A Travel Essay from the Inner Journey

In the Gene Keys teachings, the Sphere of the IQ is described as “the catalytic spark of universal intelligence that channels energy directly through your neurology, triggering insights and awakening vitality from within”. So, it’s pretty bloody important for everyone.

And I keep feeling like this Gene Key 12 that I have here is of supreme importance to me. Not only is it this IQ catalyst, but it is also in my Relating sphere in the Star Pearl, it is my husband’s Life’s Work and it was my dad’s Evolution. This Gene Key is, I feel, very connected to my masculine energy, not only through the fact that the two most influential men in my life have/had it in such pivotal places, but because I have it here in my IQ, which is all about my mind, which is most definitely where my masculine energy lives.

And what if that right there is the key to catalysing my insights and my vitality? What if that move out of the masculine mind that has ruled so much of my life, into the feminine heart that is all softness and gentleness, is the key to my evolution and growth as a person?

If the IQ Gene Key is the one that invites me into true, heart-centred intelligence, then I must follow my heart. I must trust my heart to make the right decisions. I must trust my heart to know what is right for me to hold in my hands, and what I should let go of; what I should let float by me on the river of life, because even if it looks to my mind like something I should go after, my heart will know if it is not right.

Discrimination IS about knowing what is right for me. What a world of possibility opens up before me, if only I can trust in my own Discriminating faculties.

The IQ Energy is Intense, but Oh! It’s SO Natural

Yes, this sphere of the IQ, which is all about those teenage and young adulthood years, is very intense, but I am okay with intensity. It doesn’t scare me in the least. I am so hungry for the natural synchronisation with transformation that the Gene Keys talks about, that I am completely open to whatever may come. I look at the transformations that have happened in my life so far, since I first began this inner work journey, and my life is unrecognisable … I am unrecognisable.

I am no longer the frightened woman who keeps herself locked in a box.

I am no longer the silent woman who will never let her voice be heard.

I am no longer the broken woman who cowers like a whipped dog.

Yes, I am wounded, and yes, I have more work to do. But so is every human alive. Now, I am so much more ME, I am standing in my power. I am using my voice. I am visible. I am safe. I am in sync with my own natural rhythm. I travel to the beat of my own drum.

And the most important thing I can do is trust in life. It is trust that will allow me to ground the excess energy that comes from the emotional charge of any “difficult” situations that may arise.

Even though I have done so much inner work, even though I have wrought great changes in myself and in my life, there are still challenges. I am human. To be a living woman is to face challenges (plus I have Provocation and Struggle in my Life’s Work/Evolution – hello Challenge, my old friend!).

But what can ground me when those Provocations and Struggles come up? Trust, of course. Trust in the flow of dharma that brought me here. Trust in the karma that whatever is happening holds a lesson for me. Trust that inside every Shadow is the Gift and the seed of the Siddhi.

And trust in myself to be strong enough, tenacious enough, and flexible enough, to go with the flow.

My mind must be like water!

Trust is the anchor that stops me from being washed away in a flood of emotion or drama.

Trust that I am able to navigate even the most turbulent waters.

Living Authentically Requires Deep Acceptance

To live authentically involves a deep acceptance of the totality of the human experience – feeling the full spectrum of your open-hearted emotions, from deep grief, shame and pain to its highest glory of liberated joy.

The Sage’s Golden Path Retreat

I smiled as I wrote that sentence in my journal, because it sums up exactly why I am doing this work. It’s like a mantra, a call to action, and a prayer.

It is a crystal-clear instruction and I am happy to bend to this rule.

To live authentically is a primary goal of mine. To be me, fully, unapologetically, passionately me! 

For so much of my life, authenticity felt like an alien concept. Who does that?! Who is completely and honestly themselves?

No one. We are all playing parts that some great games master or playwright dreamed up as ideals to be aimed for. The perfect daughter, friend, lover, wife, mother. All roles I tried so hard to fulfil, all roles that made me feel like a failure, because I was trying to fit into a mould that wasn’t right for me. I was never authentic.

Authentic me didn’t look anything like the girls, women, daughters, wives or mothers around me. Authentic me was wild and free. But authentic me wasn’t good enough, was she? She didn’t fit the norm. So, she had to be locked in that glass box that Gene Key 12 so expertly crafted for me, when I was so young … 14, 15, too young to know that it was not only keeping me safe, it was keeping me isolated.

I live authentically now. I’m not going to claim that I am 100% authentic, 100% of the time. I still have to fit into a “normal” life with a job and responsibilities. But my authenticity is so powerful now, it is a force in my life that I cannot and will not ignore. I strive for authenticity in all that I do, even the “normal”, mundane things I have to do.

