I feel it’s panging. I’m happier than I have ever been and yet, I still feel it’s panging, maybe it will never go away. The loneliness. Maybe that’s part of the price we pay for the evolution of universal consciousness. The necessity of the illusion of separation, the illusion of the ego and the consequence of such an ensnaring hallucination. We’re allowed glimpses of union with the Divine but we’re never allowed to stay there. It’s a challenge, the balance… walking the fine line of living.
​

In moments of loneliness it’s important to feel it, to feel it and let it pass. To feel it, but never stay there. Everything is impermanent. I struggle there. To not hold on, to let it pass, to release it – this is a skill, one I have yet to master. Maybe without this illusory separation we wouldn’t search, and thus we wouldn’t evolve. Writing helps me to question, to clarify my ever expanding inquisition into the nature of reality, and the life I find myself in. It helps me in making sense of the life that is moving in perpetual motion, all around me.

If we were in constant union with the Divine, why would we go anywhere else? Would we not just stay, for all of infinite eternity? Would we not just resort to complacency? It is this unfillable loneliness that keeps us searching and I think it is the process of acknowledging its unending presence that may show we are on the path towards true surrender and acceptance. Isn’t it avoiding this loneliness and trying to fill it, that gets us so lost in the first place? Isn’t it this running?
​

I understand the pain that precedes acceptance, I have lived in the fear, just before the relief of ultimate surrender. I have a new appreciation for writers and artists who say they create their masterpieces because they have to. It’s the only way I find comfort in the soothing of my pain and loneliness – the only comfort I find that hasn’t allowed me, or ever tempted me, to join the madness of the loss of self. Writing is me, speaking to myself, reminding me that I will never be alone, yet as this world so dichotomously exists and mysteriously works, I will always be alone in my experience. Therein lies the contradicting beauty of life.

This. This speaks to me, because it is in the hurt, in the midst of this pain that I write the truth of the sorrows and wonders of existence and the ethereal beauty of life. It is in the soothing of that loneliness that the Divine speaks to me. It is in the the freedom of expression, the flow of thought, and the release of the pressure that often builds in my brain. It is in this condition of creative flow, the extravagant nature of the words that somehow fill the page, without my being able to claim ownership over them.  It is there, that I find myself, that I find my voice for painful authenticity.
​

I write because it has always been there for me. It has always given me so much, and asked for so little in return. It has given me the gift of life, the gift of myself, and it has given me the gift of bringing this awareness back to me. It never asked for my dedication or commitment when I wasn’t ready to give it. It brought me comfort when I was sure there was none to be had and it brought me the gift of company, when I felt lost and lonely. It offered solace, a place to rest my tired eyes and weary head, when all I had to offer were my own words in friendship. It challenged me, but only as much as I was ready to be challenged. It never pushed me away and understood when I needed a break from the weight of its verity. You see, writing only ever asked for one commitment from me – it asked for truth, and truth, I wasn’t always ready to give. Writing was good to me, always understanding, patiently waiting for my return, no matter how far I wandered.

I used to fill my notebooks with my pain, tear out the pages so nobody would ever accidentally find them and see the truth of my life, the truth I tried so desperately to hide. I would burn them, erase the memories from my existence, hoping one day I could forget. I planned to rewrite these old stories and start my life anew. I would write when the pain became too much, when it seemed there was nothing left to do but write. I wrote because I had to, because my other options left me drowning without the hope for one last breath. I wrote for survival, I wrote for freedom, and I continue to write for these reasons, blessed by the collaborative commitment to sincerity.


