createinresonance

[createinresonance]

Coming Out

A Love Letter to who we truly are

~ Ina Jain ~

It happens at some point if we are lucky enough. If we wake up to our essence. Remember our core. That we fall in love with ourselves in a way we have never before, which means believing ourselves in a way that seems to leave us no choice but to reveal ourselves to our own eyes, own and embody what we know, and eventually become visible in that. More often than not that means a time of friction between who we constructed ourselves to be, often driven by how we interpreted the world and the expectations of people around us. We are so nimble in adapting to our surroundings as part of our survival response in childhood. So the changing and shaping of ourselves starts really early, sometimes so early that we don’t even remember our essence or a time in which that felt still very alive within us. Still nothing is ever lost. Who we are on the inside is always there, our essence waiting inside to be rediscovered. And as it is our essence, it will come out throughout our lives in small or bigger ways, shine through the cracks that are left open for it to show.

If at some point for whatever reason we start remembering, that often comes with a weird mix of crisis and relief, we often choose the word confusion around that, which for me means that the duality that is often quite rigid of right and wrong shifts, and we all of a sudden find ourselves on the other side of what we once stood for or felt a part of. That leads to a dismantling of identity and a deep remembering. If we are lucky it happens within the embrace of relating and connecting to a person or a group of people who are aligned with our essence and who we are becoming, and serve as a living breathing reminder and support for us on this journey of coming out as who we truly are, and offer support on this journey that more often than not is a flickering between holding on to what is familiar and the need to stretch out of that and finally step into who we are in essence.

While old structures fall away it is the biggest gift to have something outside of ourselves to hold on to. We can do it by ourselves, which offers the potential to build a strong bond and trust in ourselves. If we can hold and support ourselves through that kind of a shift, we remember in other scenarios later on what we are capable of, and how we can rely on ourselves. Ideally though it is a combination of the both.

The term coming out brings to mind a realisation, a remembering around sexual identity. And yes, that is a powerful experience of remembering our essence. For me it means connecting to the truth that we already know inside. Allowing the veils to drop away and become awake to fractals of self, of who we are, and how strong that inner guidance is, even when on the outside nothing seems to support that, we just know.

Yet, I feel it is a process that is not restricted to that experience. Actually we come out in so many ways throughout our lives if we connect to our essence and if we have disowned who we are inside at some point in our life. It always comes with a state that we label confusion. And with a sensation that the ground under our feet shifts so quickly we can hardly keep our footing, and for a while it becomes so tempting to go back to what we once believed true, yet that doesn’t seem quite possible anymore. For a while we find ourselves on the battleground of identity. Who we thought we were, who we tried to be, who we shaped ourselves into and who we know we are, and who we are called from the inside out to become from a place of remembered essence all present at the same time.

It often creates a conflict, with what we were once a part of, have shaped ourselves to, adapted to, what made us distort our puzzle piece in the first place. Especially if what we remember is not classified as the norm in the human environments and societies we inhabit. So we have to face what we tried to avoid, mortally afraid to surprise or confuse others and face the consequences.

One of the most powerful and beautiful gifts in that is to be held in that experience, to connect to people who see you, accept you and trust you before you are fully there yet. People who are just there, present on the journey, alongside you, without trying to hurry you along or change your course. It is nothing that can be forced. It is something that needs presence, alignment, a readiness that is entirely individual. All I know is, that you will recognise those people when you come across them.

And it is also crucial that when we encounter someone being on this journey, to ask ourselves honestly if there is alignment for ourselves in this as well in the presence and the support we offer. For it is so easy to want to be there for someone on their journey of transformation from a place of harmful empathy, that in the long run will neither support you or the other. The support I mean will feel effortless, organic, a little bit like breathing because there is a resonance between you, that allows for an opening on both sides, a perfect harmony in giving and receiving. That is when support can truly bloom and resonance offers a space for essence to unfold safely.

Honouring our pace in this can be one of the hardest challenges, for after what often feels like a long time of not allowing ourselves to connect to essence, once we open the doors it can feel like floodgates open and the energy that is suddenly available to us wants to move with a yet unknown urgency. It is then when we are the most vulnerable, and likely to sprint forward in the need of finally expressing ourselves, losing presence in the process to where we are actually at.

