Have you ever wondered how in the world (much less why) you chose the family you have? Yes, I do believe we had a choice in our families.  Well, I’ve thought about this a lot. In fact, I’ve had big moments of contemplation about how the hell I ended up with the family I have several times in this life.  And I’ve had big moments of extreme gratitude and calmness.   I remember when I was five years old sitting in the way back of our Ford station wagon (you know the one with the wooden panels on the side) as we drove through the streets of a small Japanese village and talking with someone about who I was and where I came from.    I used to think that I was having a conversation with my parents about this, but the few times I’ve talked with them about the lessons I learned from this conversation, I wondered if I might have been talking with the angels.  Whoever it was, what I am about to share with you has helped me to make sense in the middle of some really insane moments.

What I remember being told was that before we were born, we were up in “heaven” (loose term used for the five year old brain to comprehend the uncomprehendable) hanging out being little beams of light off of a infinitely big beam of light.  When we were given our assignment to come to Earth and looked down to see all that was possible for us, everything made sense and everything was love. so as we went about choosing the way that we would come through that could best support our mission, the mother/father/siblings we chose made the most sense to us coming from that complete place of oneness. Then I have proceeded to fill in the missing chapters of my journey on Earth with the following:

Upon coming through in corporeal form as a human being we then felt the impact of our heavenly made decisions (when you don’t understand the concept of free will, it’s hard to comprehend  the impact of freedom of choice).  I was talking with a good friend of mine this morning who is visiting her family of origin this week. My friend is in her early sixties and is a joyful, creative, breath of fresh air.  She has truly crafted her life to allow her to live as a free spirit.  Then enter some major life changes such as the love of her life leaving and she has found herself looking at the walls of her life and realizing that all of the choices she has made have gotten her to this point and that now she needs to insert some different choices that will allow her to bring in money to support her through the end of her days.  She has honestly shared with me her experience of visiting her family who consists of her mother and two brothers and feeling just as shut down and “not up to par” as she did when she was 14.  Both brothers are successful and mom is always ready with advice on what she should be doing (or should have done).

In the middle of listening to her describe herself as “flighty and not landing on one thing in her life”, I stopped her to tell her the story I just shared with you and to add that both her brothers and her mom and father (who is deceased) chose to be in that family with her  as well.  They knew that they were going to need that special brand of creativity and life force that only my friend has the ingredients for and so it was very important while she was looking at herself and contemplating where she could “grow up” and make changes, to do so with gentle and loving care.  As easy as it is to believe the outside messages from her family that she is a “loser” or “dilemma’ it is very important to remember how you came to be.  At some point in your creation, the people you find yourself surrounded with knew that you were the exact right person to complement their mission.

It’s just that a whole lot of us forget about our mission and get distracted by the accouterments of life along the way!

Remember who you are is very special.  Remember that there is only one “YOU” in the billions of all the you’s on this planet.  Remember that you have a reason for being here.  Now go and be who you came here to be!!!

Do you have a side to you that feels very up front and personal by how it constantly seems to be stepping in the way of your greatness?  Fantastic…no really, it’s a good thing that you are aware of that side of you because the flip side will be the side that can lead you to your greatness. For years I felt like I was stumbling around in the dark and that I kept bumping my toes up against the walls of my discontent.  If there was a side to me that could lead me to greatness, I sure couldn’t see it. I felt that if  you could see all the sides of me, I would look like one of those big plastic balls that babies play with that have all kinds of things circling inside……If I had sides, then surely they were all meshed together.

Upon exploring my behaviors, feelings and beliefs, I began to slowly realize that I had choices where before I believed I had none.  Gradually over time I began exploring further where my choices had led me and began to tip toe up to looking at the darker side of my being.  One of the many tools that I used in my explorations was the Enneagram.  A modern day teacher who brought the Enneagram to North America was “The Jesuit priest Robert Ochs who transmitted some of Naranjo’s interpretation to other Jesuit priests and seminarians around North America. They in turn made use of it for spiritual counseling and added their insights to the steadily growing and constantly changing core of material. The “Jesuit tradition” is thus an offshoot of Naranjo’s teaching, and both are offshoots of the original “Arica tradition” although they are both somewhat different from it.”

The Enneagram is not for everybody, but I found it useful for learning how to accept the part of me that is my “big secret” of how I showed up in my life sometimes when I let my ego take the lead.  When I was introduced to the Enneagram I was told that there were 9 personality types and to read through them.  More than likely, the personality type that I really felt uncomfortable with or  I did not like very much–was probably my type.  Yuck.  But, it’s a great way to learn to accept ourselves and then to appreciate that part of who we are so that we can see the gifts on the other side.  Those gifts when shown under the light, of Divine Guidance/The Universe/The Force whatever you feel comfortable calling that thing that is bigger than us that works the Universe, are what can lead us to greatness.

For myself, I’m grateful for every single person and event that has come into my life because I can use all the knowing that I have received and transformed through learning and awareness to help other people.  If you had told me so long ago that someday I’d be writing all about how grateful I was to be able to give back, I would have thought that surely you were lying.  Because back then, I felt like I was at such a deficit that I had nothing to give much less give back.  Today it is different for me in that I am experiencing what all those people have been talking about through the centuries in regards to being of service.  For me, that is where my greatness lays. My natural personality is one of a helper and mediator but taken to the dark edges of the soul I become just as hairless and obsessive about “my lovely” as Gollum. Better to work through my obsequious fear so that I can give untethered service.

Where will your flip side lead you?