I write because the pages never judge me, not for loving those who hurt me, not for spilling all my shame, not for sharing all my secrets, not for almost breaking – I write because it never tried to save me. I write because it’s never tried to make me choose between my love and my freedom, it never threatened my independence and the will of my free spirit. I write because it never punishes me for my mistakes or belittles me for my lofty ideas and less than perfect grammar. I write because it meets me in my sorrow, reminds me of my power, and leads me to my strength. Writing is my gift to myself. It is in sharing our gifts with the world that true healing can occur, and so I write because I don’t know what else to do, and I desperately crave my own healing. I write to remember who I was and who I am, and to understand the gap between the two.
​

I write because it soothes, it breaks me open in all the right places and allows me moments to touch my pain. I write because it reminds me to never get lost in the notion that I will ever be free from my wounds, and it is in this realization that I am truly released from the shackles of my own mind. In never trying to save me, writing always gives new breath to old life, and renews my spirit. Acceptance comes to sit with me and avoidance leaves my bedside. I write because while it may be critiqued by others, as long as I follow specific parameters, nobody could never tell me what to write.

I write because it bridges my worlds, the ethereal and spiritual become physical, when I put pen to paper. I write because as I touch the pages I touch my soul; with each motion of the pen my chains are broken. I write for my sanity, because existing in this world is tough enough and living in it is bound to make you go insane. I write to remind myself that I will never be like them, that I will never be known or understood and I write to remember that’s perfectly okay. I write to understand myself, and I write to remember that mindful self-acceptance is a practice of self-love and care, and that is enough for me.


I write because it relieves the darkness in me and allows me to not be overcome with sadness. It relieves the pain that will never leave me, for I am a healer and the best healers remain wounded. I write because it has never dismissed me for speaking the truth, even when it wasn’t exactly what it wanted to hear in that moment – writing has always been faithful and has honored our lifelong agreement, a commitment to truth.
​

Writing gave to me, and so, I write because I have to… because giving back to the only thing that has continually given me a remembrance of my reverence for life, deserves all of me. Writing consumes me and never spits me out. Writing hears, feels, sits, and gently takes my hand, whispering to me: “remember who you are…remember. No one passes the gateless gate, so be no one, or say ‘fuck it’ and be anybody you want to be.” I write for me.

I write to make sense of the world, to make sense of my thoughts, to make sense of me, and to make sense of my place in the mess of it all. I write because it transcends thinking, the words flow through my finger tips as if they are finally coming home, familiar, belonging. I write to love myself, to go within and love all of me, because grasping out there taught me lots of valuable lessons, but never did me any favors.
​

I write because I am all I will always have, and because in writing I realize the beauty in that statement – the beauty and truth that transcends the sadness at the thought of such a lonely path. It is in writing that I feel the palpable truth of life, that I feel whole, that I feel complete. I can never give that up, it is all I have ever longed for. It is writing that always takes me home, back to me, back to my freedom. I truly write, for me.

Thank you for reading, the original article can be found on my favorite publication, here: 
https://www.elephantjournal.com/2018/12/why-do-i-write-literature-a-love-letter/ 

Sending You SO Much LOVE,

Lauren Ashley 

To make my life narrative a very dramatic and long story short: I had to experience a lot of people showing me that they weren't properly prepared to love me well, for me to awaken and accept that my path would always be a different one. It took repeated cycles, pain, my choice to suffer, and innumerable lessons. It took clear instances of my being shown through experience how those broken on the wheels of life often resort to hurting another. It took my being told, by those lost and separated from their own divinity by the veil of illusion, that I wasn't worthy of love. It took that. All of it, for me to find my place amongst my hearts longings, and in it's midst, to remain grateful.

I of course believed the story of my lack of lovability, I agreed with it. Within myself I found it to be true. So through my life's experience at that time, I kept finding those who would prove it to be true. Those who would agree with the horrors in my mind, those who would believe the lies I had been fed. I attracted those who would confirm the story I had already been telling myself, and in this confirmation I felt familiarity and comfort. The self-fulfilling prophecy was well and alive in my life, feeding me shadows and illusion and leaving me feeling broken, desperate, and hungry. It took somebody looking me in the face, emotionless, telling me they couldn't love me. It took somebody I loved, somebody I admired and respected... it took this one, not the person I expected, but of course the right one for the job. It took this perfect situation, this terribly ideal heartbreak. It took him. It took the words, said without feeling or hesitation, without compassion or regret, telling me that he didn't love me. It took this. This is what was necessary for me to recognize the patterns in my life, for me to come to my senses, for me to comprehend the totality of what the fuck I had been doing to myself. 

