Spiritual Teachers

The spiritual path is SACRED.  It is so sacred that sometimes people can get confused and lost in the sacredness.  I have experienced spiritual trauma in the form of the Roman Catholic religion but also by spiritual teachers in the metaphysical or New Age realm.  Let me explain what I mean.

Recently I discovered that I turned off my gift of Empathy.  I always had known that I had this gift of Empathy but it wasn’t really “working”.   I did it for the love of a teacher that made me promise to follow their teachings which was predominantly psychic.  Now, in the spirit of taking responsibility for my part, I had a fear of letting go of the love and the relationship because I didn’t want to move forward in my spiritual growth.  But also, there was a jealously in the teacher of my emotional empathy gift.  A gift that gave me an advantage of being able to read what they were feeling and their intentions.  This gift was seen as a more powerful gift and that is where the power struggle began.  This led to a mistrust of all spiritual “teachers”, “leaders”, “gurus”, “ministers”, and so on.  I was asked to promise not to use this gift and I complied/agreed.  My mistake….big mistake.

Now I have come up against this many many times and it is predominate in the spiritual or metaphysical world, even religious world.  Remember we are human and we have feelings and experiences.  But that doesn’t mean that we need to act on them.  What we need is to notice and observe them, heal them and be aware of them.

The position that I ended up taking was that of a victim of someone else’s teachings.  But remember, we have choice. Although this was not a recent occurrence, I decided to heal from it and learn how I betrayed myself in the name of love.  But was it really love?  Yes, there was love but there was also fear.   Fear my teacher had about my gift in really knowing their intention’s and feelings maybe even shame.  Fear from myself about moving forward or letting go of relationship.  Fear of not being loved anymore by my teacher.  Fear of abandonment.  The list can go on….

But love…true love…such as love from the Divine, it would never ask you to give up a part of yourself for anyone, including the Divine.  The Divine expects you to be as you are, because you are made from the Divine.  That means, it’s your choice whether you use, keep, or turn off your gifts.  It’s all part of your experience and learning.

So the refinement for me is that I would call myself a student of life but mostly a guide to others.  Because when you are a teacher, you are putting yourself above someone else and we aren’t above someone else, we are equally, equal. 

I had this one mentor or healer that I worked with and she was/is an incredibly grounded individual.  She has been on her spiritual journey twice as long as I had been.  She was a mental health professional with a strong grounded spiritual practice.  She wasn’t as powerful in her spiritual “gifts” (as she explained to me) but her gifts of her mental health and grounded spiritual being, was the strongest gift that I had experienced and she was able to guide me with a lightness of touch and a skill that was her GIFT.  As her and I discussed this, we realized that although she and I didn’t have the same gifts, we were both equally gifted in our own way and that they complimented one another in a way that was respectful and not in an over powering way.  It was a true measure and meaning of love.  We saw the best in one another and we accepted and loved the other parts of each other.  We didn’t have to compromise ourselves in our relationship in order to satisfy a feeling of being less than one another.  We respected each other’s experiences and strengths and weaknesses in a way that was truly loving.  We were able to make mistakes, forgive and move past them because we truly loved each other and because we were empathic, we were able to see that our intention was always loving.

It was and still continues to be a cherished relationship that it does not matter how much time passes, this person will always be loved by me and I know she would say the same.

So what I would say to you is that you will experience spiritual people in your travels and not all of them will be balanced in their views about spiritual gifts, but that is their learning.  And if you are working with them, then you are meant to learn something yourself - perhaps spiritual resilience.  But remember this, not everyone you work with will try and compromise you.  And if they do, this is where you have the opportunity to grow in spiritual strength.   You can pick up your no, and move on to someone that would never ask that of you - whether there is love there or not.  But it will be up to you to be discerning all along the way.  Move out of your victim state and make a promise to yourself that you will never ever compromise your gifts for anyone, no matter who they are.  If they love you fully, they would never ask you to turn off or away from your gifts.  If they ask you to make a promise that compromises you, this is the “teacher” that hasn’t looked at their wounding around their jealously and emotions or their definitions of gifts.  They have put themselves above you, in order to protect their emotions.  As an Empath, you need vulnerability but that is earned in a relationship where someone has done their work and they are able to be vulnerable with you also.  That is the safety and soft place to land when you need help.  Always always always choose to love yourself first and respect your gifts, when you do that you will be clearer about who is helping you along the spiritual journey.

So watch and consider the labels that you use because, putting yourself above or below someone else, is a recipe for disaster.  It doesn’t serve anyone and it is the ego speaking, not the heart.  Feel into the the labels that feel best for you. That is a true Empath and that is where you learn to trust yourself and keep yourself safe.  Empathy is a very very powerful gift and don’t ever compromise it for anyone or any sentient being. The gift of feeling is what the underlaying of how this world revolves and in order to heal the world, we need to be able to feel our way through it, emotions, intention, all of it.  With great gifts comes great responsibility.  Use it wisely and with the Divine.  You will always be guided truly when you do.

I pray for the healing of your gift of Empathy and may you use your gifts for the light and if you need some guidance along the way, I would be honoured to be of service.

With love,

Jackie