So much of this path involves coming to trust again in the wisdom of our direct experience, as we reorganize outdated relationships with the members of our inner families: the shamed one, the raging one, the terrified one, the lonely one, and the one who is unworthy of being seen.
Slowly, in each moment, we can make this journey. Knowing that it may not always “feel” safe, we can push ourselves a little – making use of even a bit of anxiety as a wrathful sort of heart-guide – but not so much that we become overwhelmed and re-traumatized. We can learn to rest in the holy middle.
While clear awareness of these narratives, perceptions, emotions, and sensations is important, in the end perhaps it is not clarity and insight that heal. Rather, it is the unfolding of the embodied heart. It is not just a detached, pulled back, safe witnessing that will open the door into the sacred world, but warmth, compassion, and a relentless sort of kindness toward our surging experience.
In the radical commitment to no longer abandon yourself – to not pathologize your vulnerability nor hold it as evidence that something is wrong with you – a new pathway appears. Out of the crystalline purity of awareness the qualities of that awareness flow: slowness, curiosity, attunement, tenderness, and warmth.
Surround your inner world with these qualities and over time the new circuitry of love will be encoded.
— Matt Licata