Riding the Thermal of Personal Growth

I was recently given a reminder from the Universe about the nature of personal growth.  I experienced a significant breakthrough, only to get knocked down the next day by old triggers and patterns.  I was so happy to finally see a little light and have a taste of the sweet freedom from the prison of the old consciousness I had been so diligently working on freeing myself from, and so then all the more devastated and discouraged to immediately experience being right back in that prison.  I lost hope.  I lost faith.  For about twenty-four hours actually.  

But then I remembered.  The nature of our personal evolution and growth is that it is an upward spiral.  Cycles are the fabric of life and spirals are a significant shape occurring naturally in this world.  The thing about a cycle is that there's a high point and a low point.  Just like seasons, just like the wheel of life.  This is a very natural concept.  The thing about spiraling upward is that with each loop, even though you ultimately go higher every time, you will experience a little loss of that height before then soaring even higher.  So you get a taste of the new and then are pulled back into old territory and then expand up even higher than before.  

When we experience a shift into a new, higher consciousness, it is almost like it calls in whatever old we are releasing for one last bout in the ring.  If it has to do with the kinds of relationships we attract, someone from our past might show up (and/or blow up), or we might have just one more of those experiences, like the Universe just has to show it to us one more time as we sweep past it riding our new current, so we can say "...and don't let the door hit you in the ass on your way out!"

I had forgotten about this and instead of hovering lightly over that undercurrent of old, I allowed it to draw me in one last time and shake my faith in the progress I had made and my hope in what I know the future holds.  Only later, as the emotional storm I had allowed myself to be trundled in cleared, did I see it as the lovely sign post it was, confirming that I really had made a shift in my consciousness and was indeed spiraling upward.

So I am reminded to be gentle with myself and with others.  Like ocean waves that recede and each time push a little further up onto the shore, it might look and feel like we are losing ground in our battle for personal transformation and accessing our higher vibration when we are really still moving upward.  It's all part of the larger process that many times is hidden from our view.  But if we remember to ride on the wings of hope and faith, we will continue to spiral upward to places we never imagined possible.