True nature?
I hope you are curious about this phrase. Does it mean that you are doing something that offends others but you cannot control it? That something etched into your character is unchangeable but others wished you would change it? Is it a kind of get-out clause when the going gets rough….’Ah well, it’s in my nature, etc?’
The word nature has many connotations:
something natural and therefore wholesome?
being at ease in any situation, staying calm and always being in control?
showing your shortcomings in public and feeling overwhelming disapproval?
Good natured? Bad natured?
Mother Nature and the Universe?
And so on……
But here I’m talking about something quite magical. So let me start off by telling you a little story. Stories always help because you become a child when you listen and the story magic works on your unconscious mind in a subtle and often long-lasting way.
Once upon a time there was a poor man with a big family who had to work so hard to earn so little money. It got to the point where he couldn’t feed his children or plan for the future of his two beautiful daughters which as the custom went he would have to provide a dowry for when they married. So, reluctantly, he decided that they had no choice but to leave and go to a distant land where he could find ways of increasing is earnings and send money home. He packed a few possessions and set off for the long walk which would take him across mountains and deserts to reach such a land.
Once he arrived there because he was quite young and willing he quickly found work and began to earn more money. In time, his employers liked his work so much that they increased his wages and gave him more and more responsibility.
Eventually, he became a manager and was able to buy a big house and land, and live like a Lord. At this point, he had been away so long that he forgot about his wife and children in his distant homeland, and met and married another woman. His life was so changed. He could relax and start to enjoy it a little.
His employers gave him more and more responsibility but then he got in with the wrong type and started to drink excessively and to gamble. One day, he realized he had lost everything he had earned and acquired. So, finding he had lost even his fine clothes, he put on his tattered traveller’s outfit and set out wearily on the long journey home.
When finally he arrived his family was very glad to see him to his surprise because he had let them down so badly. So, he settled back into family life with deep gratitude even though he was still poor. In his absence, his mother had died and he was called to her house to attend to her affairs. She had left a letter for him which he opened sadly because he had not been able to say goodbye to her.
The letter read, “My dear son, I am sad when I think about your life of back-breaking work for so little reward. I was sure you would return to us a rich man, but that was not to be.
However, please now look inside the lining of your traveling coat. Before you left, I repaired this coat but in fact I sewed the family jewel inside to keep it safe. All you needed was with you all the time but you thought you could find it outside. Please learn from my final wisdom to you. My son, you have all you need to be completely happy inside your own heart.”
He gently felt along the seam of his coat and sure enough he could feel something. He took a knife and gently cut the stitching and a large ruby fell out. He cried large tears which were a mixture of joy and sadness: joy that he and his family had a secure future and sad that he had been so blind and caused such suffering for his loved ones.
So, your true nature is just like the poor man’s ruby sewn into the lining of his traveling coat. We all have a powerful gemstone inside us but because it is hidden and we neglect it, it steadily loses its shine and eventually becomes encrusted with dirt so that we cannot recognize its power.
Like the poor man in the story, he had given up on his own uniqueness, his treasure mind, his divine spark because he was forced to suffer in poverty and frustration. But if he had respected and gazed at the remarkable spirit he came into human life with, he could have polished his talents and changed his destiny.
This unique spirit, this talent to embody all love and light is something we can see so clearly in new creatures and babies. If they are healthy, their spirit is potent and gleaming, their curiosity and energy is joyful and their love unconditional. The world is new to them and the dominance of their culture and conditioning not yet exerting a strong influence.
If we watch children at play, we can see from the way they use their bodies that they are at ease, their spine and joins supple and open. They move around without effort delighting in or perhaps fearing the stimuli they find in their new environment. They are one with everything around them because they have not yet learned how to use thought to separate themselves away, to assert themselves, to develop their ego and personality. But most important of all, they do not wear any social masks.
If they feel anger, they usually show it spontaneously. If they feel joy, then their laughter in infectious. They live for love, crave the constant attention of their closest parent and seem not to have a care in the world. This lack of care shows in their bodies – free moving, balanced, no blocked energy, because they have not yet learned how to worry or compare themselves with others except at a superficial level.
We can also see this freedom especially in movement in animals. One of the most exciting sites I have ever witnessed was watching a cheetah hunting a gazelle on the African savannah. It totally embodies its instincts and its survival needs as it runs at lighting speed, flowing like a rapid stream of muscles, tendons and ligaments.
Remember! You have got a unique and glorious gem in your heart like the poor man. This is your inheritance, your true nature, and we can polish it until it dazzles and creates a bright light in the universe!!
This is the introduction to a new book I am building on my website at – www.flourishwrite.org. The title – ‘TRUE NATURE: Our Supreme Inheritance; how to take down your masks and stop repressing your natural urges.’ Please come and join me if you are curious about your gem stone within and how to polish it once you have found it!
Images courtesy of megapixyl.com: Feather on the sand – https://www.megapixl.com/tomy86-stock-images-videos-portfolio; Colourful Bhutanese art of Tibetan dragon painting – https://www.megapixl.com/wanchanta-stock-images-videos-portfolio; Diamond card – https://www.megapixl.com/kalsers-stock-images-videos-portfolio; Cheetah run – https://www.megapixl.com/rgbe-stock-images-videos-portfolio