WHAT FALLS AWAY

Awakening takes everything—especially what no longer serves your soul.

There comes a time on the spiritual path—not necessarily marked by a thunderclap of realization or a single blazing moment of awakening—but more often by a slow erosion. A quiet, relentless undoing. You begin to notice that something is changing. Not just in your thoughts or your emotions, but in how you relate to the world.

You go to meet your old friends… and something’s different. The words don’t come. The laughter feels distant. The connection you once leaned on like a pillar has become mist. You try to explain, but they look at you with that confused, slightly concerned face. Maybe they say, “Are you okay?” Or maybe they don’t say anything at all—but you feel the message: Come back. Come back to who you were.

But you can’t.

And here is the heart of it: you can’t carry the old and the new.

When awakening begins to stir, even subtly, it pulls at the very roots of your identity. The conditioned self—the one who agreed to the silent contracts of society, family, friendship—is no longer fully in charge. The deeper current of truth begins to flow through, and with it comes a strange and often painful freedom.

Because what falls away is not just what you thought you didn’t need. It's often what you thought you could never live without.

Friendships. Family bonds. The games you played to stay comfortable, to belong, to be seen. You begin to see the patterns—not just in others, but in yourself. The ways you performed, kept quiet, laughed along, agreed when you didn’t. And now… that performance is impossible. Not because you’ve become better or above it, but because it hurts to stay untrue.

There’s grief in this. There’s loneliness. There’s a limbo, a space between worlds. The old world—the matrix of contracts and compliance—no longer holds you. But the new world, the one born of transparency, love, and real presence, is still forming.

You might find yourself misunderstood. You might try to spiritualize your friends, to bring them along. I did. It doesn’t work. You can’t force this path on anyone. It must arise from within, in its own time, or not at all.

And so you walk.

Sometimes alone. Sometimes confused. Sometimes elated by the simplicity of truth. But always, if you stay with it, if you honor the flame that’s been lit, you will begin to feel the emergence of something real. Not a better version of your old life, but a new foundation entirely. Not built on performance or pattern, but on presence.

This is not destruction. This is purification. What falls away was never truly yours.

What remains is who you are when there’s nothing left to protect, prove, or perform.

What remains is the silent intimacy of being.

_____________________________

Silence is the greatest teacher
And the most ruthless guide
Giving you nothing and everything
At the same time.

-------------------------

The thinnest veil separates resistance and acceptance
We imagine the gulf is vast
But it is gossamer thin
And just requires a shift from no to yes
And in that shift the mind becomes helpless
There is your death.

------------------------

Friend, have you been deep into your darkness?
If you have not, then something will be missing
From your transformation
And it will constantly try and get your attention.

____________________

You will not find peace
by avoiding the fire.
The peace you seek
is inside the burning.

___________________

The fire carried by others
That sets you alight
And burns up your falseness
Must then be carried by you
In whatever way you can.

____________________

Yanked from the safety of unconditional warmth
Where we lived and grew for months
Fed and nurtured and always held
Unaware of what awaits

How was it, we appeared as if from nothingness
And grew these fingers and toes
And incredible inner systems of life?

Friend, we live in forgetfulness 
And take it all for granted
How rude and selfish we are
That we forget so much.

--------------------------

The Only Reality.

There is no reality anymore.
Nothing is real.
Trust no image or projection.
Doubt everything you see and hear.

The only truth is deep inside—
but you must travel
beyond your own beliefs,
deeper than your conditioned mind,
way down into the unknown.

There, in that darkness,
is the only reality there is.
You will never name it,
never own it,
but it will inform your every action
and offer you an integrity,
a naturalness
unavailable to the surface self.

All else is a dream.

An image from our recent California retreat.