Taking Back Our Listening, Our Voice, Our Light

Practice #10: How to Reclaim Your Life and Strengthen Your Marriage.

Taking back your life… by now I hope you have a sense of why reclaiming your life, discovering your true nature and participating in the re-wilding process is so important. Not only for yourself, but for the life of your marriage.

Here are words written in the 12 century by Hildegard of Bingen:

We cannot live in a world that is not our own, in a world that is interpreted for us by others. An interpreted world is not a home. Part of the terror is to take back our own listening, to use our own voice, to see our own light.

This beautifully describes the re-wilding process. Let’s look at each sentence, because therein lies a map for anyone who is looking to reclaim their life.

“We cannot live in a world that is not our own…”

How true! For living in a world that is not our own, is not living. And when we do this, we enter that psychic starvation process I have talked about. We stop living; stop being awake to our soul; stop feeling connection; stop creating intimacy; stop experiencing happiness. We begin to feel disconnection, resentment, grief, and loneliness.

“An interpreted world is not home”...

Therefore, until we stop living in an interpreted world we will never feel at peace. Within ourselves, with others, in the world.  Until we stop allowing others to decide for us, who we should be, we will never feel at home.

An interpreted world leads to unease and resentment. And when unease and resentment take up residence, we are deprived of the joy of being at home within ourselves.

When you reclaim and take back your life, you decide for yourself who you are, what feeds you, and how your soul sings. You create a home…

in which you feel deep belonging and connection to all that  truly matters.

A home that connects you to your natural radiance and allows you to be fully grounded in your truth.

A home that nourishes and feeds your soul-energy and encourages you to live in full expression of your authentic self.

A home that protects you from the negative energy, criticisms and judgments of those who approach the world from an unhealthy, disconnected self.

“Part of the terror is to take back our own listening, to use our own voice, to see our own light...”

Terror? Yes, it is terrifying to take back what we have given up or given away.

It is terrifying to speak our truth, especially when others do not like it or feel uncomfortable because of it.

It is terrifying to step into our own unique, beautiful light and allow it to shine completely.

It is terrifying to give up the false sense of safety we create for ourselves by striving to please, pacify, and accommodate to others.

It is terrifying to take the risk of defining ourselves.

However, in order to reclaim our life, we must do this, no matter how terrifying it feels.

Reclaiming one’s life is a life well-lived. One that:

Listens deeply and pays attention to the whispers of one’s soul.

Speaks these whispers to the world in a strong, steady voice.

Celebrates the light from within by giving it permission to shine fully.

How Taking Back our Life Strengthens our Marriage

For those of us who are married or in an intimate relationship, until we take back our life, until we take the ultimate step toward loving ourselves by reclaiming what we have lost or given up, we cannot create intimacy with another.

Once we create and nurture a soul-home in which our own true nature can thrive, once we listen to, express, and shine our own true nature into the world, we are more able to give a healthy, strong, clear self to love another.

In taking back our life and learning how to love ourselves, we create something akin to a prism of light. The prism is love. And it consists of many facets such as: honor, empathy, curiosity, kindness, respect, giving, forgiving, tenderness, compassion, passion, erotic energy, understanding, clarity, presence.

And all of these facets of love shine on their own and also work together to open us, soften us, enrich us and strengthen us so that we are no longer afraid; so that we no longer abandon ourselves.

When we allow all the separate facets of love to both shine on their own and also come together and influence how we live and how we love, then we strengthen our capacity to nurture intimacy with another for the long-haul.

It is my hope that this series has encouraged, inspired, and supported you in this tender and essential journey of reclaiming your life and strengthening your marriage.

It is also my hope that you do not waste another minute of (in the words of Mary Oliver) living,  “your one wild and precious life…”

Come home to yourself.

Reclaim your life.

Listen to the whispers of your true nature.

Express the whispers in a strong and steady voice.

And let your “one wild and precious life” shine for all to see.

Peace in the journey,
Jane

Practice #9 in Series

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Jane Ryan

Jane Ryan, M.A., LMFT, is a Licensed Couples and Family Therapist with twenty years of clinical experience. She specializes in intimate relationships, sexual challenges, sacred sexuality, and helping clients embrace their true erotic nature. She supports women in discovering their most radiant, vibrant and powerful feminine essence.

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