Bubbles are lovely, delicate, magical creatures, aren’t they? I quite enjoy drawing a bubble around myself now and again, feeling the safe protection from the harshness of reality, floating around in my own safe little world.
But holy smokes it seems to be bubble-bursting time — and I must say, the whole affair is not particularly pleasant.
There have been some personal bubbles busted up as old unconscious contracts I made in my eight-year-old heart with a dear sister have finally rubbed up hard against raspy realities of the fullness of each of our human frailties. I've had the experience of feeling trapped in some inner demonic energy constellation with her (in my own mind) that surprised the grown-up me; and then made me weep for a few days in childlike grief and loss as the starkness of no-more-rose-colored-bubble reality sank into my psyche.
And for sure I’m watching bubbles bursting all around me. The Behind-Closed-Doors-Sexual-Abuse-As-‘Power-Over’ bubble. The Government-Is-Stately-and-Taking-Care-Of-Us bubble, The America-The-Great-And-Admired-World-Super-Power bubble, and the Planet-Earth-As-Forever-Stable-With-Infinite-Resources bubble.
I’ve discovered that lots of people are waking up out of the I-Am-A-Separate-Animal-And-Must-Protect-Myself-Or-Die bubble, as evidenced by weekly ‘Soul Talks’ gatherings I and a friend held in my community in November and January. That bubble has been quite the thick and sturdy one for most humans for all of our history. It's remarkable and highly significant that we're bursting that bubble for ourselves now.
Pop! Pop! Pop! Pop!
This is what I find on the other side, in that place of No-Bubble.
I see ugly things. Lots of ugly and hurtful things—in myself, in the world, in others.
I don’t float around ‘in love’ with a special someone (and getting a nice oxytocin hit), which makes me sad.
But I'm also not projecting the icky parts of me out into the world . . . I own them.
I see more clearly, which is liberating, even though I don’t always like much what I see.
It sometimes really feels like the grungy spaceship Neo found himself in upon awakening from taking the red pill.
But if I go just a bit futher out . . . if I connect more deeply to the place inside that is bigger than the grown-up me to a cosmic perspective where I know myself to be Consciousness, Presence, then I’m in the white space with Morpheous.
Here, I’m beyond being harmed. Bubbles aren’t relevant. And I can create the reality I wish to experience by choosing what I give my attention to and how. I also know that all the ugliness, all the things I don’t prefer — they also belong. They’re part of the whole dance.
Even, and maybe especially, the beautiful, fragile, magical bubbles.