I don't feel you
A memory from the past, from when I was still a girl of about 6 years, seems to hit the nail on the head. In our attic me, my brother and friends from the neighborhood had made a kind of fortress out of mattresses, pillows and blankets. Our chill corner. Here we romped, chatted, rested and cuddled a bit (nothing exciting though). I remember a day when my friends were frolicking and I was "spooned" against the wall with my then boyfriend. The weak sense of connection didn't satisfy me and I leaned closer and closer to him. As a result, I seemed to crush him against the wall. The feeling didn't get any better. Apparently I was looking for a feeling I couldn't get, a feeling I knew should exist.
Fear of rejection
In any case, this relationship provides me insights in this theme for me. Where there is desire for connection, there is also a fear of rejection. After 2 years of childhood "dating" I saw him less often and one day he acted distant and weird according to me and my friends. As girls we decided that I had to break up, "because he was going to dump me and then I should have dumped him first". Like blunt rakes we went out to seek our poor victim. When I found him, all I could say were the words "OUT" (in Dutch you say "ik maak het uit"). I pushed the words out of my clenched throat. Me and my friends walked away. I had no idea what I was triggering. I thought he wanted to leave me too. I was proud of my deed.
Later it turned out that he hadn't wanted to break up at all, but had planned something sweet for me and was a bit shy about it. I didn't understand it. What this story shows is that as a young child I was already focused on rejection. If I don't reject the world, it will reject me. That way I wouldn't have to go through the rejection myself. By stepping away from it I felt a lot of relief. Which I now see as a relief to be away from the great danger of rejection.
Keeping distance, urge to prove and fear of failure
At the same time, as an 8-year-old, I went through my parents' divorce. A family torn apart, a broken family. I felt a lot of pain and incomprehension and I couldn't really put it anywhere. "Apparently if you love someone a lot, that person can still 'reject' you" I seemed to have thought. Feelings are so complex. I decided that's the way the world works. Don't whine and just join in on this charade and protect your little bit of connection with your life.
My emotional world is overshadowed by the fear of rejection. Basically everywhere in my life this fear haunts me. The friendships and short-lived relationships I entered into should not come too close, because sooner or later it would be over. In school I tried so hard so I wouldn't get bad grades and wanted to prove I was worthy of acceptance and pushed all the way up to a university master's degree.
My body challenges me to face my distancing and rejection
A number of times I have been ill for a long time, causing me to become “secluded” from my social life. As a kid in primary school, I was the first of all my friends to have my period, which made me different. I occasionally had to call in sick because of the aches and pains during the happy time of the month. I had breasts, also very early, really early. I was different. In high school I had mononucleosis as a 15-year-old and was very tired for a whole year. I couldn't go to school completely due to fatigue. I took 1 subject every day, came home, slept for a while, went to do my homework, fell asleep on my books, had something to eat, slept and went back to school. A disease that was not understood by my environment (except my family luckily) and a disease that I did not accept myself. I rejected the disease and my condition. I wanted at all costs to pass my school year and I continued this cycle for a year. Once better, my friends had found a life without me. So my year of seclusion didn't just last a year, if you understand me correctly. Consequences I hadn't even foreseen. After all, I was focused on not being rejected by the outside world, especially school. To redo a year would be the ultimate rejection, the ultimate failure. In fact, I've been especially saddened by the friendships I've seen dwindling. So the rejection from the outside world had been going on for a long time. Also the rejection from myself. I stared blindly at rejection by the system, not seeing who was rejecting who.
After another year I was struck by meningitis from exactly that bacteria for which you are not vaccinated. I survived by a hair's breadth. An experience that I did not consciously experience myself, because it went very quickly. It felt like the flu that really hurt, but after a while the reality faded and I lost consciousness. The environment, of course, experienced that differently, as you can imagine. All of my classmates suddenly mourned their sick classmate and friend. I felt a lot of support and got a lot of postcards. Something that gave me strength. On this strength I survived another year of fatigue by taking 1 lesson every day, followed by coming home, sleeping, studying homework and exams, falling asleep on books, eating something, sleeping more and back to school for a while. Again I rejected my situation and myself. Separated from the outside world again. Unsurprisingly, during this time I had also become depressed. The daily feeling of being cut off and loneliness played tricks. Once again, I mourned my pathetic distance from the outside world and fought not to be rejected by the school system. I had to and would finish my school without fail. After I succeeded, I took refuge in Utrecht with relief. New city, new opportunities. Getting rid of that mess of rejections.
Connection and like-minded people
I found my home. As an 18-year-old teenager I left my parental home with great anticipation and relief to live in a small loft next to the Dom tower, which I happily called my home for 5 days a week. There I was warmly and cordially received by my fellow students. All equals, everyone full of passion, ambition and above all fun. All with a wonderful vision for the future. We were there to make the world a better place. And oh yes, also to obtain a bachelor's degree. I felt welcome, loved, accepted and connected. Whenever I ran into someone from this lovely home base, we would cuddle. Like everyone else did. So nice. The feeling overwhelmed me.
And that's where the fear of rejection came in, sabotaging my connections. I'd rather kept everyone a little bit at bay, just enough connection. All kinds of gossip about this and that was not for me, so I kept my distance from that. I never opened myself completely, afraid to experience that I really am different and do not belong. Scared they would see right through me. Perhaps this connection fueled the harsh voice inside me. I joined in with everything, but not completely. Not with my whole being. I wanted to belong to the group of friends, but I'd rather not be bothered by them. In order to fit in, I mainly showed and sounded my agreeing and like-minded side, as this had been second nature to me for years. The desire for connection and the fear of rejection merged in a harmonious mask. In this way I was never quite myself.
