Freedom Is Now!

Current understanding...

I’m at this incredible stage where it feels like a new life is starting... In a way I have been feeling like I need to find myself again. I feel like I’m seeing a whole new part of myself and the only way I can experience this is to change the path I’ve been on just slightly, more like realigning myself and shifting myself into a new direction...

For the past 18 months I have been applying everything that I have learned internally externally as a way of bringing the spiritual/divine energies out into my physical world.

5 years ago my focus was on the opposite; back then my focus was purely on going within so that I could connect with my higher self. My higher self is what I consider my own truth, it is who I am in my purest state...it’s my potential and my inspiration. Before this, I hid from my own depth, I was afraid to face my own truth so I consumed myself purely in the superficial physical world in its extremes.

At the time my goal was to create a blank canvas so that I could find out who the person I was free from external influence. I guess you could say I went on a three year retreat. I learned how to meditate & and began to develop my own healing abilities but the most important aspect I discovered was the power of my own breath to help me reach higher levels of consciousness. I wanted to understand the mind body spirit connection.

When I first began learning about myself I detached from everyday life, I wanted to do things completely opposite of the way I had been doing things. It’s a completely different experience going purely within & I love that I had the opportunity in my life to do so. My focus was on the mystical sides of life- of opening up to the divine energies. I wasn’t focused at the time on applying the principles to my physical reality.

Our mind wants us to be healthy, our mind is pure, our mind is always in a state of fluidity, an energy that flows freely from the spiritual into the physical, it’s our conduit, and it will always guide us into the right direction. I believe true freedom comes when we understand ourselves and connect with our own truth, when we are living at our fullest energy & to do this we have to clear all the tensions that have built up in our bodies.

When we open up, issues begin to surface, suppressed emotions show themselves, the more tensions we release the better we begin to feel, this is a process that never ends, we are constantly opening up and adjusting ourselves accordingly, and the wonderful thing is we never face anything that we don’t want to face, when we are ready we will know and things transform themselves.

During this time I discovered that the only thing that was keeping me from experiencing higher levels of consciousness was my own lack of understanding of myself, my emotions, my memories and my own behaviour. I was extremely anxious all of the time, filled with fear, uncertainty, and had never experienced a moment of true relaxation.

The biggest hindrance I faced which was blocking me from connecting to my higher self were the negative experiences from my past & the emotions I suppressed related to them. When we suppress feelings they don’t go away, they instead place themselves in our physical bodies as tension. When our bodies are tense everything in our reality can feel stressful, complicated and difficult. I could easily talk about all my traumatic experiences as if I were reading a script but I had no connection to it, there were no feelings involved. I had put aside so much pain which I had never allowed myself to truly feel, instead I detached and pushed aside all the horrible feelings believing that if I put on a smiley face and think positive that it’ll just go away. It was my way of protecting myself against the pain. I didn’t have the awareness that instead all I was doing was building up more and more tensions in my body.

Now I have gained the awareness & understanding that when we have traumatic events happen to us in our lives, it is the shock that affects us, not the actual experience. When we experience shock our bodies tense up preventing us from feeling pain, it is that moment when we detach from our true feelings which can be great for coping in the short term but in the long term it may become our own hindrances in living up to our truest potential. I look at it this way, as we breathe we inhale and exhale and with tensions I view them as a trapped breath, a breath without an exhale. Now I see tensions as my own little alarm clock, it is my higher self trying to get me to take notice.

The journey I went on felt very painful at times because I chose to come face to face with many uncomfortable memories and the suppressed feelings attached to them, it felt like I was going through them for the first time and I’ll be honest it wasn’t easy, it was extremely hard but as soon as I was able to feel it fully, I was able to let it go.

Before I was too afraid to face my truths because they hurt but the thing is its ok, we all have a past, we all carry scars & our past experiences shape who we are, but the difference between me then and now is that I no longer define myself by my past, it no longer controls me, now I define myself by who I am in the here and now. Once we can face our pasts truthfully & openly we gain an understanding and with understanding everything negative fades away...

It wasn’t only my suppressed emotions that were creating tensions & hindering me from connecting to my higher self, it was also my own behaviour and thought processes which created other tensions in my body.

When I first truly began this journey of self-discovery and by that I mean when I made the choice to want to understand myself and to learn about my own true nature, it wasn’t only my past that was dark but also my present, I focused on all the negative things in this world, everything felt sort of hopeless, I definitely didn’t believe in myself and I consumed myself with negative thoughts based around my fears, worries & insecurities which only revolved in an endless circle, repeating themselves over and over without anywhere to go. By being this way I created such a negative environment for myself and created even more tensions in my body but since I didn’t understand what I was doing to myself, it only kept becoming worse and worse, negativity breeds more negativity & I was spiralling downhill into a dark abyss without any hope in sight.