Deep acceptance is what the Gene Keys have taught me. That deep acceptance of the totality of the human experience is my goal, it is the noble goal I aim for every day. I am human, so the myriad of emotions that all humans feel … fear and ecstasy, joy and sadness, anger and love, frustration and contentment … I feel them too, and all are welcome here in my open heart.

How can I live fully, how can I live in affinity with life, how can I suck its marrow, if I do not welcome in and accept all of my emotions? I cannot. It is simply not possible to only accept the good stuff! If I am to live with a consistently open heart, which is what this work eternally asks of me, then I must be in deep acceptance of the totality of this human experience.

I Must Accept it ALL

This Gift of the IQ says … accept it all … from deep grief, shame and pain … to the highest glory of liberated joy … and honestly, that idea cracks me open.

Grief, shame and pain have all been travelling companions on my journey through life. I carry wounds of grief that are over 50 years old. I carry so much shame, especially from these teenage years, and from the decades that followed.

And that is okay.

I can, I have, accepted all of it. Oh, the liberation one feels when the floodgates of deep acceptance open. You are not fooling yourself into believing that it wasn’t that bad, or you weren’t that hurt. Because it was, and you were.

No, you are accepting all of it as the dharma and karma you came here to live through and to catalyse into pure joy.

Oh, the liberation in knowing that one is capable of feeling both deep grief and deep joy at the same time. We are complex engines of emotion, but the key to all of this is simple … open your heart and love. Love even your pain. Love even when you are in pain. Love all of it, for it means you are alive, and living your life fully.

The Gift of Your IQ is an Attitude that Frees your Thinking

In the Gene Keys teachings, we learn that the Gift of our IQ is an attitude that helps free our thinking. So, I asked myself, in the pages of my journal, How is Discrimination an attitude? How does that work? For me, starting with a question is the best way to get my contemplation juices flowing!

I think Discrimination is an attitude of trust (there’s that word again!!). It is an attitude that invites me into trusting my intuition, an attitude of trusting that life will bring me what I need, when I need it, And so, with this attitude of trust opening my heart, I am able to stay open to opportunities.

Discrimination is an attitude of following my heart.

I’m putting this into practice right now, in a real-life situation that I am going through. We are looking for a new house, and there is some pressure on us from someone who wants to buy our current house, but who is in a rush. It would be easy for me to rush too; to think that I have to rush to choose a new house, just because we have this buyer for ours waiting.

But I don’t. I have to do what is right for me. I will go into the prospective houses, and I will let my heart and my intuition choose. I will not be rushed. I will not settle for less than the absolutely perfect house for us, even if it means the potential buyer for ours goes elsewhere. I will not be pressured.

I will trust myself to make the right choice, and because I trust myself, the right choice will be easy to make. Trust rewires my brain so that I don’t expect things to go wrong. Trust allows me to see the right opportunities when they come along.

This is not some magical thinking manifestation thing. This is me, feeling safe to take the right action at the right time. This is me, trusting my own decisions and my own choices. Shit! But this is a good place to be in!

And this then opens me to greater love and compassion, because it allows me to be more compassionate with myself. It allows me to treat myself with love. It allows me to then let that love and compassion wash out onto other people. I can only hold more love and compassion for others if I first hold it for myself. It’s really a win-win situation! I feel better, and those around me feel better. I do what is right for me, and I open the way for others to do what is right for them.

My IQ Gift of Discrimination

Before I go any further, I want to just bring in some of my favourite meanings of this word “discrimination” (merci, M. Roget!) …

intelligence, capacity, comprehension, understanding, sagacity, wit, esprit, gumption, grasp of intellect, acuteness, acumen, subtlety, penetration, perspicacity, good judgment, refinement, wisdom, sapience, good sense, reason, solidity, depth, profundity, calibre; enlarged views, compass of thought, enlargement of mind, genius, inspiration, geist, fire of genius, soul, talent, Wisdom in action, prudence, self-possession, aplomb, ballast, a bright thought

Oh my god! I just love these for me!! “Discrimination”, which at first seemed rather banal, suddenly takes on a refined aura of wisdom and genius! I bloody love it!!

The gift of Discrimination is to know inherently what you love, what is authentic, and then channel this awareness into your life as art.

The Sage’s Golden Path Retreat

What I love and what is authentic for me is doing this work.

It is living my simple, handmade life.

It is growing my understanding of myself, and then growing myself as a person.

What I love is love!