Duty calls
Once again my interested, enthusiastic, curious mind took up more space and the fear of rejection and failure became more apparent. As a serious student I would make it. All those wonderful people with an ambitious vision of the future around me and I didn't have all those dreams and ambitions. I had to find security and a job anyway, and I could only do that if I had a bachelor's and master's degree. That's wat I believed. I was a pleaser of the system and lost sight of the connection with myself and the outside world.
I found my studies very difficult in this way and therefore started to work harder and harder. Not being ill this time, but working at least 60 hours a week on an internship with a mean voice in my head: "I'm not good enough, not smart enough, not intelligent, not skilled". I wanted to prove that voice wrong and I started to try even harder and work harder. The adrenaline pumped through my blood 24/7, boosted by the 8 cups of coffee I drank a day. I soon burned out. And again my body, but this time also my energetic system, called me to stop. “It can't go on like this any longer” my inner knowing seemed to say louder and louder in my head. I also started to see images of guides who made it clear to me that I had to start taking care of myself. The knowledge and wisdom I possess deep within me, my mission on earth to assist the world in raising the energetic frequency. My descendance from Source. My sensitivity, my ability to do everything I put my energy to, my infinite enthusiasm and curiosity, my urge for seclusion, stillness and nature. Everything was on at the same time. What slumbered in the background now came to the front. My fear of rejection and my fear of abandonment and isolation had overpowered all of this and overshadowed my deep desire for connection. Three times a charm you would say. And that's right. Also this time I was hard-hearted.
I decided to choose for myself, as I did the last two times and renounced my internship. I wanted to pass my degree, just like the last two times, and it took me months to type a mediocre report for a mediocre grade – what I saw as progress and yet also rejection. Unlike before, I temporarily stepped away from the study system and went to work in a furniture store so I could pick up again when I was ready. This time I would know what nourishes me, where my needs and wishes lie and I would base my choices on this. An existential crisis that I entered with great interest and enthusiasm. I had choices and a slowly growing awareness of my rejection patterns. Every step I took was a very small victory in the right direction. A road that would take me years, at my own pace and learning when I rejected myself and if this was necessary.
Deep longing for connection and unity
The level at which we're supposed to connect with the system and the environment would never fulfill my need for connection. After all, this is a layer of consciousness in which I don't feel at home. A reality of dualism, of right and wrong, success and failure, love and hate. The connection I was looking for inwardly just didn't seem to be there and what I did find was second-rate and I was fighting for that. The warm bath I had experienced during my studies still didn't seem like the connection I was looking for. There was talk of this and that. We all wore our masks while connecting. As a highly sensitive person, I carried all the other's emotions and became overstimulated in no time. “This can't be it”, I often thought. What made me so happy didn't seem to be that deep connection at second glance.
Until now I could not properly articulate the connection that I was looking for. I did not truly believe or stand for the knowledge from my inner knowing, as long as it was not printed in books or reflected in reality. I have rarely found the connection I am looking for in my life. It is a feeling, an enormous nostalgia for a place that does not exist in this earthly density. It is a desire that calls out to be created, I now understand. You can feel this connection with all of your being, in all your cells, from your toes to your crown, in your chakras, your aura, and especially your heart. You cannot escape this feeling. It is there for you and it carries you. It gives you strength and is like a magnet. The rare experiences taught me that this feeling does not increase or decrease with increasing distance: it is always there and always as strong. When you have an experience like this, you would want to hug that person. Give it a try and notice how your feeling stays stable. You won't explode, promise!
So what does that connection mean? And how is this one different?
The connection goes beyond the masks of everyday life – the behaviors, ailments, patterns, beliefs – and touches you deep into your core, the essence of who you are: your divine spark of light and love. It's a special connection. Longing for it, seeking it, and actively choosing it, makes you brave and vulnerable. After all, it goes beyond your “protective” ego. This connection sometimes arises spontaneously, which is wonderful and we like to cherish this. You feel a soul connection and don't know what hit you. You can interpret it as being in love, even if something so inexplicable. You can also see it for what it is, a vulnerable connection between people who see each other for who they essentially are without making an effort. You feel at home, loved, supported, known, embraced.
You could also facilitate this connection. This does take some effort, namely the effort not to use your mask. Seeing what lives in your own shadow, facing and experiencing your emotions as they come, taking life as it is, accepting yourself as you are and from this forgiving energy lower your barrier. Holding space, or offer the space for yourself and for everyone around you to show up completely as they are and also accept them in their true essence. A lot is possible in that space. The connection, often even without words, can then arise and be felt on a deep layer. This creates space for the connection with more than yourself and the other, namely nature and the energy around you, to Source. The intangible, the subtle, the ethereal. What is happening here is a connection in another level of consciousness.
Where you seem to talk to yourself more with your masks on and the outside world mainly mirrors itself so that you get to know yourself more - without this mask you will be in a heightened state of being, connecting with the other and get to know the other in its essence. That essence is based on a collaboration. I am as I am while serving my own purpose, and you are as you are whilst serving your own purpose and together we serve a shared purpose in harmony. Individualism takes on a whole different meaning. Both manners have an individual element. The difference: in the first case, we interfere with the other, because we reject parts of ourselves and mirror this to the other. In the second case, we work together with the other, because we accept ourselves in our completeness and also mirror this to or share it with the other. A deep and nuanced difference. A very nice difference. From rejection to acceptance. Disposing of the scales. Lovingly dancing with life.