But once I began to study & observe my thoughts and my own behaviour openly, freely & truthfully I gained an understanding of how they affected me and saw how I could change and how I didn’t need to be that way anymore, all I needed to do was change the way I saw myself and this wasn’t easy either but I was determined, I was aware that I created my own reality and if I was able to create such a dark reality then of course I could create the opposite, a reality where I was happy, confident and at peace. Once I reached this awareness I was able to let go of my negative thoughts and behaviours in order to clear the way for new positive ones although it did take a lot of time, persistence and patience but eventually I got there.

Another aspect that plays a huge role in my journey is my breath. I began paying attention to my own breath and I discovered that most of the time I was holding my breath, which is yet another way I was creating tension, I focused on making my breath deeper and deeper, it used to be incredibly shallow and as my breath became stronger I became incredibly tuned in to my own body. I used my breath to focus and relax every part of my body and as I progressed I began to be able to heal tensions and open myself up to whatever it was causing it, my own breath became a guide. Our breath is what gives us life and one of the most important things we can do is begin to pay attention to it, it is my breath that brings new energy into my being and I want my body to feel at its fullest energy at all times.

The more tensions I released my entire existence began to transform. The more I let go the more I felt I could tap into higher levels of consciousness. Each time I opened up I felt my connection to the divine energies become stronger and much clearer.

And through this connection I gained deeper awareness of myself and my surroundings, I began to see a whole new world, an existence based on love and all of the positive qualities of life instead of a world based on hate & anger. This connection creates a peaceful state of mind and when I’m in this state of mind I don’t need to question everything instead every thought becomes a fluid action, there is no doubt, everything feels certain yet at the same time understanding that everything in life is uncertain, everything becomes simple.

In the beginning the times when I felt this connection were few and far between, months could pass before I felt the same strong connection, I would go on an extreme high then an extreme low fearing each time that I would never feel that same connection but that is something that I eventually learned could never happen.

Once you begin the process of opening up and letting go it is absolutely natural to feel the way I did because it will always feel so intense at first but then it may feel like the intensity fades away, and then you may feel like you went backwards but you are not, you gained a glimpse of how your life can be & how you can feel and it is up to you to make the necessary changes within yourself in order to experience everything more fully so that you can truly live up to your own potential.

As I continued my journey I reached a point where I felt divided, I had my spiritual reality and then had my physical reality, I was trapped in a false sense of duality & I had to still learn how to merge the two together and see these two realities as one whole and this took a lot of time, and most importantly a lot of patience.

One of the things that happen when you embark on this type of journey is that your values in life change and mine changed drastically and everything I did had to be in accordance to these new set of values, if they weren’t I felt I was going against my own true nature and to do so in my opinion would be spiritual suicide.

After about three years I reached a point where I needed to change my direction, the environment I was in no longer useful. When I look back now I see that period as me focusing on the mental aspects of my being, the masculine element of myself and it became the time for me to open up more to the feminine aspect of my being, my heart. It is through our heart that we truly bring the spiritual into our physical reality. The wonderful thing was that throughout those years I was already opening up my heart, I saw the divine as absolute purity but what I didn’t understand at the time was that that same purity is what I now see as unconditional love, I just didn’t have the awareness of it but once I did gain that awareness everything and I mean everything transformed itself, the gaps I felt I had in my understanding began to be filled and a new simplicity of the way I viewed myself and the world was formed.

I felt it was time to have some new experiences and I just wanted to see the world as the new person I felt I had become, I needed a break, I just wanted to live a little, freely, openly and see what experiences would come my way, it had been a dream of mine for as long as I can remember to just see the world and to meet all the incredible people in it and it was time for me to turn that dream into a reality.

After 18 months of travelling which brought me to Jordan not once but twice, Palestine, South Africa, France and now Sweden I have gained the understanding of where I truly want to be in life and now I feel the need to stay put for a little bit so that I can allow some of my ideas to form and grow into what they are meant to be so that I can fulfil another dream that I have. It’s time for me to develop another aspect of myself that in some ways has been neglected.

