and to be honest, if you can get to a place where you believe with all of your heart that you deserve the things you want, the experiences your soul craves and your heart beats for, then life is yours. Period. And don't you dare tell yourself that you don't deserve any of it, because if your soul and your heart wish for it to be so, than you do deserve it. For what your heart and your soul tell you are guiding the way to joy, love, and happiness and you always deserve those. Each and every one of us.

Once you believe that you deserve what it is you desire, you must then work to believe that you can obtain it. That is step number two. When working through this, it will benefit you to remember that you need not know the means in order to believe in the ends. You do not need to know how you will get somewhere to get there, all you need to do is trust that there exists a path from where you are to where you wish to be. See that path as a line between two points, shaped however your mind wishes. Allow the universe to decide the method of the line between the point of where you are, and where you are headed. Imagine what you want. Decide the end point. You determine the destination. The pathway to this vision of yours, is a long and winding highway in a dark, quiet desert. All you can see is the 8 feet ahead of your car that the headlights illuminate. Yet you know you are on a road, and you know you are well on your way to your destination. And although you can only see 8 feet of road at a time, you know that as you keep moving forward, another 8 feet will appear, and another, and another. This is how life works. You pick a destination, a vision, a goal, an aspiration, a want, a desire, an adventure. You jump on the highway and drive. That is your part to play. You've got to get in the car and go, with your destination buzzing brightly in your mind. But once you are on that highway, it is not your job to see every inch of road that will lead you to your destination. That's the job of the GPS. Or, the universe. So allow the GPS (universe) to give you the direction you need, to guide you on the path ahead. Allow the headlights to light up what it is you need to see, and focus on driving your car the best you can on the road you are brought to. Knowing fully that the GPS will get you to your destination and the road will always unfold before you as you courageously drive onward.

Back to what I was saying before, about planning something so far in advance that you've already set it in motion and began manifesting it before you chicken out. Or in other words, before your nerves, your ego, the devil on your shoulder, convinces you that it cannot be done and your attitude implodes. This is a surefire way to confirm that your soul wants this, more specifically, that it's meant to happen. If you know deep down, that something needs to happen, and you feel it in your bones, you will do all you can to put it into motion before you might lose faith in your intuition, in your dream, in your heart's desire. That is courage. Planning a trip across the world, that feels so exciting and meant to be, before you start having panic attacks about leaving the continent for the first time, that's courage. Courage isn't living life without fear. That's not real. Courage is surfing the rough waves of life, the ones that bring both fear and a surge of exhilaration, knowing the thrill is worth the discomfort. Courage is following your soul's dreams, your heart's wishes, despite the fact that you may run into extreme worry and anxiety along the way. That's where courage and faith go hand in hand. Courage flows like a gentle surge of electricity when you have faith. Because although you may worry or fear certain things, you have faith in something higher. You have faith that there is a purpose for everything, and everything will serve a greater purpose. Then, courage seems more accessible. No matter what comes your way, you have the strength to believe. Even if you know it will be hard, scary, painful, uncomfortable. Courage is dreaming it up. Faith is trusting in that dream's meaning to your soul. Belief is knowing it will be. Courage is deciding you deserve what you desire, having faith that you can do it, and creating it. Despite the ego-based emotions you will experience along the way.

So my point here is this: Manifesting is courageous. Manifesting is hard. Manifesting is worth it. Manifesting your dreams is the most miraculous experience you can endure. Manifesting what lies within you, is natural. It is something we are made to do, energetically and spiritually. Our thoughts, emotions, beliefs, they all work together to create the reality we are surrounded by. What you operate from, you send out, you pull in, you become. You are one giant cellphone tower of energy, sending out signals to the universe with each and every word your mind produces, each feeling and emotion your attitude projects and your body experiences. You are constantly creating the life you experience, and you don't even realize it. That is how natural it is. So imagine, what life would be like, if you took it into your own hands? If you believed you have the courage that already lies within you, just waiting to be invoked? What would you do with that super power? That is what it is, a super power. Waiting to be brought forth, waiting to be put to use to save your life. Put on your cape, pull up your tights, set your destination in sight, and fly. Trust the universe to respond, trust yourself to believe, but most importantly, allow yourself to feel the satisfaction, the joy, the heart exploding happiness of the dream you are flying towards. Because it is already here, it is already a part of you. The minute you decide you want it and you can fly towards it, it is already yours. All you have to do is receive it.

The law of attraction is on your side, my friends. Dream big, believe even bigger.

To Survive or to Thrive?

I've come to a very important conclusion lately. Maybe it was meant to be this way all along, maybe I was meant to put this delicate puzzle together sooner or later, and my consciousness just happened to choose now. Or perhaps it was destined to find its way out of the depths of my mind at this very sacred time. Whatever the cause, whichever the method of timing, I can absolutely say I am incredibly thankful I figured this out now and not a minute later.

