During a guided visualization last night I asked for an image or a metaphor that represents who I am and what I do in the world. And I was presented with an image from the Disney animation The Little Mermaid, where Ariel is trying to figure out what to do with a fork that she discovered in a shipwreck. She is fascinated with all things human but knows nothing about them and ends up combing her hair with the fork.
That image made me laugh, because The Little Mermaid was one of my favorites when I was a kid. I liked the drama and the humor in it. But it also made me laugh because every time I repeat this guided visualization process of asking for an image for what I am and what I do in the world a new aspect of the initial story comes up and this one was wackier than any before!
A little background to this: I took part in an amazing Woman Unleashed online retreat a few weeks ago and I experienced the STATE process with Devorah Spilman for the first time. It is a guided visualization process to find images, metaphors and stories within that helps you find the answers to your questions and get to know yourself on a deeper and more powerful way. This was were I got my first taste of what it is to have a visual that integrates who I am and what I do in the world. I am and I do many things in life, but the essence of everything I do is help people find their inner treasures and gifts and help them find a way to use it and integrate them into their life. I decided to call it my Soul Treasure Seeker story, because in essence this is who I am and what I do in the world. I help people find their treasure.
Going back to the fork and The Little Mermaid metaphor, having in mind the Soul Treasure Seeker’s narrative. I was surprised to see that fork at first, but very quickly these words came to me….
What may be just a fork to some is a treasure to others
It hit me, that is exactly what happens to most people who embark on a path of find their higher calling, their gifts, talents, purpose or life’s mission. As you start your journey with a bag full of random things, maybe even a fork among them, perhaps a ball, a piece of rope, a marble, a shining mirror, you look at all these little keepsakes as just something ordinary, usual, nothing special. But as you go along and get to know yourself better and deeper you start realizing, that this ordinary every day object is actually an amazing magical power tool, that comes into action when you least expect it. All you need to do is notice it working it’s magic! And the longer you walk on the road of self-discovery and self-creation the more objects in your bag become real tools and talents that you start using to create and change your life and other people’s lives too.
This is exactly what happened to me. My journey started a long time ago, when I was a teenager, but the first part of stumbling and groping around in the dark looking for my path and my purpose took more than 10 years. It was a necessary step in the journey as I came out of it with a bunch of random experiences, skills, talents and tools. Stumbling onto SoulCollage® sky rocketed my journey to self-discovery. I realized this is what I want to do with my life and to become a SoulCollage® facilitator I needed to learn a lot and quickly! So I spent every spare moment for nearly a year making SoulCollage® cards and getting to know them and myself in the process.
After becoming a SoulCollage® facilitator I needed to pull out my bag of random tricks that I have collected over the years and decide if there were tools that I could use in this new part of my journey – leading others on the path of self-discovery. I found some that I already had – communication skills, technical knowledge, business experience, etc. But in process I also found some that I never even though of as useful, like my ability to see connections in what seems to be a random set of events, natural connection to the spiritual realm that made leading meditations surprisingly easy, ability to focus, speaking and writing intuitively and many other unexpected gifts.
So going back to the metaphor of a fork, it could stand for any of your newly discovered and re-purposed talents and abilities. At first you think it is just something totally normal, usual, “doesn’t everyone know how to do this?” sort of thing. But then at some point it hits you – this skill actually becomes a magical tool in your hands, in combination with other abilities and skills it lights up and turns powerful!
And then the creative process starts: How can I use this ability to help myself and others? What other magical powers do I have? Can I find a way to help others discover their own magic? How can I use the same process of finding my treasures to help others?…
Every new skill you find, new technique you learn, new ability you discover you go through the same process until it becomes an instrument as natural to you as your own hand.
So have a look inside your own bag of tricks, how many ordinary “forks” have you got? Are they really that ordinary? Take it out of the bag and give it a wave, look at it closely, maybe ask a friend – is it as ordinary as I think it is? Some of them may simply be forks, but some may be transformed and revealed to be amazing magic powers!