Coming to Sweden has been so good for me...I definitely needed this time to de-clutter and be away from the internet... This trip has been about me making decisions and allowed me to see where I want to be and I feel the best when my life is revolved more around my inner world than it has been... I see now so clearly where I want to be and I see everything I need to do to create this new dream for myself... I feel like building something new for myself and the only way to do that is to create a new environment because to live the life I want to I have to create change and the only way I can create change is if I change my environment. It feels like I’m seeing things in a whole new way, with such clarity and certainty, I have found my way again...

Since I have a bit of time before moving in to a new place I’ve decided to come to Sweden to see my family...I haven’t been here since last year and thought it was time to return. I got here just a couple of days ago and It’s kind of like coming back home has given me the space where I see the truth, the truth in everything and not only seeing things through rose-tinted glasses. This trip is definitely some sort of cleansing.

Since I’ve been here I’ve been thinking about selfishness. Selfishness has been a huge one for me this year. I see it thriving all over the place in so many people’s hearts. The ego still rules.

I’ve come to think that the problem isn’t the selfishness in others that you may feel is there but the way you deal with it...if you get angry and believe that someone is selfish because they are not being the way you want them to be isn’t that in itself also being selfish since you are imposing what you believe is right onto someone else? Selfishness breeds selfishness just like anger & hate creates more anger & hate it is also in exactly the same way that love creates more love...

Instead of reacting to it negatively why not try to understand it instead. Every individual has their own reasons for their own behaviour; we should never take it personally. Behind the mask of selfishness lies fear, insecurity & and/or false pride. We are all individuals having our own experiences of a certain moment and wherever we are in our journey, & whatever lessons we are all learning will be unique to us and we should allow each other to be able to follow our own unique paths. We may share similar paths with others but no two paths will ever be identical.

As a human race, I think we at times can be really hard on each other, expecting each other to live up to a certain standard that we have created. I know I have fallen victim to that, I used to have such high expectations of people and would get really upset when they didn’t live up to them but thankfully I became aware of the fact that being that way is not a way I want to be, it’s selfish & it’s the same thing as pushing your own beliefs onto someone else, and I do believe in treating others in the same way I would like to be treated.

Thinking about selfishness it makes me ask the question is it even possible to live in this world being completely selfless? Because there comes a point where you also have to take care of yourself because no one else is going to do so for you and you may have to do something that in some ways is selfish because maybe that action to some people will feel like you are not thinking about them and instead thinking about yourself. I guess the reason why I say that is because that’s something that I can find difficult to know what is the right thing to do and what is the wrong thing to do. In my past I was extremely selfish but completely unaware of it and I think because I see how ugly that was and how it made others feel I try my best to not create that environment but at the same time I have to always be true to myself and it feels like it conflicts sometimes with everyone else’s expectations of me.

I think tolerance is probably the most important aspect of being able to live peacefully in our lives.

To me tolerance is just an outcome of a true understanding of who we are. I see myself as no different than anyone else, I have the same struggles, the same emotions and the same faults as anyone else. I’m not perfect & sometimes I realise that maybe some of my actions may have been selfish but that’s OK, I’m working on it and I’m willing to see that in myself so that I can change it.

We live in a world where people are constantly judging each other. In some places people are still judged by the colour of their skin, their sex, or religion but what I see even more happening is people judging each other’s behaviour...So many people are so quick to judge others when they do things differently than themselves and really this is just another element of selfishness or of believing that your way needs to also be everybody else’s, this is just another part of false-pride, your own feeling of superiority...people seem to become so defensive when they are faced with the opportunity to understand and maybe that’s because you have to be open to the unknown, to the possibility that you may see things differently.

Why is that so scary? It is the only way that anyone will ever be able to change their perception, if you are afraid of letting things in then I think that maybe you are doubting yourself and then it is as good a time as any to get past it by being open to new thoughts & ideas.

Why can’t we just allow each other to be without pulling our own needs and wants onto each other? We need to be more tolerant. Everything would be so much easier...we would stop creating pressures and everything in our lives would change! We would be free to be who we truly are peacefully and with our minds and hearts wide open so that we can explore the endless possibilities that lie before us without restriction.

Words cannot describe the feeling I have within me; everything about my entire existence feels brand new...I’m undergoing a complete renewal on all levels of my life. It really is so important to always be aware when things in our lives are no longer useful so that we can clear the path for new things...this is exactly what I’m going through now.

