Peeling Back the Layers of the Onion

“Our deepest fear is not that we are inadequate. Our deepest fear is that we are powerful beyond measure. It is our light, not our darkness that most frightens us. We ask ourselves, ‘Who am I to be brilliant, gorgeous, talented, fabulous?’ Actually, who are you not to be? You are a child of God. Your playing small does not serve the world. There is nothing enlightened about shrinking so that other people won’t feel insecure around you. We are all meant to shine, as children do. We were born to make manifest the glory of God that is within us. It’s not just in some of us; it’s in everyone. And as we let our own light shine, we unconsciously give other people permission to do the same. As we are liberated from our own fear, our presence automatically liberates others.” -Marianne Williamson

"The one who has faith, and is sincere, and has mastery over the senses, gains this knowledge. Having gained this, one at once attains the supreme peace." – Bhagavad Gita

"Who looks outside, dreams; who looks inside, awakes." -Carl Jung

“Know Thyself.” – Socrates

I started therapy at the tender age of 13, when my mother found a journal of mine where I had written feelings about being attracted to another girl. She and my entire family, who were very democratic, strangely sent me to a psychiatrist in Washington, D.C. where we lived over this. I’m sure he was a nice enough man, and I was a pre-teen who did not want to be there. I still remember looking at the Rorschach inkblots, responding that everything looked to me like inkblots, and telling him that the framed picture of an onion on his wall looked to me like a framed onion on the wall. I was not interested in being there and I’m sure I was rude. Recently I heard that Rick Rubin’s parents took him to a psychiatrist when he was 14 and that psychiatrist taught him transcendental meditation. I’m a firm believer that everything happens for a reason, so clearly Rick Rubin, and not me, was meant to learn to meditate at 14.

It wasn’t until I was 24 years old, after 12 years of abusing drugs and alcohol, that I surrendered to the fact that my best thinking was not working well. I started going to 12-step meetings all over L.A. Since I had been fired from my job and I was living with my father and his wife, I did this all day long  - whenever there was a meeting, I was there. I was obsessed with getting better, and all of the “old-timers” said that attending meetings was the way to do it. I got a sponsor and I started sharing in meetings. I also started working the 12 steps, which required doing some deep dives into myself. After about a year of 12-step meetings, I branched out into other meetings, including CODA, Co-Dependents Anonymous, and I started talk therapy with a woman that I wish to this day I remembered because she started me on the path of deep healing. The kind of healing that causes tremors from within to outside of your body. I was shaking for a good two hours after our 3rd or 4th session. She taught me so much about myself and I would love to thank her.

I continued with 12-step groups, group therapy, one-on-one therapy, and self-help for the next 12 years – right up until I moved to the Highlands. I attended women’s weekends, conferences, and talks by people who were well-known in the healing industry like John Bradshaw. Once I lived at the Highlands, I continued doing self-help therapy in the form of different books like Dr. Phil’s book and workbook Self Matters: Creating Your Life from the Inside Out, and The Artist’s Way by Julia Cameron, and I continued to read everything that I could get my hands on up to the present day. Some books and workbooks that have been extremely helpful for me are Dr. Nicole LePera’s How to Do the Work: Recognize Your Patterns, Heal from Your Past, and Create Your Self and Colin Tipping’s Radical Forgiveness series. I also have met with different therapists over the past 24 years.

Understanding why I do what I do, healing the pain and trauma and even tragedy that I have lived through, has been a key part of my spiritual journey. In the 12-step groups, it led me to seek a real Power greater than myself and allowed me to see deeply into my own psyche to understand more about why I do the things I do, why I am triggered by certain events, and has allowed my spiritual life great depth. It has in no way been easy, and it has been really worth it.

Ultimately, meditation is the key to knowing oneself in a real way. Therapy, self-help, and all of the 12-step groups and even online therapists that are available, are a valuable resource and a really great place to start. The ultimate lesson that self-awareness has given me is that it mirrors my meditation by confirming that we all really are the same. At the core of all of us, even with all of our differences, we truly are one humanity, one with All.

Sending love,

Kelly