“And I have felt a presence that disturbs me with the joy of elevated thoughts; a sense sublime of something far more deeply interfused, whose dwelling is the light of setting suns, and the round ocean and the living air, and the blue sky, and in the mind of man; emotion and a spirit, that impels all thinking things, all objects of all thought, and rolls through all things.” – William Wordsworth
Many of us live in earthquake country and know at any moment the earth can move and buckle beneath our feet, causing enormous upheaval in our communities. Even with the most thorough earthquake preparedness planning and civilian drills, the actual seismic event is still a great shock to the system requiring a long period of quiet healing and recovery.
Earthquakes constitute a known yet unpredictable threat to our physical safety and psychological stability and we have prepared as much as is possible for these geological events. However, in all honesty, are you and I prepared for a SoulQuake?
This life-changing event also causes great upheaval and change in our lives. A SoulQuake occurs when we say YES to life and the desire of the Soul to express itself exerts an irresistible and unrelenting pressure on the personality. If this compelling inner force encounters a mental, emotional and physical body that is not sufficiently integrated and able to gracefully and skillfully respond to its call, then an uncomfortable and unnerving build-up of pressure ensues until it reaches an inevitable breaking point.
Any time the Soul is invoked and meets with resistance, or encounters aspects of our personal life that are not in alignment with its deep purpose, it will shake us until we conform to the new requirements. All the unnecessary and outworn parts of our lives will be reconfigured or refined and, in dire circumstances, may even be reduced to rubble. A SoulQuake is a time of great perturbation that clears a space for the new Soul-directed life to begin – one that is more in alignment with our essential nature and spiritual purpose.
Thankfully we have been given explicit instructions on how to act in an earthquake, with useful recommendations as to what provisions should be safely stored in order to survive the post-quake conditions when normal service may be curtailed for a while. These are extremely helpful safety and survival tips that we would be wise to follow. But how do we prepare for a SoulQuake?
Here are three tips:
In a SoulQuake, we don’t run for cover – we stand in the unshakeable stillness and security of the Higher Self.
In a SoulQuake we don’t hoard or hold on to things – we let go of all baggage, belongings and beliefs that no longer serve us.
In a SoulQuake, we don’t practice survival – we enter the fiery crucible of a transformative process that eventually leads to renewal and thrival.
A good friend once told me that in earthquakes, as in the rest of life, there are no safe places, only safe people.
The gift of a SoulQuake is that it breaks open a heart that may be encrusted with bitterness or frozen with fear and it liberates a mind that might be clouded by separative thoughts so that the beauty and splendor of the indwelling life can reveal more of itself.
“When we resist change, it’s called suffering. But when we can completely let go and not struggle against it, when we can embrace the groundlessness of our situation and relax into its dynamic quality, that’s called enlightenment, or awakening to our true nature, to our fundamental goodness. Another word for that is freedom—freedom from struggling against the fundamental ambiguity of being human.” – Pema Chodron