Written by Ronya Banks – The “Mastering Flow” series (flowdestiny.com) is exploring the realm of natural “flow.” In this realm, the focus is not on “manifesting your desired reality” or “making things happen.” Instead, the mystery of “flow” manifests when you surrender to the unexplainable universal life force that directs your destiny to unfold naturally and effortlessly.
From June 15, 2013 – This series is an ongoing journey involving the exploration of and inquiry into “FLOW.“ I have learned and continue to learn so much from this “FLOW” space, including that while residing in “FLOW,” my life’s destiny is unfolding in a more effortless and yet mysterious way.
I discovered “FLOW” during a time in my life when I was wrestling with a major quandary or question, which goes something like this: “How do I continue living a life with purpose and passion after taking the proverbial plunge into the stream – a stream endowed with egoless-ness?”
Allow me to give you some background information…. During years of consistent and deep mindfulness meditation practice, I saw how many cravings and attachments I was laden with, and how these attachments drove me into making decisions and taking actions that put me into a lot of messy situations. I saw clearly that my motivations and actions were embedded with wanting, judging, striving, trying to manifest what I saw as success and basically causing myself and everyone else around me stress and grief. I am sure none of you can relate to this, right? Anyhow, when things were going good, I was a pleasure to be around, but when things were not going the way I wanted them to, I fell apart. Seeing the futility in this unhappy loop, I began to gradually let go of my ego-based attachments to striving, success, money, possessions, position, you name it – I started setting them down, one by one.
Then to complicate my life further, while attending a month-long silent Insight Meditation retreat, I experienced a profound inner death. Without going into too many belaboring details of this awakening experience, suffice it to say that after getting over a mourning period filled with a sense of loss and confusion, a new space, filled with inner peace within me, remained (which continues to prevail today).
Also, now armored with a clear understanding of the emptiness and futility in following ego-based desires, I just quit! Quit pursuing, striving, trying to make anything happen. But as you can imagine, a major dilemma arose. You see, I was still an adult in this human body having a human experience. Bills continued to arrive in my mailbox, and I still had daily responsibilities to fulfill. I quickly saw that I could not just sit there hours each day, basking in my new spacious awareness. But since my previous ego-based motivations, to make things happen in the outer world, were gone, I was at a loss on how to proceed.
Questions in me arose, like: “Maybe I should renounce lay life and become a Buddhist nun? I would still be fine living anywhere, so perhaps I should live on the street, or with someone I know? Maybe someone who understands my dilemma will take me in and support me?” Does this sound familiar to any of you? If so, you can relate.
Thank goodness that a deep inner wisdom shone through, illuminating to me that although I had this major positive shift in perspective, I had yet to integrate some internal processes, and that for me, following any of these “get supported by someone else” possibilities were not appropriate for my path.
While allowing wisdom to lead me through this integration process (which intuitively feels like a continuous journey), I have discovered and continue deepening my connection with what I am calling: “FLOW.”
“FLOW”, which continues to flow and unfold on this journey, is many things, which I will relate to you in future postings in this blog. In many ways, working with “FLOW” is the opposite of manifesting, and yet it is out of this space that creativity, energy, and life flows. It is mysterious and beyond comprehension, and yet from this space of nothingness, one’s true destiny unfolds.
I am sharing this journey with all of you who would like to access and understand the creative magic of “FLOW”, or for those of you who are already accessing “FLOW” and would like to share your wisdom and understanding with other beautiful beings.
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Ronya Banks is the founder of and lead Mindfulness Meditation teacher at the Asheville Insight Meditation Community in Asheville (ashevillemeditation.com). As a veteran of nearly 30 years of intensive daily meditation practice, Ronya has been exploring the seen and unseen worlds to the point that these distinctions have fallen away and melded into one unifying realm – a realm she calls the “Flow.”
Ms. Banks leads mindfulness trainings for individuals and groups, including businesses (see mindfulnessremedy.comfor more information). She also offers her services to the world as a spiritual guide, business consultant, and energy healer.
