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“If the path before you is clear, you’re probably on someone else’s.” attributed to Carl Jung
It was Easter Sunday, 2020, in the middle of the pandemic. I’d picked up a book by Carolyn Myss about archetypes some time ago. I remember impatiently speed reading through each archetype in an effort to find myself in one or many of them. This book sparked my interest at the time but I was still not aware enough of myself to apply any teaching or insights.
So on Easter Sunday, I impatiently looked for my archetypes again but stopped and told myself I was reading to consciously hear everything this amazing author was saying. I was attempting to define who I was at a much deeper level this time but still didn’t quite have the awareness to go further. I felt compelled to “get it” and a strong urgency to push through. Clearly my ego was in charge.
Backing up a bit in my life, early attempts at writing in an effort to find home or my path took the form of searching for a light that would illuminate the path ahead.
"The Path Taken", August 2018, reframed what success meant to me then as in what I wanted to have, do and who I wanted to be.
"The Path Taken 3", Nov. 2018, dealt with my developing self-image. “Beauty begins the moment you decide to be yourself.” (attributed to Coco Chanel)
“Through the Rabbit Hole” was another attempt with a very different pathway in November 2018. My name is Alice and I identified strongly with Lewis Carroll’s Alice as she adventured whilst down the rabbit hole.
Looking back on it I see that "The Path" series corresponded to my attempts at finding my definition of success. The most promising stab at writing and pathfinding began when I was setting up my Home Staging business back in 2002. I wrote about the concept in my journal, and then got really busy! Seventeen years later, in January 2019, I re-read the concept and wrote an outline. I called it “Finding Home”. It was a book about the rooms in our homes and how they have the potential to deeply affect our lives in subtle, yet profound ways. Here’s an excerpt from Chapter One:
“As a highly visual and sensitive person, what I surrounded myself with mattered. What I surrounded myself with was also just the first layer of finding home. My theory, at the time, was that as I uncovered the multiple layers to make my home healthy for myself, I would relinquish the layers of my protected self and be able to feel connected to a nourishing, soul-supporting environment no matter where I lived. What I really discovered, however, took me to a place I really didn't see coming.” Finding Home, Alice Carlssen Williams, 2019
I wrote 5 of 9 chapters before I decided again to abandon the concept to throw sheer willpower, strength, determination, hard work and every ounce of attention at my hybrid real estate/as-yet-unknown career. The results, however, were far less than my efforts and at tremendous cost to my physical health.
So, on Easter Sunday, 2020, I was munching on Nanaimo bars, my grown family's version of Easter eggs and overweight by about 50+ pounds. I only had enough money put aside for the next 4 months, if I was careful, and real estate work had vanished into oblivion as the pandemic drew the world into its reality. In a kind of dark night of my ego, I started yet another attempt at writing, but this time I wrote in a flash of indignation, “The Path isn’t a Path at all!” It spanned the month of April with more journal entries. In one of those entries I recorded a vivid dream I had in my early 20’s. It seems I’d been on a long journey and was arriving at my home in the forest late at night. After a great night’s sleep, my Mom arrived the next morning with a stack of dresses for me to try on. Apparently I was performing at an event that night and needed a dress to wear. I put all of them on, one on top of the other. Not happy with any of them, I took all of them off, one by one, and decided I loved the dress I already had on that I designed and made.
The most amazing and magical thing happened the moment I chose my dress. A sudden and powerful sense of love, joy and happiness all wrapped in the most incredible peace I’ve ever experienced rippled through every part of me. Then I woke up. That deep peacefulness stayed with me for hours and, with goose bumps rising on my arms as I write this again, I still remember its powerful presence.
I wonder if you’ve gone through a journey, walked a path, struggled with your purpose, too. If you have, CONGRATULATIONS! You’re on your way to bringing forth your purpose even if you can’t yet see it. Perhaps you’re wondering why it might take so long to get the right fit or “dress” for you and your purpose. Perhaps you’re wondering how one survives materially while working on something that seems so abstract. All valid questions, for sure. The only thing I can say is allow it to unfold. Practice using your intuition. It will help you navigate to the next right step along your way.
Most important to keep in mind, you’re not only navigating your path, you’re designing and creating it. Know you’re on the path you need to be on because it’s NOT clear. It’s your unique path. Look for bits of clarity, something that makes your heart sing, a synchronicity. When I finally knew I was an author/healer/visionary, it felt right, it fit. I felt that joyful peace again. However, my ego chimed in, as it must, and said, “Well, who are you to just decide to be an author/healer/visionary?” It even seemed a bit presumptuous to say it out loud until I quieted my ego and realized a purpose isn’t fully grown or expressed in a person just because one finds clarity about who they are. We grow into and with our purpose as we walk on the path we’re creating. Author/Healer/Visionary, I was home at last.
By the way, that place I didn’t see coming in my dream in 2002 and in my book in 2019, was finding my inner genius, my soul, the center that was uniquely me, and finally, deeply, loving myself and my life. I encourage you to follow that dream, find that magical place, and experience that deep sense of peace. As you follow your own authentic, purpose-filled path, your expertise will grow into a passion our world needs in a way that only you with your personality, your experience, your history, your gifts AND YOUR DREAM can offer.
From “Finding Home”:
“They say the eyes are the windows to the soul.
When light shines on the soul through those windows and you discover what's really there, you have finally come home.
Home is my story.” Alice Carlssen Williams, 2019
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