If you haven’t already, centering yourself is the best place to start. You can use this free Centering in the Light Meditation to do just that.
Now, we begin our journey on the path to Grace Based Reality. Keep in mind that awareness goes a long way to opening the doors into shifting the experience of shame/blame to a Grace-Based Reality.
Here are the 7 Steps to Shifting to a Grace-Based Reality:
Step 1: Observing – By observing the body, our thoughts and our feelings, we can break the cycle of shame. Staying with ourselves during the experience, asking yourself, “what is my body doing right now? What are my thoughts? Fears? Feelings? All of these questions bring forward the conscious mind in the midst of an overwhelming emotional experience.
Step 2: Acceptance – So, if your stomach is in a knot – accept it – if you thoughts are telling you this is crazy, I don’t want to do this, she’s out of her mind, we are in danger, keep breathing and accept the feelings. It works really well to say the acceptance out loud: I accept…and take a breath between each statement.
You know the brain – which is where this shame-based response is hard-wired – can’t tell the difference between being in a shameful experience and remembering a shameful experience. To the brain its all happening now. The good news, however, in walking through the shameful experience in this setting – consciously, awake, intentionally – is that you can slow it down, and begin to rewire the reaction with new tools.
That’s how we learn to shift, by interrupting the shame-based response with a new choice. With this new choice, new neuron pathways are created and soon your gut will not clinch every time you think of the experience. After some practice you clear shame from your reactive nature.
Taking the journey to reclaim yourself from the grip of shame can be scary. It is also fascinating and beautiful. Give yourself permission to make a different choice in your life and rewire those neuron pathways. Opening up to the power of grace is your birthright. It has always been and will always be. You know that wonderful quote from Goethe – “That the moment that one definitely commits one self, then Providence or grace moves too. All sorts of things occur to help one that would never otherwise have occurred….Whatever you can do or dream you can, begin it. Boldness has genius, power and magic in it.
Step 3: Compassionately Listening to Ourselves is the next step in your shift. Do you have a friend that you can call anytime and pour your heart out to and they will listen and love you through it all? What if a part of you always had your back, had the time and the commitment to hold you in compassion and love you how ever you felt or whatever you were going through?
Do you know you have ability to do this for yourself? Where does that ability come from?
Grace-based reality has it’s foundation in the Divine or Spiritual Nature of who you are. Your Divine Nature, unlike your reactive human nature unconditionally loves you – which means it does not shame, blame or judge you. It can’t it is not its nature. Our divine nature lives in wholeness – when we are whole we are not separated which is what happens when we judge. When we are whole we know our worth, our value and our completeness. We see it all and we accept it all.
Imagine for a moment that you could draw a linear line from your age right now back to the beginning of your life…and on that line you were to document all the major events- good/bad/messy/joyful/ugly/beautiful. Now, imagine a large circle around your entire life experience – around that entire line – the wholeness of your life is completely accepted and loved by your Divinity.
I call this part the Compassionate Listener. It listens to you without judgment – it holds compassion for you when you are having a hard time loving yourself or something you did or did not do – and it always supports you in your choices and does not inflict it’s will on you. This is an experience of Grace.
Step 4: Forgiveness – Now comes the hard part. It’s time to listen compassionately and not judge, but forgive and accept whatever is going on, just as your Divine Nature does.
Step 5: Open Up – In this step, your job is to create the space; sometimes called do the work; or make room; or choose or open up to allow the shift to take place. It all begins with a choice – the universe works this way and you are wired for this wholeness. Your brain tells you; you’re hard wired for shame– but you are more than your brain, your thoughts, your feelings and what has happened to you up until now. You are a part of it’s Divine Nature and it’s wholeness.
Step 6: Receiving – Receive what co creating a grace based reality gives you; the spiritual tools to fashion a fresh, alive, vibrant and expansive place inside you. This can replace what now is inhabited by shame and blame.
Step 7: Giving – Your journey to a Grace-Based reality isn’t over just because you’ve gained the tools, created the space, and released the shame and blame. Now it’s time for you to share what you’ve learned and how it’s impacted your life. Teach others about your new reality and share how they can create the same.
Remember, Grace is the active expression or experience of Unconditional Loving of Spirit
Welcome home to your Grace Based Reality.