The Cold Hard Ugly Truth About Spirituality – 8 Truths

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When I first began the practice of spirituality, my main intention was to discover why I was having ‘weird’ experiences. As I progressed deeper understanding unfolded, along with the cold hard ugly truth about spirituality – we can never unsee or unknow what we learn. Here are some points for contemplation – maybe you resonate.

The cold hard ugly truth about spirituality

There is a lot written by myself and many others about our spiritual awakening here on the planet, how to grow spiritually, and how to develop our self-awareness and mindfulness.

These are all wonderful practices and have great value in life yet there are some cold hard ugly truths about spirituality, too.

These truths are not about the practice of spirituality itself which can, of course, have many benefits.

These 8 truths are more about the results you may find yourself having as you progress on the spiritual journey.

We may discover on the journey that: –

• we are experiencing injustice
• not everyone is ‘good’ or trustworthy
• suffering and loss can happen at any time
• being psychic or intuitive can at times be very difficult
• the spiritual journey isn’t all about expanding our vibration and going somewhere lighter and brighter.

Our experiences of people, life situations, and circumstances can end up dropping us into some dark moods and some dark places and spaces.

Cynicism or truth?

When I was a teen, I used to think my dad was just being very cynical when he used to say “80% of people are no good“.

What he was trying to verbalize was that a lot of people are still trying to separate their minds from their egos. As a race of beings, we still have a long way to go on the road to spiritual evolution.

Some people can’t overcome their karmic patterns in this lifetime, so consciously or subconsciously they choose to live them and the consequences of doing so.

This can result in bad behavior and damage and trauma to other people in their path.

As M. Scott Peck said in The Road Less Traveled

“Life is not fair, but people can choose to be.”

M Scott Peck

Learning this particular lesson can take a lifetime, or perhaps several.

So, when we do finally face up to our own karmic patterns, what happens next?

1. Friends and relations fall away

I have heard this from many people on the journey and have experienced it myself.

Luckily I still have some good friends from long ago who are still stepping along on the journey with me.

It’s true, though. If you take the spiritual path, it’s highly likely that you will lose friends and possibly outlaw yourself from family.

This is partly because you are experiencing an expansion in vibration. Your worldview is changing, so how you express yourself does, too.

Vibrational expansion changes our aura

People will notice this difference in energy resonating off your aura – they may either resonate or back away because you are no longer a match.

This can be a healthy part of maturation and growth. People who are stuck in schoolyard thinking are pretty obvious in a circle of friends.

We may love them, but we can see that they have chosen not to change or grow many of their behaviors.

Black sheep of the family

From your family’s perspective, they might believe you have either completely lost it or are going against years of tradition or family history.

In some ways, you may well be doing exactly that!

The upside of this hard truth is that you will make many new friends along the way.  You may also discover a whole new concept of what family really means.

I have always loved this quote and am not quite sure where it comes from.

“You may meet people, but you will recognize friends”.

Anon

On the spiritual journey, we naturally begin to identify with or attract people who are more like us vibrationally.

It doesn’t mean anyone is ‘better’ or ‘worse’. It’s just that since we have made changes, we are now ready for some new life lessons.

Disconnecting from a family member and abusive practices

The great Louise Hay has been quoted as saying: –

Only honor family members who are honorable.

Louise Hay

For many people, this is a revolutionary idea. Why would we disconnect from family – isn’t family everything? Shouldn’t we forgive them everything by default?

For those of us with heightened sensitivity and strong intuition, we may have grown these skills and abilities out of necessity.

Perhaps our childhood home wasn’t safe because of an abusive family member. Maybe we were raised in an environment where abusive behavior was practiced and not acknowledged because of a lack of awareness.

Our awareness expands to keep us safe and to be able to ‘read the room’. Once this process begins – in my experience – repressed trauma will also need to be cleared from our Personal Energy.

If we do our own work and expand our vibrational awareness around issues like verbal abuse or physical abuse, it may then become intolerable to be in the presence of family members who choose not to clear their own trauma this time around.

2. The cold hard ugly truth gives you clarity

It’s a fact that on the spiritual journey, one of the most shocking discoveries on the path is your own growth in self-awareness. 

Over time, you will become much more discerning about other people’s true motivations and inner workings.

This is because you are becoming more embodied and not just living in your head.  Sometimes the openings from this perspective can seem overwhelming – the spiritual version of Too Much Information (TMI)!

The aha moments will come thick and fast as you realize why a certain person has acted a certain way.   Often you will gain clarity around karmic issues. You may discover that their behavior has nothing to do with their interest, support, or possibly love for you, sad to say.

[click_to_tweet tweet=”I believe spiritually we go through difficult experiences like these to wake us up to our own intuition and to remind us that the soul is with us all along.” quote=”I believe spiritually we go through difficult experiences like these to wake us up to our own intuition and to remind us that the soul is with us all along.”]

3. Projections will be revealed

When we project our wants, needs, and desires onto others, we fill in their gaps for them — whatever those gaps may be.

Focusing on our own needs and side-stepping responsibility, we choose to get what we would like out of a situation by not being real.

Once projections are identified, our whole worldview might suddenly spin into a whole new dimension of understanding.

