In order to progress in your spiritual life, you have to take risks. You cannot become too comfortable—you have to let go. When you first enter a spiritual path, you start to work with letting go of anger, frustration, and a whole host of issues that are obstacles to your fulfillment as a spiritual being. Over time, however, as you meet some of your challenges, you may become comfortable again and begin to glide.
When this happens, the flow of your life begins to be staid, and in the staidness of it, there’s stagnation. There has to be movement, and what comes in for energy has to go out in equal measure. It comes in, and it flows out, it comes in, and it flows out. If it doesn’t flow out, it starts to build up and then what needs to flow gets stuck and you’re in a holding pattern. You have to find a way to keep flowing, to stay open, to maintain a dynamic tension.
When was the last time you risked anything? I’m talking about a level of risk that goes down to the root of your survival level and shakes you, so that life as you know it changes dramatically. I’m talking about something that really puts you on a different trajectory than the one you’re currently on. You’ve probably seen pictures of the “jumping off place.” There are two rock formations, and somebody at the top must jump across a huge abyss. If you are the one who has to jump, you don’t know if your jump is going to be high enough, wide enough, if you’re going to land on the edge and slip off, or if you’re going to make it and land securely. This is the kind of radical risk where you actually enter a new lifetime.
For this to happen, you have to want this opportunity. You have to want the new spiritual level in order for you to be presented with the choice and the new potentialities. You have to begin to feel you must go forward in order for you to stay alive. You cannot coast and be half in and half out. This is about allowing your soul to be at the helm.
This is true, no matter what your human age. For older people it is a special challenge because our society supports slowing down. But in the last third of life you’ve earned a certain degree; you hold the keys and the gifts that have been given. It is important to maintain a dynamic tension, to be uncomfortable, and to allow your soul space to constantly speak to you. Let it put you in places that you wouldn’t normally put yourself. Make those shifts and do those things you are called upon to do.
We get to choose. If we say ‘no,’ we’re rejecting and we’re resisting what God wants for us and how God wants to use us. It’s about allowing our soul to be at the helm.
God does choose you and has chosen you for many things. And you have to learn how to get out of your own way and say ‘yes.’ There have been many calls, many taps on the shoulder, many ways in which you have been contacted. It’s never ending. It’s always offered, it’s always needed.