Those of us, the lucky ones, strong enough to blaze a path through our heartbreak, always come out the other side. Leaving ash in our wake we shed our skin like a snake, and let it burn with the stories of our past. We sweep out the cobwebs of the people we've been, and the lives we've lived, all that no longer serve us. We gather our courage and weave new webs of light to better suit our higher calling. The journey isn't easy, choosing to step into challenge and discomfort every step of the way is painful and scary. But your time in the fire pales compared to the pain of living a life that is not meant for you. It is us, who make it out of the fire and find our freedom, that then have the tools to go back into the fire, to burn once more and help our brothers and sisters find their way. The fire cleanses us, it frees us from the shackles of our subconscious story, it gives us the fresh slate we need to carve our new life. Like the Phoenix, we rise from the ash reborn.  We all have heartbreak, life has a way of breaking us wide open, leaving us with a choice: to  heal and soften to the wonder of the world, or, to build a wall and close ourselves off from the ecstasies of true connection. The various ways in which life breaks us all, is part of what reminds us of our humanness and offers us comforting visions of the beautiful vulnerability of our true humanity. 

So it is here that I leave you, hoping to have helped you feel something. Hoping that you are able to take something from these words of truth. Be gentle with yourself, be kind to yourself, give yourself the gifts of feeling.

With So Much LOVE,

​Lauren Ashley 

"One of the greatest things about science is it's assumption that what it thinks it knows today will probably be proven wrong tomorrow. The theories of yesterday have served as platforms to climb higher, as Sir Isaac Newton meant when he said, 'If I have been privileged to see farther than others, it's because I stood on the shoulders of giants.'"
~ What The Bleep Do We Know

We're often so used to operating from our subconscious mind and moving through life on autopilot that we neglect to pay attention to our ubiquitous assumptions. We tally up observations about the things we've done and the people we've been, and we use these to form arbitrary beliefs about ourselves and others. We judge people we know for doing certain things, judge ourselves for doing the same, judge that others must be judging us for this... and the insanity continues. With complete disregard for scientific inquiry we often hold these assumptions to be true for the duration of our physical existence on this planet. 

While it might sound like a nice idea to simply cast our assumptions and judgments aside, this is an unreasonable task. We will never be entirely free of judgment, just as we will never be entirely free of the egoic mind. Judgment can provide an intuitive purpose and offers a protective function to the self-preserving nature of the ego. Judgments are there for survival, to serve as defense mechanisms; it is in bringing awareness to our defenses that we are able to harness our power, willfully choosing our thoughts, words, and subsequent actions. What if? Rather than casting our assumptions aside, we took a page from Sir Isaac Newton's figurative book and became our own giants, standing on the shoulders of our previous identities. Don't we all have that supreme power? The power to be our greatest heroes and our most threatening foes? 

I was speaking with somebody several weeks ago regarding his incredible physical transformation in health and the mental hurdles he overcame in the process. I had asked him what had made the difference. When had he decided he had enough? When did he first have the realization that he had a choice in the circumstances he accepted in his life? When did he first feel the sides of his mouth begin to curl upward into a subtle smirk at the thought of his transformation? His response to me was both familiar and surprising. It was simple, logical, and somewhat counterintuitive, I could relate.

He felt comfortable stepping into his TRUE self when he had moved for a job, to a place where he knew absolutely nobody. What shocked me about his statement was the sudden realization that it sparked within me. There wasn't anything tangibly real that had been holding him back. It wasn't the place he moved to that gave him the freedom to be himself, it was the LOSS of the place he had been in previously, the people he had been surrounded by, the continual reminders of who he had been. We (professionals) in the wellness and medical field place huge emphasis on having a support system in place when making drastic life changes. Moving for a job away from friends and family and simultaneously deciding to make incredibly challenging life changes (both mentally and physically) sounds inordinate. Yet, I completely understand the inclination. On a completely human level, I get it. It's a highly valuable lesson to learn that you can often be your greatest support system.

