Your vision is an expression of your truth

In Canada, where I live, this past Monday was the National Day for Truth and Reconciliation. It is marked as a day to acknowledge the harm perpetrated against the indigenous peoples of our nation and to honour the survivors. The intent is to begin the healing process from our painful history.

I don’t pretend to know the extent of suffering of those who endured the oppression at the hands of those meant to protect them. I can imagine that the systemic abuse would have devastated their humanity, depleted their spirit, and deprived them of their inherent right to experience the joy of life. This injustice had far-reaching consequences, not only in their lives, but also in the lives of their families and communities.

While I may be ignorant to their personal experiences, what I do know is that atrocities are committed every day on this planet because we, as human beings, are erroneously attempting to gain power by dominating, manipulating, or outright seizing it from another. This gross imbalance typically plays itself out in dynamics such as victim-abuser, thief-loser, landlord-tenant, combatant-captive, occupier-resister, possessor-sacrificer, and so on.

One of our many mistakes in all of this is that we have confused the idea of energy with power. In scientific terms, energy is the ability to create change and power is the measured rate at which that energy is used. In spiritual terms, energy is what creates all manifested reality and power is simply the flow of that energy through our being into the world. Our quest for power is misguided, what we are actually seeking is the ability to receive and flow our own energy.

Our quest for power is misguided, what we are actually seeking is the ability to receive and flow our own energy.

We all have equal access to source energy. It flows through the experience of each and every human being. However, when we don’t realize we have access to our own energy, we will attempt to misappropriate it from another. In contrast, when we are able to source our own energy from within, there is nothing to seek from another, we are sovereign unto ourselves. In this state, we are living from sufficiency, free to be in service to each other. This is my version of living from truth.

The truth is...

Truth is a tricky word to define. The dictionary defines it as “facts”, but I find that unsatisfactory because so-called “facts” are often influenced by the observer. In the context of the Day of Truth and Reconciliation, part of the process is to reveal the facts about what happened, but I wouldn’t call that being truthful as much as I would call it being transparent.

Oftentimes, people will speak what they call their “truth”, but what they are actually sharing is a story from their individual perspective filtered through the lens of their own experience. There’s nothing wrong with this because that’s all any of us can do. We cannot perceive the world outside of our own lens. However, I perceive truth as a more encompassing term.

By my own definition, truth is a principle that is fundamental to our human existence and can be expressed as a characteristic desirable to all humans. For example, I would consider the following to be truths:

• Love
• Connection
• Expression
• Freedom
• Empowerment
• Esteem
• Compassion
• Sovereignty

Unless one is a sociopath, I think we would all generally agree that these principles are desirable to every being. I also find it interesting that a “principle” is defined as the “primary source” or “origin” because it is through living our truth that we connect with our inner source of energy.

In my work, I help people clarify their vision, and the way we go about doing that is by discovering the principle that most closely aligns with their truth. The way we go about determining that is by examining the opposite, by looking at the places where they’ve given their power away, which is the wound.

Our wound points us to our truth

In regard to speaking the “truth” about what happened to all those children, in addition to the “facts”, the truth might be something closer to “I felt powerless in my own being so I entered into an abusive relationship with another in the misguided attempt to regain my power”. But even this is not the truth because for an aggressor to feel powerless, they would have had to have bought into a lie about who they are.

From a young age, we tend to develop overlays that have been projected onto us by others. They may be societal or cultural beliefs, or perhaps familial stories or generational karma. We will adopt false ideas of our own “not enoughness” and then play them out in our lives. Therefore, before we can create a vision that is sourced from our truth, first we have to look to the place within ourselves where we have yielded our power – our wounds. We have to be transparent with ourselves about where we have been complicit in a story of our own diminishment.

This exposure of our wound is not for the purpose of berating or judging ourselves, or anyone else for that matter. It is not to wallow in our unworthiness. And it is not to waste our energy in trying to “fix” ourselves. The wound is a lie. It’s an untrue story that we have believed about who we are. And the longer we live with that story, the more painful it becomes. However, the benefit of the wound is that it creates a desire within us that points to a more truthful story of who we are. And the moment we decide that the wound is no longer our story and we reorient ourselves to our true desire is the moment we reclaim our truth.

Truth is framed by the statement: I am…

For example, if we look to the list above, you might claim your truth as:

• I am love
• I am connection
• I am expression
• I am freedom
• I am empowerment
• I am esteem
• I am compassion
• I am sovereign

When we claim our truth, we instantly connect with our source of energy within and we become an open vessel for its flow. This is why it feels so powerful. The secondary effect of claiming our truth is that in the living of it, it naturally heals our wounds. Our work can facilitate this process. This is the therapeutic capacity of living our inspired work.

Our work is to live into our truth

I believe that living our inspired work is the hardest work we will ever do for one of the reasons that it invites us to stop energetically feeding off of our own wounds and actually live sourced from our own energy. This does not happen overnight, it is a lifelong practice, and our work becomes the vehicle for that practice.

Initially when someone claims their truth, it often evokes from them a flood of emotion and sensation. This is because they have released their internal resistance to the receiving of and flow of their own energy and the physical sensations they experience in their body can be overwhelming if they are not accustomed to it. Often accompanying this physical release is the emotion of grief. In claiming our truth, it amplifies the recognition that we have lost much of our life to living a lie. It’s a sobering moment.

The benefit of creating a vision for our life based on our truth is that it helps to remind us of who we are and what we are living into. Our work then becomes an opportunity to invite others to live into the vision with us.

A vision is framed by the statement: I envision a world where everyone is…

Again looking to the list of truths above, then your vision statement might be:

• I envision a world where everyone is love.
• I envision a world where everyone is connection.
• I envision a world where everyone is expression.
• I envision a world where everyone is freedom.
• I envision a world where everyone is empowerment.
• I envision a world where everyone is esteem.
• I envision a world where everyone is compassion.
• I envision a world where everyone is sovereign.

I know when someone creates a vision based on truth because it is the image of a world that we all want to live in. When we live from truth, we are sourced from within. We have access to our own energy and when we allow it to flow through us, we are powerful unto ourselves. There’s no need to usurp energy from another. There’s no need to enter into power struggles with another. And we certainly would not have the ability to cause harm to another.

To live our truth requires us to take full responsibility for our lives. In doing so, this is how we reconcile our own wrongdoings and offer our ourselves and our work in true service to humanity.