It all started with a philosophy paper. Being the anxious student I am, I planned to come up with my topic for the paper far enough in advance so that I'd have ample time to write the paper itself. So, months ago, before this sacred time of the most important epiphany of my life, I chose the topic of the Self. Are we an Atomistic Self or a Relational Self? Do we discover our truest, deepest Selves through introspection or extrospection? Is our Self discovered only within, or through our relationships with others? Little did I know, this topic would turn out to be a HUGE turning point in my life, bringing to my attention some aspects of me and my beliefs that very well might change life for me in the most miraculous of ways.

I won't get too much into my philosophical argument but I will tell you this.. Philosophy is known for teaching you the extreme views of beliefs of the universe. Religion, Ethics, Metaphysics, and Knowledge are the four main topics that most philosophies explore. The brilliant thinkers and ponderers that philosophize their way through life in order to pass down their beliefs, tend to pick a radical side of the issue and use reason to prove why their belief makes the most sense. But what REALLY makes the most sense, is finding a middle point between these extremes and taking parts from both sides of the spectrum that hold up to create one powerful, meaningful, spine tingling theory. That is what it's all about, I've learned. Studying philosophy may mean reading and understanding these radical theories, but practicing philosophy (which means the love of wisdom, by the way) actually means using these extreme ideas to form your own beliefs. Your beliefs and "aha moments" come from moving yourself closer to the center of these philosophies of life. Essentially, to philosophize or ponder is to inspire your own inner revolution. The real radical part is that sometimes, that movement changes your life.

I started creating my theory based on the topic mentioned above. I noticed that I was really adamant that all you need to discover and maintain your true self, is your self! How much simpler could it get? To be honest, that was just me being the person I have believed myself to be, detrimentally independent. Stubbornly alone. Angrily secluded. It wasn't until I presented my thesis to my Professor (who I highly admire for his natural wisdom and love for pondering) that I realized just how radical my beliefs were. About myself, about the Self, about people in general. Clearly, I still had some exploring and discovering to do. After he explained to me, so pure and simple, that we need both our Self and others to discover what lies deep within, I started to see the denial slipping away. It was time for me to shift my belief to the center, to give up my hard-headed, arrogant perception that I only needed myself to discover my Self, to better my Self, to BE my absolute Self. It's amazing, I mean truly extraordinary, how fast my perspective shifted and my mind opened up when I became comfortable with the fact that it would benefit me more in life if I didn't put my ego before my expansion. As a mind and as a soul. Philosophy has humbled me that way. After all, the first lesson of philosophy, stated by my favorite philosopher Socrates, is to know that you know nothing. Only then will you truly be able to learn something.

So after speaking with my professor, I realized that I was angrily defending solitude. I know from experience how necessary it is sometimes to pull yourself away from the rest of the world. After all, to heal a wound, we cover it from exposure. I have been operating under the notion that I needed to be on my own in order to completely heal. Only I could heal my wounds, only I could reassemble the shattered person that I was. That's true, but only to a certain degree. We are humans who are here on this planet to learn about ourselves, heal ourselves, and grow as we continue forward on our eternal journey. Part of that learning and healing can only be done within you, by you. You are the sole person who decides whether you heal, learn, or grow at all. You are the only one who has power over what state your soul is in and in what condition your heart lives. No one can break you, no one can fix you, except for you. However, an enormous amount of learning here in this great life is also done through our relationships and deep connections with others. How else would we learn about the parts of ourselves that we spend so much energy hiding and denying? Whether we are pained or loved by others, it is our relationships with those very others that can teach us about how we give and receive love. Do we allow ourselves to give and receive love, or do we deny ourselves those very pleasures and purposes of live? The only way you can know is if you connect with someone who is learning the same idea, which we all are, constantly. Also, we are all mirrors for each other. We are attracted to those who can help draw something out of us by just being themselves. To help bring something within ourselves to the surface and to our attention. Without relationships with others, our Self would be nothing more than what we can do on our own and as we can see from the way we humans function and live, it is more than necessary to have help, to have more than just our Self. You won't get very far on your own in this world, take my word for it.

In the end, I have found that there is equal and great power in pure discovery of Self and in our relationships with others. Therefore, the topic of my paper and the theme for my life that I have chosen, is the Mutual Self. The Self that can learn from both connection to Self and connection to others, seclusion and infusion. The Self that can fit both of those halves together in one divine piece that is our existence. Forming together imperfectly but extraordinarily, in order to teach us to the fullest extent, who we are and why we are here. We can survive with just our Self, but do we want to survive, or do we want to thrive? That is the question of a life time!