Our life can be a wonderful experience, but it can also be mediocre and unfulfilling. At times, we feel free and full of potential, but other times, we find ourselves lost, unsure of what we truly want. We often invest our energy and potential into activities that lack meaning and fall into habits designed primarily to create comfort and safety, which do not support our growth or expansion. We forget to explore the possibilities around us because we are focused on the small details of meaningless obsessions, often passed down from our parents or society. Our value systems are dictated by the media and the status quo, which don’t inspire us to discover our true callings.
Nevertheless, being human is an amazing experience, and it can be deeply fulfilling. We possess incredible qualities—intelligence, creativity, and the ability to transform this planet into a paradise, rather than contribute to its destruction.
Spiritual traditions and teachings have long aimed to help humanity realize and actualize more of its potential. Unfortunately, many of these teachings have been misunderstood or distorted to serve the interests of a few. The dogmas created reduce us to helpless sinners, without hope for salvation, demanding profound changes that seem unattainable for ordinary people.
Focusing on humanity’s shortcomings diminishes our love and appreciation for who we are and what we can become. It prevents us from venturing into the actualization of our potential by instilling a sense of being wrong or deficient.
The idea that we are limited and need to develop can, on one hand, encourage growth, but if viewed negatively, it can become crippling.
If we learn to tolerate the fact that we may not be living up to our full potential, without feeling bad about ourselves, it can actually stimulate our desire to grow. It’s simply how things are—we arrive in life like seeds with the possibility to grow and blossom. Once we understand this, curiosity and love can replace the sense of limitation and feeling lost, transforming it into a recognition of our immense potential, waiting to be actualized—the freedom to truly be ourselves.
The central idea of our approach is that humans have both a Real Self and an Ego, also referred to as Essence and Personality. The Ego and Personality are like an acquired software. This software runs automatically, without any conscious effort. While it helps us function in society, it often prevents our Essence—our True Self—from manifesting and evolving. Our true potential becomes forgotten.
Thus, we can see that we have two aspects: our True Self and our acquired personality or ego.
In our journey toward development and freedom, we start to realize how willful our false personality is. We gravitate towards what is familiar, and when an impulse arises, it seems natural to act upon it; we don’t know how to stop ourselves. We mistakenly believe that these tendencies are a part of who we truly are.
Our True Self, on the other hand, has often been neglected because it wasn’t fully received by our families or society when we were growing up. In fact, when we dared to express it, we were often ignored, rejected, or discouraged. Being real was met with difficulty and danger.
As a result, we become confused, criticizing our True Self—which may still be in an embryonic stage—and reinforcing the personality, which is fully formed and falsely believed to be our true identity. Because we don’t accept or nurture our True Self, it doesn’t have the opportunity to develop. The True Self evolves through engaging with life in a real, authentic way—by being who we are, with all our imperfections and insecurities; through experience, trial and error, participation, and by not hiding or judging it.
During the retreat, we will help you reconnect with your Essence so that it can support your growth and your life. We will also explore and work through the issues that are blocking it.
When we begin to support the journey of our True Self, we start to experience Essence. Essence is the felt manifestation of the qualities of our True Self. Once we realize that we come equipped with these inner allies, we no longer need to question how to live life—we simply know instinctively.
When faced with challenges, we feel equipped rather than deficient, ready to take on life and live fully.
Love,
Emilio
Emilio facilitates the Journey to Essence retreat series at Mandali. Each retreat focuses on a different ‘Latif’, a subtle energy center in the body, associated with specific qualities of being and deeper spiritual states. The next in the series is this December 7-12, 2024, The Black Latifa: Exploring Inner Peace and Personal Power.