I'm confused.
There are some days - like today - where I feel so intensely vulnerable and uncertain about the path I am on that I am nearly choking on what I can only describe as complete and utter loneliness and bereavement. Today, I am crashing into the outer limits of this limbo-like No Mans Land in the same way that Jim Carey crashed into the fake horizon in The Truman Show when he realised his whole world was an illusion. I feel an acute sense of loss and displacement.
In my deepest heart, I know my purpose is to birth 'No Red Herrings' into this world and I also know that No Red Herrings will in turn create its own healing communities around the globe. I know this at a cellular level, from the deepest part of me. What I do not know is how to navigate the precarious and immediate territory I find myself in.
I have had no active income since April 2010 when I resigned from a fantastic job that I loved in order to pursue my passion and my purpose. Since then, I have relied on U.S funds to take care of practical matters while I maintained focus on shifting paradigms. For me, part of that paradigm shift informs of a new world that is not driven by monetary exchange for goods and services but instead, a world in which we are wholly governed by by passion and service. Its not surprising then, that what I now seem to be attracting into my life are some of the most amazing, enriching and fulfilling experiences and opportunities that further my passion and my purpose to connect with people but do not immediately or directly pay the bills. And for the first time in my life, I am feeling real anxiety about a sustainable future that maintains or betters my current standard of living and remains true to my vision.
On a practical level, I realise the obvious solution is to go back to the corporate world and pursue a job in marketing, promotions or film that at least keeps me out of financial distress, at least until a viable alternative is realised. And yet, that is not the solution either. I cannot go back, even if going forward means learning to survive without money and truly feeling my way into a new way of living. But that seems inconceivable to me, too. I am no longer part of the world I left behind but nor am I a truly awakened individual who has transcended material comforts. I love my life and I enjoy my standard of living and although the idea of living truly off the grid in a sustainable community of like-minded people calls to me at a soul level, now is not the time for that either. So it feels like I am very precariously teetering on a thin red line between two parallel universes, where one beckons to a place of surrender and stillness and the other calls for a reinterpretation of "survival of the fittest". I feel torn and at a loss of how to move forward.
Am I being naive? Am I nothing more than a fool led by romantic idealisations and pipe dreams in a world driven mad by avarice and paranoia? I just wish someone all-wise and all-knowing would tell me that I am unequivocally on the right path, that it will all work out, that there is nothing to worry about and that I (and all of us) will be provided for when we surrender to our hearts and follow our calling. Martin Luther King said that "faith is taking the first step, even when you don't see the whole staircase". I have taken the first step and I am now on the landing where the steps diverge. I don't know who I am, where I am heading or how to get there. All I know is that today I feel alone and in the dark.
