A Fire Burns Within...

“Isn’t it time to turn your heart into a temple of fire?”

Rumi

There is a deep wound in me that needs to be addressed, and the pain of that wound that at times is so intense that I feel my heart is being torn out of my chest. And so I have been to the edge of the Abyss of “the wound” – really looking into it, allowing it to reveal itself. And – at the same time – the fires of creativity are being stoked. Interesting. At times there is such an excitement for Life that my heart can hardly contain itself. An Aliveness awakens and burns within, that wants to be *lived*. And then I feel the tear of separation again, and the aliveness gets snuffed out by the pain of “the wound” – which translates into sadness, melancholy and depression. I know the two are connected, related somehow – this deep “wound” of life, and the fire of Life within.

The pain of “the wound” has been with me since childhood, in many different forms. Although I’ve done a good job of numbing it, it is familiar. It is the pain of humanity - the original wound of separation. Humanity is living out the drama and pain of this original wound – the perceived separation from our Divine Nature - in many different ways. We have fragmented into illusions, into stories of who we really are, rather than retaining the Truth of who we are – our Natural State of Beingness. We have fractured into a life of accumulated suffering, pain and struggle. This “wound” of mankind represents the *belief* in, identification with and attachment to this sense of separateness as our identity that burns a hole in our hearts and psyches, and creates a fire of longing for “Home” – the Natural state of Being “Home.” The feeling of separation is a deep tear in the consciousness of man – creating a shadow of the Real that in its extreme leads to desperation and violence.

This “wound” of separation is a sense of separateness from our Wholeness and Holiness within – from the congruency with the deepest sense of Being. It is a sense of longing for that Source within; some call it God, or Truth, or True Nature. However we know it, it’s all the same longing. I have suppressed the pain and grief of that “wound”, and that longing for a lifetime; trying to quell it with religion, with many different forms of “spirituality” – with the “search for Truth” – with the search for “Enlightenment,” the Holy Grail of those on a “spiritual path” – looking for *something* to fill the hole of “the wound.” And there have been many moments of “awakening” to the Truth. But nothing has filled “the wound.” And the grief of that will not be assuaged.

The pain and grief that I have been experiencing are now recognized as the pain of this perceived separation, and the sense of incongruency within, that must be acknowledged and allowed to be released from the heart where it has been held captive. Because in its acknowledgement is “the Door” to the Fire of the Heart – the Fire of Life that burns within - which must also be expressed: the pain of the wound and the Fire of Life in the Heart – the inner dynamic interflow of Being. And so I cry and I create, which connects me with that Natural State of the Core of Being, until I no longer feel defined or confined by “the wound,” by the pain of perceived separation, and the grief for something unknown.

Allowing "the wound" to be seen and heard leads to a different movement *through* life, where it is no longer felt as a “wounding”, but an opening into the Heart of Being. This is the secret of “the wound.” To allow it to open us deeply to the Truth of who we are, knowing the wholeness of who we really are – the Fire in the temple of the Heart that is beneath, behind, and even *in* the pain.

Vortex Art™
Woman Dancing in the Fire…

~*~

“All our longing is but an eternal echo
of Divine Longing.
Embraced within that Divine Longing
we can dare to let our longing lead us…”

”When your true heart speaks,
the echo will return to assure you
that every moment of your presence
happens in the shelter
of the invisible circle…”

Quotes from John O’Donohoe
from Eternal Echoes