When you know the truth of who you are, you just know. Do you know?
I was interviewed for Tor Njamo's new podcast yesterday and Tor asked whether I identify as the essential self that we are, and I realised the answer was both a yes and a no.
Yes I do. It is who I am. I deeply know it's who I am.
But to say 'I identify as' sounds a bit much.
It just is.
The same way the name I was given is Helen - but I don't remind myself of that all day.
My age is 47 - but I don't need to think about that unless I'm filling in a form.
And I have a female body - but I don't need to identify or not with that. It just is.
How did I get to here?
If we track back a few years, in 2018, I had my initial big awakening - a huge collapse of ideas, big fat sobs and then Cheshire cat smiles - and a deep in-my-bones knowing of OK-ness. When you know, you know.
That OK-ness , that deep, deep OK-ness - that's the feeling of the truth of who we are.
So I could say I knew it at that point because it never fully disappeared from view after that. It was an ever-present knowing in the background. Not something I had to remind myself of. Not something I identified as. But known.
After that stage though, as often happens, I experienced oscillation. The movement from feeling that OK-ness so clearly, and then feeling like it had disappeared, as I started to be shown all the places my thoughts, feelings and actions were out of alignment with that deep, deep OK-ness.
This is the natural process of enlightenment which arises after (and often starts before) awakening. It can be tough. It can feel super challenging. It's a time I am so thankful for having people to walk alongside me in it. To remind me of that OK-ness, as the guiding light inviting us home.
Reliably home.
And so, after much psychological cleaning up in this enlightenment process, I was then drawn to energy transmissions. I was done with talking - but I wanted to know. I wanted to reliably know. I wanted a FULL 'when you know, you know' experience of that OK-ness, so that I would never feel like I'd left home again.
And it happened.
In September 2021 I felt the click of that full realisation. The feeling of fearful contraction in my belly, that I hadn't even noticed was there, was gone. Only noticed in its absence. The knowing of the nondual awareness as the ground of all of this experience was here. And it was beautiful. That deep OK-ness I'd felt those years before, was now reliably known.
And in that 'when you know, you know' there was now no need to do anything to remember that feeling. There was no longer the experience of losing sight of it. It no longer made sense that it could ever go.
It was entirely known as who I am.
So you could say, I now identify as that, and yet to say that 'I identify as' simply feels to be saying too much.
It simply is.
When you know, you know.
With peace, love and joy; Helen
PS: If you want to know this for yourself, "The Complete Book of Awakening" is a fully guided, practical workshop in a book. It invites you to inquire and explore, to recognise the truth of who you are, what you're not, and how these are not separate. All of this so that you too can be in the beautiful, grounding space of 'when you know, you just know'.