​"One story sounds good until another is told."
​~ Aesop

It took him being away from everyone for him to realize how the assumptions in his environment (physical, social, etc.) had impacted his personal choices. He had succumb, as we frequently do, to the theory of the looking-glass-self and the ideology that we are who people say we are. His thoughts and beliefs about himself were in agreement with the thoughts and beliefs others displayed towards him. As Charles Horton Cooley says: "I imagine your mind, and especially what your mind thinks about my mind, and what your mind thinks about what my mind thinks about your mind." It wasn't until he was in a new place, where nobody knew who he had been, that he suddenly felt the freedom to  become who he really wanted to be. 

We hold a lot of assumptions and judgments regarding our own identities. We like to label things neatly and put them into boxes, people included. Sometimes we allow our established masks (even if we no longer connect with them) to shackle us to the empty shell of our past lives, hindering our personal growth and further development. There is great power and freedom in losing the reminders of all the identities you have previously embodied. It is clear that in this process of self-forgetting we move on from who we have been and into who we are meant to be. After all it is often change that brings about the chance for new opportunity. So let's throw off those masks, run towards change, and take a giant leap outside of our proverbial comfort zone.

"No matter who you are, no matter what you did, no matter where you've come from, you can always change, become a better version of yourself."
~ Madonna

I have personally experienced this freedom as I have recreated myself more times than I can count. I have changed through every friendship, relationship, breakup, job, educational experience, and self-perpetuating pattern in my life. I lost bits of myself in every situation I participated in that didn't resonate with my higher calling. The beautiful thing about life is that it is also in these places that I discovered my own divinity, and ultimately found myself in the process. It is always safe to come home to your true self, no matter how much time you've spent away. There are so many things in my life that I am grateful to have experienced and entirely elated to have moved on from. New places can sometimes give us the freedom and confidence to have the courage to be someone we've never been before.  

"Why do we keep recreating the same reality? Why do we keep having the same relationships? Why do we keep getting the same jobs over and over again? In this infinite sea of potentials that exist around us, how come we keep recreating the same realities?"
​~ Dr. Joe Dispenza

I encourage you to own your story, leave the pieces of yourself you've lost behind, and start gathering the new pieces you find. Come home to yourself. Be a scientist in your own life and employ the belief that what you assume about yourself today will in all likelihood be proven wrong tomorrow. Take note of the assumptions held by those you surround yourself with and bring awareness to your own judgments. These can serve as the mountains you struggle to climb or the giants whose shoulders can take you to new heights in your life, the choice is yours.  Encourage yourself, support yourself, by God reach out to me if I can be of any service, or reach out to those you love if you need a helping hand. Stand on the shoulders of giants to see farther than you ever have before. Recreate yourself, again, and again, and then once more, and  become the person YOU decide you want to be. There's a certain freedom to be found in losing yourself in the woods of self-discovery and finding your creative power, coming out the other side a totally new YOU.  We are all in this together. 

Much love,

​Lauren Ashley 

​Life will continue to happen around us and within us, whether we participate actively or not. The debate on free will rears its head here as we have a choice in the ways in which we participate in life. The only constant in life is that nothing is constant, or as Heraclitus (one of the Greek philosophers) eloquently puts it: "Change is the only constant in life." The oxymoronic nature of this reminds us that we are surrounded by dichotomy in life. We are often pointed in a direction we don't much like, guided to practice the one thing we can battle our entire lives, acceptance. It is because of this denial and rebellion towards acceptance that we suffer. We stubbornly continue on, strangling life under the grip of our neurotic control, breaking ourselves into pieces in the process; and yet, in this coming undone life insists on offering us the choice to accept the beautiful gift of peace, surrender. 
​

"Our suffering comes from our attachment to people and things, our repeated attempts to find something lasting where there is nothing lasting to be found."
​~ Philip Martin 

​Are we not living in absolute insanity? Isn't the social construct in which we choose to structure our entire lives built around the intangible and unrealistic hope that we will one day be "safe" from the ever-changing perils of this world? Why do we chase stability? When there is none to be had. Please do not get me wrong and twist my words to justify staying in an unhealthily unstable relationship, or use this as a justification or excuse to give up on searching for the truth you so desperately seek. The truth is out there, and by out there I totally mean solely within yourself, so please, keep searching. I am merely suggesting that we may be searching for the wrong thing in entirely all the wrong places. 

