Spiritual Integration

Tags

integration, spirituality, unity

Spiritual Integration for #SpiritChat by Christy Johnson

 

Dictionary.com defines integration as an act or instance of combining into an integral whole. In Latin the word integer means untouched, meaning an undivided and whole number.

 

Each of us comes into life as a whole being, yet we may forget our inherent wholeness as we traverse our imperfect way through life interacting with other flawed, yet paradoxically whole, humans. Spiritual integration balances our human imperfection with our divine perfection.

 

To heal the internal split and integrate, we must learn to accept of all parts of ourselves, including any aspects we’d prefer to keep secret, especially any aspect that is violent or unforgiving in thought, word, or deed. This requires self-awareness, courage, and persistence.

 

The turbulence and violence in the world calls for integration of both our collective and personal shadows. As Carl Jung wrote in Modern Man in Search of a Soul, “How can I be substantial if I do not cast a shadow? I must have a dark side also if I am to be whole.” 

 

Unintegrated shadows may manifest as judgment or can extend further to discriminatory or even violent acts. To integrate our own shadows, we need to acknowledge all humans have the potential for darkness rather than deny that aspect of humanity in general and ourselves in particular. Being aware of our shared human frailties while consciously choosing not to be driven by them reflects our spiritual integration.

 

How do we make peace with our own shadow? How do we shine light on humanity’s collective shadow to support integration? 

 

Please join us as we explore how we might help ourselves and the rest of humanity heal the collective trauma of unintegrated shadows. Let’s shine a compassionate light on darkness and brainstorm about how to create a healthier, less shadow-driven, more integrated future for mankind.

 

Dr. Christy Johnson quit her decades-long engineering career in 2010 to open her integrative energy healing practice. She helps clients grow, evolve, and get empowered via soul level information and energy healing. You can connect with her via her website www.intuitiveheal.com or on Twitter @IntuitiveHeal .

P. S. Join our special guest host Dr Christy Johnson as she steps up to host our weekly twitter chat (Sunday Aug 25 at 9amET in #spiritchat) on this wonderful topic. Thank you – Kumud

 

On Making Work Play

Tags

creativity, integration, play, work

The first Sunday of September is ‘celebrated’ as the ‘Labor Day’ weekend in the USA. It was the first ‘long weekend’ that I encountered when I first here for graduate school. I was intrigued by a holiday that had the word ‘labor’ in it, and I also wondered why they did not spell it with a ‘u’. Over the years, I learnt a bit more about this classic American weekend that marks the passage from summer into autumn.

But, back to ‘labor’. The word itself seems to carry a sense of ‘heaviness’ about it for me. It conjures a vision of coolies carrying suitcases on their heads at railway stations in India, ascending and descending staircases with a seeming ease that defies their wiry frames. As a child, I was always impressed by their superhuman strength, and often felt a bit guilty about the tough negotiations we would do for hiring them. In their work, they seemed like Atlas carrying the weight of their shoulders on their back.

However, we all well know that not all ‘labor’ is manual. In this day and age of technology, our labor is often defined by our ‘finger dexterity’, ‘mental organization’, ‘oral delivery’ and ‘visual acuity’. The ‘gentler’ connotation of ‘labor’ is simply ‘work’. And the even ‘gentler’ connotation of ‘work’ is often ‘play. And some of us have mastered the niche and cultivated the art of ‘making work play’. They are perhaps the enlightened creatives.

So, what is it that defines those masters of ‘making work play’? I imagine that we would have to know what the words ‘work’ and ‘play’ mean to us at an individual level. For simplicity sake, let us assume that ‘work’ leans toward ‘labor’ and ‘play’ leans towards ‘fun and recreation’. When ‘work’ and ‘play’ tilt away from each other, like the two arms of the letter V, they tend to pull us apart. When they come together, as in the letter I, we feel a sense of integration, of wholeness, of wholesomeness.

And then, there is notion of ‘duty’. For me, the word connotes an even ‘heavier’ form of work than ‘labor’. When it first appears to do its bidding, ‘duty’ tends to invoke resistance. It is often inconvenient, and tends to be demanding of what we may be unable or unwilling to give of – which is our sense of freedom. Friction results, sparks fly, unfamiliar words and thoughts and feelings emerge. Play becomes the farthest thing from our hearts and minds when we approach the work of our duty as a burden that has befallen us.

We need not despair, though. It is time for evaluation of our (spiritual) practices. Do they feel like burdens, or like play? It is self-reflection that reminds us of our capacity to love, and it is that love which ‘greases the tracks of duty’. When approached with love, we take the first step on the path (towards doing our duty at hand) with a renewed lightness of heart. This leads to a sense of vairagya (non-attachment to the results), which leads us back to freedom, and to the joy of play!

Love of work. Freedom through love. Play through Freedom. This is our work.

The result? We find ourselves in That ocean where all of our work is a wave of divine play – Leela.

We have come full circle to the center, where ‘labor’ has become weightless. It’s time to celebrate!

Kumud @AjmaniK

P.S. Join us Sunday, September 2nd at 9amET / 630pm India for our weekly community chat on twitter. We will work on ‘Making Work Play’ in #spiritchat – bring your game-boards and game-pieces!

Nature’s (handi)Work – or is it merely Play?!