“I wonder if I’ve been changed in the night? Let me think. Was I the same when I got up this morning? I almost think I can remember feeling a little different. But if I’m not the same… Who in the world am I? Ah… that’s the great puzzle.” ~ Alice (Alice in Wonderland)

Who in the world am I?

It’s a question I’ve asked myself frequently over the past two or three years. Life-changing events call for deeper understanding of self. And once you’ve started the journey of finding the deeper meaning of everything, there’s just no going back.

This can be frustrating at times because life is simpler in an unconscious state of mind. It is easier just going with the flow, doing what other people do, thinking other people’s thoughts, doing what’s expected of you. Which is, in a conscious state of mind; really, really unfulfilling, frustrating, boring and just plain sad.

So, who am I then? To be honest, I do not yet know.

But after putting piece by piece into its right position in the great puzzle, I do see the outline of someone I wanted to be twenty years ago. I’m not finished, but I do see that everything I wanted twenty years ago is here. Right now. It’s been a hell of a journey at times. But I’m here. And that is, in fact, all that matters at this point.

Because past is past, and all I (and you) have is here and now.

Embrace it. Love it. Live it. Now.

Sometimes I feel as lost as Alice, when I’m trapped in rooms I’ve never been in before where the only way out is through a locked door that not only misses the key to its lock, but also is way too small to escape out from. Sometimes I’m hurled down a dark tunnel with seemingly no end, only to escape into foreign landscapes with strange creatures with erratic and even hostile behavior.

Trapped in a place you don’t want to be, among people you don’t want to be with, and without (seemingly) no means of escape, what do you do?

Most of us run. Most of us pack the experiences down in boxes without labels and store them deep in rooms in our subconscious. We lock it up in storage, never to be looked at again. And then we throw the key away.

We humans are afraid of all things we do not know.

We hate to think for ourselves. But when you open your eyes, unafraid, in the foreign landscape; when you trust that at the end of the tunnel you will see light and stable ground; when you start thinking your own thoughts and making up your own mind; when you decide for you, you open up to miracles far greater than anything else you will experience in the unconscious state of mind.

There can be great beauty in the shadows, because sometimes (and more often than not), the darkness hides the most wonderful treasures.

I’ve opened those boxes I had in storage, I’ve looked inside them. In fact, I’m still sorting through a few of them. The content of the boxes has hurt me (and sometimes do still), some of them made me cry, others made me laugh, yet others made me angry, very angry. But they have all revealed clarity, insight and understanding. They have led me to forgiveness. And that has changed me. There is no going back.

I don’t know about Alice, but I do know that I am different than I was yesterday. And that, I think, is actually all that matters.

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Editor: Renée Picard

Photo: via Google Images