By Raphael Awen
I had the pleasure of holding space for a man yesterday in session space over zoom and we encountered something together that feels really common for awakening men.
As he described some precious and powerful awakenings with Yeshua and many new places of openings recently, I couldn’t help but feel an anxious undertone in his sharing, so I just asked if he could feel a part of him that is vigilant about keeping up with awakening, and that opened out a whole portal to go into together where we felt and saw that the efforting and vigilance about awakening was being used to avoid an inner well of ‘persistent hollowness’. We were able to see and feel the part of him who lives in this hollowness and begin to see him as the one who holds vast access to creativity, as well as the men’s version of the womb, what’s known as the Hara.
This all felt so familiar to my own process of being out of touch with my own grief over the years, and with that of course, my own depression. I didn’t have any depression as near as I could tell, for decades actually, but truth was, part of me had just done an outstanding job of keeping it buried. I was quite a stellar human then, liked by many, but the treadmill of the efforting was starting to wear the benefits thin and the costs were tabulating.
I don’t think anything would have changed for me were it not for a crisis, and in some ways, an ongoing series of manageable mini crisis’ if you will.
Together in session with this man yesterday, we began to feel the call to really begin to bridge to this part of him, curiously and with open heart, get to know his reality. Negotiate with him to return out to play, not as another item on the to do list or the to be list of awakening, but just as a natural longing and appetite to get to know.
Then we felt THAT to be the ending of the efforting, as the efforting was actually being used to keep this part’s world and reality suppressed inside, when life is actually ripening this part’s reality to the surface.
I so don’t feel I could have bridged these realities inside of myself and my own healing/awakening process without ‘parts work’ as it is known. Without parts work, we just leave the part of us to pull themselves up by their own bootstraps, without them feeling a you there to be with them, to bridge and support them in the changes they wish to make, kind of like the physically present, but all too often emotionally absent parents we experienced in growing up.
When the bridging occurs between you and a part of you, the perception of what both the problem and the solutions are also shift and change and whole new worlds emerge that were not seen before.
This is the magical portal that our wounding is, offering us sacred entry into dimensions not seen or known yet. Spiritual fixes for depression or anxiety aren’t much better than the pharmaceutical fixes are as both are about the fear and avoidance of this portal.
Being ready to enter this portal is quite organic, and you simply know when you are there. The call and question about sufficient courage is outweighed by the growing inability to hold up the old way any longer.
Whatever needs to be surrendered in order to enter the portal is kind of like shrinking your life into a 2 suitcase limit on a one way overseas airplane flight. You only have 23 kilos per bag, so the question becomes about what’s coming or not. Really, you can only take yourself, and a few most necessary items. The life you’ve created and accumulated needs to be largely or completely let go of. Socially, this is probably the hardest as our underlying and unconscious social agreements are about each of us promising to remain proximal in both geography and within a certain consciousness bandwidth with one another. You could say that we co-sign one another’s agreements to stay in resonant around remaining small, that is until we default on the agreement.
Some around us understandably get pissed, and rightfully so. We were the best exemplars to the agreement, maybe even better than the others in the picture were. And now, you’re the one pulling the pin. You also have some apologies to make, but the crazy thing is, no one wants the apologies, they want you to return, but crazier still is that you’ve already morphed beyond the place where that could even be possible. There’s nothing left but to honour that with grief and sorrow and goodbyes.
‘You’re the one who changed’ my best friend once told me while out on a hiking trail trying to bridge a conversation about the growing differences between us. He was right. Our unspoken agreement had been about remaining true to a code of values, purpose and meaning. My emerging values, purpose and meaning we’re leaving the parameters of our agreement. My old me simply couldn’t fit in the suitcase any longer and my departure date was fast approaching.
It wasn’t but a couple years later that I sat across from this friend at breakfast, with tears, and said goodbye to him, to our friendship, as where I was going was only going to leave both of us strained in a very unreal friendship, something neither of us were really capable of.
Life, real life, always brings up new enterings and leavings in this way. All of life could be summed up as a series of beginnings and endings in this way, and the most adapted to this reality, in their ability to feel grief and sorrow are truly the happiest campers. Joy comes in the morning and through the mourning.
What is it in life that is shifting and rumbling for you? What are you being asked to grieve and let go? How could you do that in a way that doesn’t leave you more wounded, withdrawn and reserved?
Could I help you make that transition? Could I help you embrace your bigger you? Could I help you find your soul family and passion purpose calling expression?
I moved into a new and brave world as a beginner, and have made some discoveries that may one day bear my name, but for now they are just here being offered to you, as these discoveries need more bold souls to test drive the living, loving and learning. Then it can be our discovery, and not just mine.
I would so welcome hearing from you, more about me and sessions at soulfullheart.org/sessions and you can email me at soulfullhearts@gmail.com. Sessions are for 90 minutes and cost $100 usd. You may also be drawn to one of the three other current SoulFullHeart facilitators, my wife, Jelelle Awen, Aurius Amara, Kasha Rokshana, whose info is also at the link above and who can be reached at the same email address above.
The pic above is from a recent group day with six of us here in Glastonbury/Avalon. We look shiny and lovely because we are most of the time, but also not without some serious mess in the playful bliss, both as couples and as a community.
Love,
Raphael 



Our next group call:
taking place on March 14th @ 5pm GMT (London, UK) with Raphael and Jelelle, which will focus on Sacred Sexuality. More info on that call can be found here: soulfullheart.org/grouptransmissions
Raphael Awen is co-creator, teacher, and facilitator of the SoulFullHeart Way Of Life. Visit soulfullheart.org for more information about sessions, events, videos, etc.
We are now offering our SoulFullHeart Portal on Mighty Networks, a private virtual gathering place for sharing exclusive content from us such as energy update writings and guided meditation videos, plus community forum threads with topics and groups that you can read, join, and contribute to as you want. You can join us at the SoulFullHeart Portal for a membership fee of $14.99 USD a month: soulfullheartportal.mn.co/
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