Do you ever get so frustrated you want to scream? Well, I do.  I'm actually in that space right about now.  Lately life has been terribly complex and I'm over it.  The difficult stuff has got to go! Yet, the difficult stuff is where the juicy is.  Don't get me wrong, I'm still waving my flag and yelling "I need a break!" from the mountaintops.  I just also realize the importance of these moments.  When I get still and quiet, when I calm my mind and notice, I can feel the power in them.  I know they are leading me toward my highest self.  Still, if I put all the spiritual bullshit aside, I'm ready to tap out.  So what is a girl to do?

First of all, I try to remind myself that the spiritual is no more or less sacred than the messy, hurtful, difficult yuck of it.  It is actually all one.  No matter how I feel, the sacred is inseparable from me and my experience.  I am the divine and therefore, my experience is divine.  That gives things a new perspective.  So, I can have a temper tantrum (or twelve) and I can feel frustrated and upset and I am still in constant connection with all that is.  If I feel separate, it is me that is separating myself.  My connection to the divine is ever present, it is up to me to notice it.  I am not more or less spiritual because I go (or don't go) through hardship or because I notice, experience, or feel the pain of it.  Having a spiritual practice doesn't guard me from human emotion.  As a matter of fact, in my experience, having a spiritual practice assists me in feeling my human emotion more deeply.  After all, my soul did choose to take on human form, so there must be some value in my human experience.  If I were meant to have no emotion or to only feel joy or enlightenment there would be no purpose for me to take on this form and to visit this beautiful planet.  However I did choose this life and I do have the ability to feel a plethora of emotions.  So, why do I feel the need to judge them? 

When I am frustrated with a situation, it is only my ideological view that separates me from present time and therefore causes the frustration.  Then comes the judgment.  The frustration is sacred because it clues me in to realizing I am somewhere other than present time.  I'm usually in a past story I have created about myself.  The story often goes something like this "I deserve more than this.  I've worked too hard for this to be the outcome.  This isn't what I want. Etc."  What I'm really doing when I start on the path of re-telling my story is judging my current situation as less than what I have decided I should have.  There is a little problem with this process though.  I'm overlooking the fact that this experience is exactly what I have and therefore, I have contributed to it's manifestation in that very moment.  So, I can choose to continue reading the story I wrote many years ago, or I can start writing a new one.  I can choose to continue to be frustrated, which by the way is my right and perfectly okay.  However, I can also choose to acknowledge my participation in the creation of my life, recognize my power, own it, and put it to work.  

For me, right now, this means I'm noticing my judgment which shows up as my desire to change things.  As I write this I haven't moved past this step.  This is mostly because I haven't yet been led past the noticing.  When/if I am, I'll make an intentional move.  Until then, I'll sit.  I'll breathe.  I'll practice.  I'll trust that the noticing is enough.  This is my power.  In this space I let the magic happen.