As you might be aware I have been in the process of moving for what seems to have been a very long time, if it wasn’t packing my own place I was helping others move...I even considered to become a professional mover but in the end I decided against it, HA! Now it is finally coming to an end...no longer in the old flat and already new people have moved in & all of my things in storage. But it’s not quite over...still in search of a new home...officially I’m homeless and it’s the most incredible feeling in the world...its freedom. Everything from this moment on will be new, all the stagnant energies of the old place gone...I love moving...I’m excited to be in a new area with new places and people to discover.

The world I’m seeing right now is the most beautiful ... I love being in London and that is something I never thought I would say but right now all I see is possibility. I think love always makes everything feel better...right now I have someone really amazing in my life. Sometimes it takes a while to see what is truly right in front of you. People do change and I do believe that when we let go of our attachments everything that is meant to come our way will & our lives become fluid, when we no longer push and pull ourselves or others and instead we allow everyone to be their natural selves so that everything we do feels organic and absolutely natural and truthful.

I know I write about love a lot but if I can be honest I have to say it’s always been more challenging for me to be able to truly accept love, I love to love those who it is hard to love, the ones that I feel need it most, but these people are unable to give back that love to me which had never been anything I expected but I think by being that way for so long I wasn’t able to truly believe it was real when it was directed to me and that is what I feel has changed with me now, now I’m able to also accept it on the deepest inner most level and it feels incredible.

I think also a part of me was afraid to accept love because I feared that it would make me lose myself and by that I mean afraid that I wouldn’t be able to truly be me but this time I don’t feel that way at all. Nothing has changed, I am still who I am and I have my own life but he enhances it and makes me want to be a better person.

Whatever it is that we have, above anything else we are true friends and he’s been my best friend for the last few years. Our connection is based on absolute freedom, honesty, trust & unconditional love. To me it is a relationship that feels effortless, we don’t impose expectations onto each other, we don’t own one another, and we are both aware that tomorrow everything could change but we love each other in the moment because it feels right and not because of a fear we may lose each other. I feel so blessed. I have never been with someone who truly doesn’t judge me.

The most important thing for me right now is accepting love, you don’t have to be afraid or question it so much just accept it with open arms, heart & mind believing that you truly do deserve it. I believe that during our lives we are presented with this opportunity over and over again but that sometimes the timing isn’t right, it all just depends, I think it’s all just a matter of being ready for it or not.

“Love has the ability to turn the tamest spirit wild and the wildest spirit tame...”

As human beings we are blessed just by being born into this world, we are pure potential. We really do have the power to create the life that we want to live. We have to take our lives into our own hands and not rely on others to create for us the life we dream about. I believe the most important aspect of creating the life we want is to first find peace within ourselves. Martin Luther King, Jr. said it perfectly when he said, “Peace is not merely a distant goal that we seek but a means by which we arrive at that goal.”

What I have learned about myself is that if I don’t feel at peace in all areas of my life it becomes very hard for me to know what the next step I should take and pretty much impossible for me to create the life I want. The most important thing for me is to feel peaceful at all times and this is my highest priority because if I don’t have peace of mind & feel peace in my heart every action that I do in this life feels distorted. If I’m not feeling peaceful, the path in front of me that I usually can see so clearly becomes lost in some sort of fog.

A peaceful heart is one that is free from worry and trouble & a peaceful mind is a mind free from heavy thoughts and thoughts that revolve in an endless circle repeating themselves over and over without any further development. When we are facing obstacles, going through hard times it is even more important to have a peaceful mind, I always want to be comfortable in the most uncomfortable situation. Everything that happens externally does not need to affect us negatively internally. When I allow the things outside of myself to take complete control of me, I become reactive and the actions I take may not be the ones I would normally take. I want to act on things but not react to things. I want to be certain and sure of every action I take, I don’t want to find myself in a position where I question myself. I want all my decisions to be coming from a pure place & not from a chaotic place.

I trust my own intuition; it is always my heart that leads the way. Peacefulness come from within, it is an inner calm, a specific state of mind. When I have moments where things feel a little off-kilter where there’s some area of my life that doesn’t feel at peace I take a moment & turn off all of the noises that I can around me and allow myself to unite with the silence. The quieter I become & more still I become the more I can hear my own inner wisdom & find the answers that are needed in order to clear the fog that has distorted the view of my path ahead.

I love the silence & the stillness because it’s here where everything begins to fall back into place. It is here where I restore my own inner peace. In my past I was never able to feel true peace, sure I felt peaceful when things were going good but unable to feel it when I was dealing with obstacles and challenges but now I am able to, and it’s amazing because with all that is going on around me at the moment I’m able to keep a peaceful mind, It takes a little bit of effort on my part ok well maybe that’s an understatement it takes a lot of effort and patience but it’s something I have to do, to me I see it as no different than eating, I have to eat because otherwise I’ll starve same goes with my mind & heart, if I don’t give myself the time to bring myself to a peaceful state I also feel sick just in a slightly different way.