Once we see something that was previously hidden from us due to personal bias, trauma blocking or the desire to continue to experience a secondary gain, the ‘scales fall from our eyes’.

A favorite mentor of mine would use this phrase to sum up this phenomenon: –

Shift the filter, force the sort

Joseph Riggio

To only way through vibrational expansion and the clearing of karma is to make the choice to grow and evolve.

Once we do shift the filter, what is ‘sorted’ – the choices and opportunities in front of us – may be a completely different worldview to how we saw our life beforehand.

Vibrational expansion – some signs

This shift changes our personal experience of the world all of a sudden.

In our relationships, we begin to see the dynamics as they really are and not as we would like them to be.

We see from a higher level of awareness that we are now able to maintain because of our soul expansion work.

Before we could only view the world from the mirror of our own projections.

This can often be referred to as a paradigm shift or spiritual awakening.  It’s a game-changer for sure.

Projections fall away

We see people in our lives in a whole new light and start to have retrospective and deep contemplative experiences. New truths will be revealed.

As Maya Angelou always said

“When somebody shows you who they are – believe them”.

Maya Angelou

Sometimes we have to do a lot of work on ourselves before we can truly believe, and we can stay in denial for many years if a relationship, situation, or circumstance benefits us in some way.

This refusal to ‘see the light’ is sometimes referred to as cognitive dissonance.

4. More truth about humans and humanity

I remember the first paradigm shift I had as a teen.

At age 13 I read one of Gloria Steinem’s books (I was an early reader and my parents let me read almost anything I could get within reason).

I read about certain parts of the world where women were circumcised and even had their genitals sewn up before marriage as a form of enforced chastity.

That was a huge shift for me and definitely a cold hard ugly truth.

I suddenly realized that the world was not as friendly a place for women as I thought it was.

As a young person, I tucked this information away and got on with living my earlier life. I decided that women were treated unfairly in third-world countries and that I lived in a country of privilege.

Of course, to some degree that is true.

Since that day, of course, I have learned many more truths about the nature of patriarchal energy.

Patriarchal thoughts and beliefs have affected women’s rights and opportunities by normalizing our lack of them.

5. Shift changes everything

This shift will keep happening to you in one way or another on the spiritual journey.

Many of us are in group paradigm shifts and pull together into new social groups. Then we can hold each other up on the path.

Some examples of current group paradigm shifts are

• a growing awareness that the Food Industry is not our friend 
• the need to change how we use products such as petroleum and plastic 
• realization that photo-shopping the picture of a teenage girl and publishing the images as desirable is a form of abuse
• the #metoo movement
• an awareness that gun violence must become a priority in social politics
• awakening to the damaging nature of patriarchal energy
• becoming aware that not all of those with intuitive gifts have our best intentions at heart.

6. Narcissists exist

There’s been a lot of talk on the internet about the Empath and narcissist dynamic.

The ‘narc’ is out there and seen as preying on Empaths.

The two personality types have a natural attraction to each other and create a symbiotic relationship.

Due to the imbalance of power, this relationship is commonly much more damaging to the Empath than the narcissist.

I believe that part of living in the Aquarian Age is to help us wake up to abusive power dynamics.

Narcissism is just one example of bad behaviors and old ideas that create karma for everybody.

7. Patriarchal ideas prevent evolution

When I was younger I was fairly self-involved and interested in developing my career fully. I wanted to earn as much money as I possibly could.

Immersed in the energy of the ’80s I was not interested in anything else.

As a ‘career woman’, and I was labeled as such for wanting to grow and succeed in business. These days, I understand that wanting to be an entrepreneur is part of my Human Design.

When Margaret Thatcher became the first female Prime Minister in the UK, she had voice coaching to lower her tone.

Her PR people told her that her voice was ‘too shrill‘. She also changed her manner of dressing to look more masculine and streamlined and less female and frilly.

Shoulder pads

In my case, I wore business suits and massive shoulder pads to square off my body. One day, when my then-boss patted my shoulder to say well done about something – he remarked on my shoulder pads.

I figured out I had three set of shoulder pads on that day. One set with my outdoor coat, the next with my suit, and the third set from my blouse underneath.

I could blame ’80s fashion of course, which has a lot to answer for. Some of this unconscious behavior was definitely related to working in information technology. This was a very male-based field at the time.

Subconciously I knew needed to project myself a certain way to be perceived as successful. I joined a group or cultural behavior in order to be accepted, rather than plowing my own furrow.

8. You can never go back

It’s true. Just like Joseph Campbell’s hero’s myth, or Lissa Rankin’s heroine’s journey, we can never go back.

We cannot lose our new perspectives and experiences gained on the spiritual journey as our vibration expands.

We have changed ourselves. The river is no longer just a river, and the valley is no longer just the valley. When we go home, we may seem different to friends and family.

The spiritual journey brings us gifts. No matter how painful, hard, cold, and ugly the truth. We are living the journey and the gifts change our perception completely.

A dear friend of mine describes it like this: –

Once you know, you cannot unknow.

Harry Nichols

Once we expand our vibration and have a paradigm shift, life becomes an entirely new proposition.

Sarah is an Intuitive Coach and gives a range of different readings to clients, and coaching sessions too.  Download the free PDF brochure to learn more about the readings she offers. You can join the client portal to chat with her directly.