Inner work
Before my awakening, I’d heard the term ‘inner work’ but didn’t understand its full meaning, or at least the full meaning as I know it now. I also didn’t realise how essential it is to moving forward.
My version of inner work
Inner work is about going deep within yourself to understand where the fears are coming from. The things that cause us hurt or pain, the things we shy away from, the things that bring us shame - those are what we have to work on and accept as part of ourselves.
We are two parts of a whole, two sides of the same coin. We are light and dark all rolled up into one package. No matter how much we want to avoid our dark side and pretend it’s not there, we can’t live with out it. We cannot be light all the time, just as we cannot be happy all the time. We need to experience times of sadness, regret and anger in order to truly know what happiness is. To recognise our light side we also need to experience our darker side.
I can tell you what this looked like from my experience and you may or may not relate. I hope it gives you a better understanding of inner work.
How it started for me
For me the inner work started when I reached the lowest point of my life. A difficult, dark place that I never expected to experience. I’m generally a happy, positive person. I never anticipated I would go to a dark place. Like everyone else, I’d had moments of anger and frustration, sadness or regret, but those were always fleeting. What I found myself in at this point was a depth of despair that was incredibly hard to crawl out of.
What made it really difficult is that I would just be starting to climb out of that hole when something would come up and send me spinning back down again. It took several times for this to happen before I realised that I was being presented with the next piece of inner work to wade my way through. Each time I went through it, I came out stronger, and eventually this helped me get back to my happy, bubbly self.
Facing emotions
My inner work consisted of facing my own emotions - the things that caused me shame, pain or hurt in some way. Often times I realised that I’d been accepting situations for years or even decades because I hadn’t stood in my own power and given myself a voice. There was anger and frustration within myself that needed working through.
To unpack this I had to understand the why of the situation. Why did I feel it was necessary to be the peacekeeper all the time, the one that brought harmony to any situation at the expense of my own voice? And this is where the inner work really started for me.
Looking for patterns
Stepping back from the emotions and looking at the patterns that came up in my life helped me understand where this was all coming from. Unpacking that was key to moving on.
If you are going through something similar you could ask yourself where this started for you. Did it start in childhood because of an incident that happened at that time? Is it a belief that you have developed over time, or is it a family belief that has been passed down over many generations which is now holding you back rather than keeping you safe? Is this a recurring theme in your life that you haven’t noticed until now?
For me I noticed a family trait of the women not having a voice and not having the freedom to be authentic to who they truly are. Culture and social customs obviously have a big impact on our belief systems and it’s not until we start looking at our beliefs and values that we can look at this with fresh eyes to see if it sits well with us in the here and now. This is the inner work.
It’s not easy
Recognising it, unpacking it and accepting that this has been part of our life until now is part of the process. And it’s hard. This is not easy work. There is a reason we shy away from our darker side. We don’t want to see those parts of us. We don’t want to acknowledge that we are a balled up knot of resentment, or still suffer the anguish and pain from comments made in our childhood. But face them we must if we want to move forward.
We need to incorporate these aspects of our Self into us, knowingly acknowledging them as part of our whole. For me this involved many forgiveness ceremonies (including a lot of forgiveness for myself) that usually involved writing things down, reading them out loud and then safely burning them in the fireplace as I released the energy back to the Universe to be transmuted into something better.
Self love is key
It also involved a lot of self love - recognising that the things I didn’t value in me were actually highly valued by other people. Understanding that I was doing the best I could with the information I had, lots of positive affirmations (which I still do daily) and always looking to a more positive future.
Working through all this made me look at the bigger picture as well. I wasn’t just looking at me as a person, I was looking at me in the wider world. Was I fulfilled in my job? Was I being of service? And what would it require of me to be able to do that?
It comes in waves
The other thing I noticed about the inner work is that it came in waves. This may be different for others, but for me in the beginning there were lots of beliefs and emotions to work through, all piled one on top of the other. I noticed a memory would suddenly arise or be triggered, which would raise uncomfortable emotions, and there would be a difficult time of working through these before I could lay that memory to rest and move on. To begin with these came thick and fast, with hardly a gap between but as time went on and I managed to work through each one, they became less frequent, with longer gaps between, and they were less difficult to manage.
In effect the intensity of the inner work decreased over time. Things still arose but they were more manageable. Perhaps that’s because I now accepted this as part of my journey or have accepted this part of me. There is inner still work to be done - I don’t think we have ever completed the inner work - but I now go into it understanding why it’s important which makes the process that much easier.
Valuing the light
I’ve come out as a more complete whole. I now understand more fully who I am and what makes me the person I am. I’ve reviewed and changed my beliefs, I give myself a voice and stand in my power. I feel more confident, more empowered, and there is a greater depth of self love than ever before. I also view the future with renewed positivity and joy. Having experienced my dark side I now truly value my light side.
If you are in the midst of your own inner work, know that you will get through it and that it is definitely worthwhile. You will be better for it and you will also be grateful for it.
Karen
