Lifeletter #121: The Labyrinth of Your Life

About eight years ago I walked the labyrinth in Chartres Cathedral in France. This labyrinth is famous—many thousands of people have walked through its twists and turns. I had a powerful experience there, in which I experienced directly how this labyrinth reflects the nature of life. Something in the presence of that vast cathedral, and the millions of pilgrims who came there to pray to Mary, seemed to heighten my awareness of what this labyrinth was designed to reveal.

As I made my way around the labyrinth, I kept thinking I knew when I was on the right track. I’d be getting closer to the great six petalled flower in the centre, and this sense of ‘yes, I’m nearly there!’ would overtake me. And then the next twist would take me back out and away from the centre. It happened over and over again. I couldn’t find the way back to the centre.

Finally I ended up on one pathway that was taking me further and further out. No matter what I did, I was getting closer and closer to the very edge of the labyrinth, further and further away from the sacred flower in the centre. I started to feel cold, lost, and discouraged. Then I stepped on a new pathway, and in less than thirty seconds, it took me straight to the centre. I was so surprised. I stood there in the centre of the enormous space of Chartres, one of the great temples on our planet, built for Mary, the great mother. Everything went silent inside me, and I fell into a whole body recognition of how much like real life this labyrinth is.

My experience at Chartres is just how it goes on our human journey. It’s heartbreaking to feel lost, abandoned, and alone, so far from the divine centre of our being. I meet so many people who carry a deep longing to feel supported by the unseen, by the divine, by a great field of intelligence and love, larger than ourselves. We are hoping to find the evidence for this, to be able to trust in this mysterious presence. And it’s not easy.

The truth is, the evidence is already here. This great intelligence and love is the ground of our life, but we have not yet learned to trust in this, and to receive the signs of its existence. Instead we have been deeply conditioned to perceive the world from a core sense of separation. The great field of loving intelligence that holds us all is excluded from our reality, and we do not know how to attune to it, how to listen, how to receive the evidence that is all around us. We remain lost in the labyrinth of the mind.

Sometimes I invite the people I work with to do an experiment. I ask them to make a request to the great field of loving intelligence. This is a request, in their own words, for evidence of the existence of this divine energy, that which is unseen and invisible to our human eyes.

I’ve done this experiment myself, several times. Sometimes people speak directly to this unseen energy and say, “Okay, I need to receive evidence of your existence within the next 48 hours. I’m ready, please show me!” It’s very interesting, what unfolds for each person. What happens to me is that I really start to wonder about what is not evidence of the divine source? As Rob Brezny says, “Thousands of things go right for you every day, beginning the moment you wake up.” How on earth did I fail to notice this?

For other people, the signs of a deeper and wider dimension of life appear in all sorts of subtle ways. A moment of unexpected love with a friend, an email they never expected, a movement of energy in their heart, a flash of insight, a dream, a soft whisper in the depths of their being.

The ones who are disappointed are the ones who were looking for a miracle, a great sign, something momentous. Most of the time, this doesn’t happen. We need to learn another language, if we want to make contact with this invisible dimension of life. If we want to find out way through the labyrinth to the centre. Our culture doesn’t speak this other language. It only knows the language of the mind, the logical linear intelligence. What we need to learn is the language of the heart, of the body, of our deep intuitive intelligence. This intelligence is always speaking to us, but we don’t hear it. We cannot understand this language, unless we take the time to slow down, unless we open ourselves to discovering a whole new way of paying attention to our life.

This subtle, non-linear language can wake us up from the spell that binds us. Our culture has literally cast a spell on us, a powerful spell that is difficult to break. Difficult but not at all impossible. Inside this spell, everything seems to be telling me that I am separate, that life is not safe, that I have to struggle and try to control everything. Because I am all alone.

The signs that this is not true, the signs that we are living inside a great field of love and wisdom are everywhere. Don’t look for this evidence to appear like a great star in the sky, leading you to Bethlehem. Look for the small signs, the ones that are so close to you, you never even knew they were there.

If any of you want to undertake the experiment I have written about here, please let me know how it goes.

with love and gratitude,
Shayla