I have come across many people who will do anything to stay away from silent moments & instead try to do anything in their power not to have to experience any silence at all. Allowing yourself to become still & silent can at first be uncomfortable because first we have to come face to face with all of our thoughts that causes us tension and sometimes it may seem easier or at least more fun to do something else with our time, anything else with our time even if it’s something that’s not really good for us, we all like to escape from things that make us uneasy but by doing this nothing will ever change for us, we will never be able to feel at peace and everything we do in life becomes more of a struggle. Whatever it is that is making us uneasy will not just go away by ignoring it, these things stay in our shadows until we face them.

There is never anything to fear about ourselves, so what if we feel a little uncomfortable with the way some thoughts we have make us feel, this passes just as quickly as it came. It is precisely those moments when you are feeling uncomfortable that your heart & mind is opening up preparing you to enter a peaceful state. You just need to be patient and allow your mind the chance to settle down. During this process what you are really doing is just clearing out the old, replacing any negative thoughts, worries and fears with a new way of seeing things.

Our inner guidance, our intuition or if you like our higher-self will guide the way for us. If you find it hard to let go of certain painful memories or thoughts, what I do is just take my focus onto my breath. My own breath is one of the greatest tools I have in my possession. As I breathe in, I focus on a point between my fore-head and as I breathe out I breathe out with the intention of letting go of anything that makes me feel uncomfortable allowing my breath to become deeper and slower each time. Eventually I bring myself to a state of utter calmness and it is here where I allow my inner guidance or my higher self to lead the way. Everything becomes easier when we feel relaxed, and once we are in this state true change begins to take place & we are able to truly create a better reality for ourselves.

All I know is what works for me and this is how I go about my life; it’s the only way I know how and the only way that I’m able to deal with the things in this world and I’m sure for others it’s not the way for them and that’s alright too, we all just have to find our own way of dealing with all the injustice, pain & suffering that exists in this world and I just feel so lucky to have found a way to do so....

In the last couple of weeks so many amazing things have been happening, it seems that Palestine has been on everyones mind. Even just going on my little walks around my neighborhood i end up in conversations about Palestine, this to me is such a great sign that things are changing and people are starting to care even more. It doesn't stop there either, I'm even getting emails from old friends & even family who I never thought in a million years would even have an opinion on the issue saying how they are so happy to know that there are people out there like me who do care and who is on the right side of the issue. People who before didn't have any thoughts about palestine are now beginning to actually want to get involved in supporting the cause and wanting to learn more, and to me that is incredible and definately a sign of hope.

Over the past year many people have asked me why palestine? and i do find this such a strange question and my first response is always why not? There are injustices taking place and as a human being it is my responsibility to speak out when i see things that aren't right. Then some people say well what about Darfur, what about Burma? I mean really what kind of question is this? Of course my heart goes out to all the people in this world who experience suffering and I would love to see a world where there is no suffering of any kind but Palestine is where my journey has taken me, it's not something that I even knowingly chose, it just sort of happened.

All of my experiences led me to Palestine and it has become a place that has warmed my heart in such an incredible way. The incredible people there have taught me so much about love, passion, perseverance & tolerance and i genuinely feel that through them I have become a better person. It's been about 7 months since i've been away from Palestine and in these months I feel I have changed so much. Reflecting on my time in the west bank, I feel like a completely different person. Being there and being surrounded by some of the most amazing people i have ever met in my entire life, really ignited an inner flame that had been lying dormant for some time. So i guess my answer to the question why palestine is that I could never turn my back or turn a deaf ear to those i consider my friends or family, and having spent time in Palestine i have found people i consider a part of my greater family and formed friendships that mean the world to me. The issue of palestine has become a very personal issue to me.

When I hear about someone's house being bulldozed, I worry that it may be a friends of mine's house. When I hear about someone being evicted I worry that it will be a friend who becomes homeless. When i hear about someone being shot & injured in the peaceful demonstrations i worry that it is a friend of mine. When i hear about someone's olive grove being destroyed I worry that it may be my friends livelihood destroyed. When I hear about someone being arrested for no particular reason I worry that it is someone close to me. So to those of you who wonder why Palestine, well this is why. There is no complicated answer, It is simply because I have such a love for everyone there.