{"id":1479,"date":"2022-06-07T12:22:48","date_gmt":"2022-06-07T16:22:48","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.celiamcbride.com\/?p=1479"},"modified":"2022-06-07T12:22:48","modified_gmt":"2022-06-07T16:22:48","slug":"return-of-spirit","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.celiamcbride.com\/?p=1479","title":{"rendered":"Return of Spirit"},"content":{"rendered":"

\"\"<\/a><\/p>\n

Dearest Readers,<\/p>\n

As many of you know, I’ve spent the last six years writing a spiritual memoir called\u00a0O My God: An Un-Becoming Journey<\/em>, and am now in the final stages of assisted publishing with Tellwell, a Canadian indie company. Fingers crossed, the book will be available for purchase in June.<\/p>\n

Am I over the moon with excitement? A part of me is doing a happy dance, yes, but the inner critics (there are more than one), released an avalanche of negative self-judgement while I was completing the penultimate polish of the manuscript, and with it came a pile of dread.<\/p>\n

If you have your own inner critics you know they aren’t very kind. I struggled to finish the draft while the “voices of dissent” (as I like to call the barrage) went on and on. I listened to them, tuned them out, asked for help and took care of myself. It took me a while, but I eventually remembered that negative voices are not truth-tellers. They are fearful needs trying to get met.<\/p>\n

Last week, I managed to complete the draft and submit it to Tellwell, and later that day I went for a massage. It was good timing. I could reward my achievement by doing something special and allow myself to receive intense self-care at the same time.<\/p>\n

Just before getting on the table, the massage therapist asked me if I’d like to pick a card.<\/p>\n

“Always,” I said.<\/p>\n

He held up a deck in a black box, emblazoned with an image of a fluorescent, psychedelic phoenix on the front, accompanied by the deck’s name: “Return of Spirit.”<\/p>\n

He shuffled, and held out the fanned cards. I let my fingers hover above them, feeling for the energetic pull. A card found my fingers and I slid it out.<\/p>\n

We looked. The image matched the one on the box. The card read “Return of Spirit.”<\/p>\n

“No one has ever pulled that card before!” he exclaimed. “That is the first time anyone has\u00a0ever\u00a0<\/em>got that card! It’s the master card!”<\/p>\n

I smiled. The Universe has its ways, doesn’t it?<\/p>\n

Excitedly, he read the card’s wisdom:<\/p>\n

“You have come a long way in your journey.\u00a0No, it hasn’t been easy<\/em>, but you have made it through. Acknowledge, for just a moment, the strength and courage that you have discovered within you. This is the card of triumph, heart-felt connection, and mastery. Hold your head high and feel proud of who you are … Your spiritual connection to Source is stronger now than it has ever been.”<\/p>\n

Really? I was a little baffled. I wasn’t feeling anything close to triumph or mastery. The illness I wrote about in my\u00a0last<\/a>\u00a0two<\/a>\u00a0letters is still with me, the inner critics had just spent days trying to kill me … oh, and there’s some other hard stuff happening: a pandemic, a war in Ukraine, nasty divisions bubbling up everywhere, climate change.<\/p>\n

No, it\u00a0hasn’t<\/em>\u00a0been easy. For anyone.<\/p>\n

“But you have made it through.”<\/p>\n

Well, yes.<\/p>\n

Could you acknowledge\u00a0just for a moment\u00a0<\/em>the strength and courage you’ve discovered within you?<\/p>\n

Yes … I could.<\/p>\n

Could you hold your head high and feel proud of who you are?<\/p>\n

“Now wait a minute,” the critics jump in, “that is going toooo far into the corny-mushy-gushy zone.”<\/p>\n

Shhh. It’s okay. Just relax already. You don’t have to police that zone. It’s not your job.<\/em><\/p>\n

Okay. You’re right. I’m relaxing. Sigh.<\/p>\n

Now. Could you trust that your spiritual connection to Source is stronger now than it has ever been?<\/p>\n

Well …<\/p>\n

Well?<\/p>\n

Well, yes. I suppose I could. I pulled Master Card, didn’t I?<\/p>\n

You certainly did.<\/p>\n

Whoot-whoot! I pulled the Master Card! Happy dance! Head-held-high-and-proud dance! Goofy-silly-freedom dance! I’m-publishing-a-book-that-took-me-six-years-to-write dance! Yee-haw! Yippeeee! Wheeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeee!!!!<\/p>\n

From the corny-mushy-gushy fires of love,<\/p>\n

Celia<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

Dearest Readers, As many of you know, I’ve spent the last six years writing a spiritual memoir called\u00a0O My God: An Un-Becoming Journey, and am now in the final stages of assisted publishing with Tellwell, a Canadian indie company. Fingers crossed, the book will be available for purchase in June. Am I over the moon…<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[1],"tags":[1042,923,1041,1043,1040,1039,910],"class_list":["post-1479","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-uncategorized","tag-accomplish-your-goals","tag-healing","tag-healing-cards","tag-how-to-be-brave-in-the-face-of-fear","tag-inner-critic","tag-memoir","tag-spiritual-journey"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.celiamcbride.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/1479","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.celiamcbride.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.celiamcbride.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.celiamcbride.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/users\/1"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.celiamcbride.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcomments&post=1479"}],"version-history":[{"count":1,"href":"https:\/\/www.celiamcbride.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/1479\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":1481,"href":"https:\/\/www.celiamcbride.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/1479\/revisions\/1481"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.celiamcbride.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fmedia&parent=1479"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.celiamcbride.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcategories&post=1479"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.celiamcbride.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Ftags&post=1479"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}