If life is a beautiful display of uncertainty, then why do we refuse to accept and surrender to the cascading improvisation? Why are we so fanatically determined to control it in all it's  simple complexity? Why must we manipulate it to our liking? Is it not our attachment to outcomes we determined to be "valuable" that keeps us locked in our neuroses? Maniacal and grasping for any sense of control and power over our own lives. Society told us to value stability, to value a predictable and transfixed future. We were trained to think that all of life revolves around us, that we'll be "safe" as long as we don't break pattern and venture too far from the herd.

Ironically, it is this flawed and illogical perception that we can control everything that keeps us trapped in this insanity; confined to our own ordinary existence. It is the embrace of ultimate surrender, facing ourselves and removing the mask of character, that liberates us from the confines of our biological plane of bone and blood. It is in accepting that we ultimately have no direct sovereignty over the world and those in it that we are given real power in our lives. Creativity and choice offer us the power to choose how we act and react in the situations life presents us. 
​

"Life is not a problem to be solved, but a reality to be experienced."
​~ Soren Kierkegaard

It is in the act of tapping in to the flow of life that we find our freedom. Letting each and every experience, regardless of whether we perceive them to be "good" or "bad," (as this will be dictated as we prescribe judgment according to our conditioned perceptions), pass through us, moment by moment, fully felt and fully released. It is how we see life and how we experience its vastness and wondrous instability that ultimately gives us this opportunity to become newly transfixed with its awe-inspiring-splendor, and suddenly, our existence becomes anything but ordinary.

"I am responsible. Although I may not be able to prevent the worst from happening, I am responsible for my attitude toward the inevitable misfortunes that darken life. Bad things do happen; how I respond to them defines my character and the quality of my life. I can choose to sit in perpetual sadness, immobilized by the gravity of my loss, or I can choose to rise from the pain and treasure the most precious gift I have - life itself."
​~ Walter Anderson 

The power of choice is one of our greatest treasures. We can never control what happens to us, but we can control how we choose to perceive all that we encounter on the many walks of life. In The Transtheoretical Model of behavioral change practiced in health and wellness coaching and psychology, there is an emphasis placed on a client's locus of control (internal vs. external). A client with an internal locus of control believes that they can influence events and their outcomes, while clients with an external locus of control blame everything on forces outside of themselves. There have been numerous studies paying particular attention to the correlation between resiliency in life and locus of control; it should be no surprise that there is a high correlation between the incidence of resiliency and an exaggerated internal locus of control coinciding. I will also note that if we so choose, we have the ability to intentionally alter the way in which we naturally present ourselves in life and the perceptions we give attention to, thus giving us the opportunity to change our locus of control.  

All of this leads me to beg the question: God doesn't protect us from the lessons that we need to learn, so why do people try to? The universe doesn't spend eternity toying with us, maybe the things that are presenting themselves to you in your life are there for a reason. Could they have something to teach you? If they did, what would the lesson be? Whether we're practicing codependence by trying to save others from learning their own lessons, or simply trying to take the "easy" road in our own lives by playing the victim (which - spoiler alert - winds up being the much more challenging and destructive road in the long run) this isn't doing anybody any favors, including yourself. Life isn't using all of its ever-expanding intelligent consciousness to do things to you, it's like Byron Katie says, everything happens as it is meant to..."You don't have to like it.... It's just easier if you do." So I will leave you with this my friends - Why not seek comfortability in your instability? And let adaptation be your constant.

​"Tell me, what is it you plan to do with your one wild and precious life?"
~ Mary Oliver

​Lots of Love, 

​Lauren Ashley 

"There's no weakness as great as false strength."
~ Stefan Molyneux 

I wanted to bring up this concept of projecting falsity because it has come up for me several times in conversation over the last several weeks. I think it's important to note that in our fast-paced and social-media-driven world it's challenging to be able to decipher the truth about who we really are. So don't even get me started on how questionable it can be to try and gauge the authenticity of another persons relationship with themselves.