There is nothing wrong with that, stumbling is part of the process more often than not, yet it is also the moment where because we are still very raw in who we are becoming that if we fall onto our face, we are most likely to circle back completely to where we set out, retreating on the safe ground of familiar pattern and the identity construct we once so diligently built to hide our essence. It is here when we are likely to disown ourselves yet again with new conviction, it is here when the voices: I told you so, hiding was the best option, well, this proves you can’t trust yourself, you don’t know really, you are delusional, can get stronger than they ever were and stop us in our tracks.

We will circle back eventually from that, most of the time, and we will have learned a lot through it. Yet, I believe it is not necessary to go on this journey of self-inflicted suffering and losing trust in ourselves. What it takes is a self-supporting commitment to the process we are going through. A strong awareness even in the smallest and seemingly ridiculous outside steps, how huge they are in the process we are going through and honouring that truly and fully, not just as lip service but in true understanding of the magnitude of what we are doing.

As crucial as the support is in the beginning stages in remembering our essence, it is actually at this stage, when we have seemingly grappled it all, uncovered it all, come out in whatever way that it is that we are shifting from identity construct into remembered essence, that we are the most vulnerable. For the next step of growing into ourselves is to practice this version of ourselves in our lives, and that is where we so often lose our footing. And that is where support is the most crucial, someone, something that can support us in catching ourselves over and over again, when the battle between what was and what is unfolding, seems to clash in the present moment and invites us to stand still yet again for a moment and just be with it all, rather than jump into action that is more often than not a running away from the discomfort of this prolonged in between stage of who we truly are.

I found that it is here when practices of embodiment are the most crucial, for writing the memories within our bodies, creating a safe space for us to land within ourselves and for all that rises and is alive or gets activated within us to move through, knowing it is part of the process rather than individual states, thoughts, emotions we need to identify with.

Embodiment to me is the key of holding space for all the different parts in me, that are reforming and settling, where who I was and who I am becoming can settle side by side in full body presence. And I can meet myself in all the transformational stages again and again and again from moment to moment and build that fundamental trust, that organically leads to stages of readiness. First usual in the smallest of ways, but then in bigger and bigger steps.

It is here where it is so beautiful and supportive to have others who are there, believing in us, celebrating with us and holding space for us without expectation or judgement, just in a mutual understanding of this shared human journey, from an inside out felt sense of what it is to commit to growing fully human, rather than an attachment to how that has to look on the outside. People who mirror back to us the love, the joy, and the trust in ourselves, when we forget, when remembering becomes too hard.

We are not the same as who we were yesterday, we are constantly changing and evolving, and that is not a curse, it is a gift. Embodying what we know, allowing ourselves to be who we truly are, to me lies at the core of holding ourselves and each other in the tender courage of wild sovereignty. We all hold in our unique and individual ways a piece of the puzzle, that only we can offer to the human story. Nobody can ever or actually should ever take it off our shoulders, they can’t. We have to do it ourselves, that is part of the empowering beauty of the process walking ourselves home but we don’t have to do it alone.

I hope this lands as inspiration and nourishment in between the pages of your life. If this resonated with you, please let me know and feel free to share with others around you, who might also feel inspired by reading it.

Ina Jain : February 2024

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[createinresonance]

Phoenix Chronicles

~ Ina Jain ~

When there is comfort in tears, I know the wind will change. I know that listening to the whisper has already begun. I know it and I still dread it. I know it and I still try to resist it.

Water is the element of change, they say, water is the essence of acceptance. And yet in all its might and terror it can shift the walls that have been the longest on the solid ground.

The wind, changeful call of all that lingers just out of sight. I hear it in the cry of migrant birds. I smell it in the first raindrops settling on spring streets. I taste it in the grapes ripened under autumn suns.

Snow is falling and I rest my head on your heart. It is the steadiest to me and the most mysterious. I know the ice will melt and the wind will turn. I know the clouds will part and rain will fall. There will be comfort in the tears running down my cheeks. I will lift my head and smell the promise of the changing tides. And it will be time to follow the breeze.

I will lift my head and step away. You know it and you don’t resist it. Water and wind we dance the tides. I hold you in the stillness of yet unbroken days. You know the wheel will turn and so do I. Beyond the reef dancers rise on salty spikes. I hold you close. Your fingers along my spine. They urge me to keep listening to the whisper.

Guardian to my song. You catch me to release me. There is no way to do this half way. So I leave my armour at the door. Opening my arms I release you to enfold you when it is time again for us to rest in the crevices between the hours.

Water and wind. We sing with our lives. A promise made between the elements and kept on the edge of coming home.

~ phoenix chronicles : ina jain ~