I Didn't Know I Was Having a Spiritual Awakening

It took me 6 years to realize I'd had a spiritual awakening. I didn't know exactly what I'd experienced, only that everything was different from one moment to the next. The quality of my friendships, the desires I had around my business and profession, the places I could tolerate living.

When I first became trained in Reiki I thought I was learning a healing tool. I knew that to be a better healer I also needed to work on healing myself. Same with coaching – any good coach has been thoroughly coached. They know what the process feels like. They have empathy and compassion for their clients because they, too, have experienced the monumental shifts that come from having your life turned upside down.

When I started my business, I launched in the field of Leadership Development. I was still chasing accolades and wanting important clients. But after a time I realized I wasn't really following my own goals or vision. I was following what I had been taught success looked like.

And the truth of it was, that version of success was now totally out of alignment with who I already was – and was continuing to become.

The things that had once felt so important to me, simply weren't. I was craving time alone, space. I needed extensive amounts of recharge time after any client interaction or social engagement.

Me, the off-the-charts extravert (just look at any Myers Briggs equivalent I've ever taken – I was literally off the line in extraversion) had suddenly swung towards introversion and needing infinite amounts of time and space to recover my energy and be in stillness.

And believe me when I say I didn't go willingly. I was still programmed, after all, to who I'd always been. Still programmed to the version of myself that had always relished being a social butterfly. I followed old maps to living my life, only they no longer brought me where I thought they would.

My life changed drastically in 2018. That was the year I moved to Asia, became a coach, became an energy healer, and let go of any semblance of the life I had known before.

I've written often about my first experience with Reiki, but even with the profound sensations of energy flowing through my body on that first day in Emma's training room, I didn't fully grasp what I was experiencing.

It wasn't until six years later, when people I know and love began to train in Reiki as well – and in discussing their experiences I was confused. Why hadn't they felt that rocking sensation throughout their bones? Why did they still say they hadn't really felt all that much to start, but that their teacher said it was flowing?

For me, the flow was immediate. It was palpable. There was such a clear sensation of rushing energy through me there was no way to unfeel it. I still remember sitting on that chair during my first attunement where the world went quiet as the vibration of the air around me churned and swirled in and out all around me.

My husband and I went to Bangkok for his birthday last year and he took Reiki Level I with my beloved teacher. It was a remarkable experience and he learned so much about himself and his views on meditation and energy. I won't share his experience further since it's not mine to share, but what I will say is that was the moment where it all suddenly clicked for me. His experience, while also magical, was so vastly different from my own. And that was the moment I realized that sitting in that Reiki training room back in 2018 I had had an awakening.

Something I was still trying to understand more fully so many years later. My search for understanding and for others who got it was endless. My podcast was launched with the desire to bring deeper understanding to all who were experiencing their own spiritual search – bringing them the healers and experts who could answer at least some of their questions about what they do and how it works. Only I was really trying to get answers to my own questions.

What is spirituality, what is energy, how is it felt, how deep does this run, how many different ways can we engage with it?

Because I never had a context for my experience, I felt like I was free floating through time and space without a peg to hang my coat on.

And that is the reality of a spiritual awakening. The messy, chaotic, overwhelming sensations that don't really make sense. That no one can actually explain to you because it is so deeply personal.

Most people teach you how to awaken. Or, if you're lucky, how to attain mastery. But most miss the glaring gap in the middle which is the awakening process itself – which can last years or even decades before we sort ourselves out again.

People share their power and brilliance, but don't talk about the hardship they went through to get to that place.

And I am determined to shed light on that part of the journey. For any of you (or anyone you know) who might be going through their own messy middle of an awakening – know that you are not alone. That your feelings are not isolated. And that there will be a time at some point in the future where it all starts to make sense again.

And in the meantime, embrace the chance to learn who you truly are and what you're made of – because the process you're in right now is the stuff of legends.

With love,

Amanda

P.S. If this message resonates, share it with someone in their own messy middle.