Something that has repeatedly come up has been the concept of "teachers" in the health and wellness world - whether it be mental, physical or spiritual. I have seen several examples of people who "look" like they have it all together and are more than happy to preach to others about how they should live their lives. Their approach has a subtle undertone of narcissism and something about them always just feels "off" for me. Several times I have ignored that feeling and thought to myself that for whatever reason they just didn't click with me, only later to find out that it their "teaching" was all a show. What I've now recognized is it's okay to listen to that small quiet voice when it whispers that everything they're about screams "trying too hard." 

These "teachers" often have a great message, amazing gifts, talents and a genuine desire to help others. The problem that I see is that there are a lot of people out there desperately seeking help in the areas of wellbeing and when doing so they are forgetting to have a discerning mind. The important thing about being a teacher and a role-model for others is not egocentric, it is not important how well you can project an image of perfection - news flash, nobody is perfect and most of us barely have it all together. What is of the greatest importance in being a leader (especially on these subjects) is that you have taken a good look at yourself, the life you are TRULY living and taken inventory of what you find, inviting awareness in, without judgment.  

People can be a mess inside, hanging onto any semblance of thread to look like they have it all together and project that false image onto the world. Oftentimes they're so deluded that they believe the mask they wear in public is their true identity, lacking true awareness. While their intentions and messages can be good it is important to use extreme caution in guiding others when you have not fully looked at yourself first. One of my favorite proverbs that I find so true about life is "the road to hell is paved with good intentions." You can do a lot of harm under the guise of assistance, oftentimes with the best of intentions. 

I think I have developed a little bit of a knack for being able to recognize it more easily now, because in it I recognize pieces of myself. I was there, many times in my life. Trying so hard to be okay on the outside and convince others that I was a noble and helpful person; consuming my time with "helping others" so that I could avoid helping myself and dealing with my own personal pain. I hadn't yet fully accepted myself, dark side and all, and while I have made incredible headway in this aspect,I imagine that it will be a lifelong practice. We live in a world that continually tells us to run from ourselves, that we aren't good enough, that we always need more OUT THERE which inevitably leads to the avoidance of what is IN HERE. 

I think this is especially relevant now as we have begun to see a wider acceptance of health and wellness and the continual development of ourselves, as they have become rather trendy these days. While I welcome things that are universally beneficial to the world, such as wellbeing, becoming trends I also hold some concerns.  Living in a world that makes money off of us staying perpetually lost to ourselves helps me to value the true weight of responsibility that teaching entails. People are waking up and  genuinely seeking guidance and it can be more damaging than beneficial to be "taught" how to live and experience things for further growth by somebody who hasn't looked within themselves fully. 

The more people I come into contact with and the older I get the more I realize that none of us really know what we're doing in this wild thing we call life. We're all just doing the best we can with what we know, the issue is that we live in a society that doesn't emphasize the right things, the things that truly give life meaning. Unless we welcome our deprogramming, in that area, some of us are much more confused than others. 
​

"The greatest enemy of knowledge is not ignorance, it is the illusion of knowledge."
~ Daniel J. Boorstin ​

The ego is clever and very admirable in its ability to survive, it can convince us that teaching others how to live the way we have chosen to is a noble and beneficial act, when in reality it is a mere scheme to avoid dealing with our own baggage. A genuine teacher will not promise to have all of the answers and they will not tell you how to live your life. They may offer guidance and share the tools that they have seen work for people which may or may not work for you. There is no one right way of handling the complexity of all of life and its plethora of unforeseeable circumstances. It is not a teachers place to judge where their students are, but it is the teachers responsibility to meet them there. 

If you are seeking guidance in the health world, I remind you all to follow your heart and use a discerning mind in choosing whom to take advice from. If you are a teacher in this realm, I urge you to be cautious with your abilities and be aware of the responsibility of impact that you have on another's life. Listen to your intuition above all else, you will always be your greatest guide.

Lots of Love, 

Lauren Ashley