The #1 Thing That Matters More Than ‘Knowing’

On this last Sunday of spring, I’m sitting in a car with my sister, my best friend since childhood and her long term boyfriend. Despite this couple’s first concerns being wildly different to mine, I’m enjoying sharing in their silliness: she’s sticking out her tongue and messing up his hair, then he’s telling another joke.

Since ‘waking up’ three years ago, I’ve prioritised friendships & relationships with those who also ‘know’. I’ve spent one and a half years qualifying men for their ‘awareness’ on paper, and each one has fallen very short of the mark in person. What is the point of knowing the shadow of the world if we do not even face our own? And, what does knowing truly mean?

Knowing is about what one does in full awareness. Of course it’s not about what one thinks, feels or believes if it will not affect how one acts. Otherwise it might as well not be thought, felt or believed!

Knowing is the embodiment of truth. Knowing more does nothing if we aren’t being more lively, more radiant, and fully present with that in-formation. The advantage humans have above animals is our capacity to reflect on prior situations and improve the way we act in future opportunities. We are meant to take the new information and expand with it so that we are propelled into better action. If we’ve come to know the world’s shadow, we’ve hopefully also become emotionally resilient when turning inward, and physically prepared in the external for what is to come. If we rely, depend or expect to be saved by anyone other than ourselves, we are doing only damage with our ‘knowing’.

Individuals who have seen beyond the veil can be brought to hardness of heart, cynicism and depression. But that’s when we succumb to what we say we stand against. This is just another form of spiritual bypassing that builds disdain and contempt. Once we have gone down the rabbit holes of the world’s shadow, how do we integrate them? Do we turn towards the difficult parts and meet them with grace and gratitude? Having resurfaced from being at the bottom myself, I want to know what we will do about these dark places with an open heart — such a thing that I have learned to tend to, cultivate and nurture. Awareness is an embrace, not a pushing away. Here’s my perspective: we are to do all things in joy, or not at all.

Awareness is an embrace, not a pushing away.
We are to do all things in joy, or not at all.

I’m talking about the quality of person who will do whatever it takes to feed the children, even if this means having no sleep, working the next morning, and sharing the difficulty with no one. Is virtue not about who we are when no one is watching? When only God is? Bring me the man who has befriended his own weakness, for he cannot be manipulated. It is the seeds of doubt that grow to be poison ivy, but the seeds of curiosity that breed inspired action.

Is virtue not about who we are when nobody is watching? When only God is?

Here is what I know to be true.

1. What we will create with the information we receive is up to our free will, and we choose to make more of what we already are.
2. What keeps us young is our ability to share joy in the love and safety that is nourished where two or more are gathered. Only children can enter the kingdom of heaven.
3. My circumstances are the reason I show up, not the excuse why I don’t. How I do one thing is how I do all things. This is integrity.
4. Talk is cheap. I want to see the fruits of your labor. It isn’t about how we label ourselves, but what we stand for. It is a question of substance over superficiality.
5. In the age of information, knowledge truly is rare. Be that which you seek to find.

I now choose relationships with those who make me feel light and joyful, who are open to what life asks of them, resilient in the face of fear and brave enough to thrive in the constant of change. After all, isn’t the quality of our relationships based on the depth of their presence?