What I love is peace and simplicity.

What I love is truth and honesty.

What I love is creativity.

What I love is nature.

What I love is this life I live now.

And how I channel all that I love into art is through my writing, through my words. Life as art, that is how I want to live. Life as a creative, spiritual practice. Life as a canvas to paint with love.

That is the life I want to create.

Now, I don’t think of myself as an exceptionally talented artist/writer, as the Gene Keys suggest of people with this GK12 in their IQ sphere. I think what I am is honest. I think that what I am able to do is put into words the feelings that others may have, but cannot express.

I do have an exceptional talent for being me! I do have an exceptional talent for doing the deep inner work and pulling nuggets of gold out of the void within me, and bringing them back to the surface to share with others.

I do have a talent for being honest with myself.

I am deeply in love with my life and with this path I am on.

Is that enough? Is living my own simple life enough? I guess it will just have to be, because this is the life I am living. So, it must be right.

The Refinement of Authentic Expressions of Creativity

Richard Rudd says, “Discrimination takes the vain urge to be better than others as an opportunity to refine authentic expressions of creativity.” There is that word authenticity again (and “refinement” which was in my list of Thesaurus words!). This is the key to Discrimination.

Authenticity. Living it. Recognising it in others. I can only be the best version of myself if I am being utterly authentic. There can be no fakery. There can be no falseness. There can only be absolute honesty, absolute truth.

I am safe to show my real face to the world. I am safe to be myself. My authentic self is perfect. She glitters with natural gold stars. She doesn’t have to strive to be better than others, to “win”. No one is better than anyone else. We are all equal. We are all worthy. If I take away that feeling of incessantly having to prove myself, if I take away that striving to be accepted, and instead simply be myself, my raw unfiltered, authentic self, then there is nothing to prove. I simply get to be me. And I am enough just the way I am.

These high standards become the ability to discriminate and critique art and expression, not as a form of malice or judgment, but as a radar for what is true.

I think this is something I have always inherently been good at. I am sure everyone thinks their taste is the best, but I think that I am able to see when someone is expressing something that is true to their heart, and when they are just out to make money. Not that there is anything wrong with making money from art. But there’s a different energy to art that comes from the heart and soul.

Richard also says, “Discrimination is the ability to recognize the beauty of true expression, as well as see through falsehoods and concealed agendas.”

This is not just a statement about art, this is about life. This is about people being truthful and authentic. This is about people living with integrity. And I must always shine this light of truth and integrity on my myself first. I must always see through my own concealed agendas. There can be no falsehoods. There can be no pretending to be something I am not.

In order to keep the channels of discernment and discrimination clear, I must myself always radiate clarity, authenticity and truth.

This Gift is where my innate desire to be authentic comes from. I cannot critique life unless I am first looking honestly at myself. Understanding this Gene Key is pivotal to understanding myself. How perfect that I have it here in my IQ, where my mental thought patterns and beliefs were formed.

Diving Fearlessly into the Drama of Life

Oh, what a delicious invitation that is, to dive into the drama of life without fear and allowing every experience to be expressed through authenticity and creativity! I am not entirely sure I’m there yet! I still get caught in the drama. I still feel fear. 

But I am getting better at spotting the fear, I’m getting better at catching my Shadows in the act! I am getting better at pulling myself back and reminding myself not to get sucked into the fear, not allowing myself to be literally over-Shadowed by it!

Life is always going to throw up challenges. Life is always going to bring Provocations and Struggles. 

Do I react out of fear, or do I step into this authenticity of Discrimination and trust that I will know the right next step?

Do I allow my fears of exhaustion and overwhelm to win out? Or do I say, no, I will not succumb to fears.

I know that I can cope with anything. I know that if I take one honest step at a time, then I can climb the mountain, step by step.

I am being triggered by a situation in my life right now … I can respond creatively, by leaning into my Gifts. My Dynamism will keep me going, even when the fear of exhaustion threatens to overwhelm me. My Perseverance will keep me going until I get the outcome that is right for me. My Authority knows that I can handle anything. And my Resourcefulness does handle everything!

I can lean on all of my prime Gifts, and I can lean into this IQ Gift to know what is right for me.

So, I must focus on bringing my Gifts to the fore and not allow myself to be engulfed by my fears. My fears can turn me into a nag and a shrew (my mean names for myself!). My Gifts make me expansive and honest. My Gifts soften me and melt my walls.

Every Shadow I have is just fear in different clothing.

But every Gift is love.

I have all of these amazing Gifts so alive in me. I have all these flavours of love. I need only lean into them; I need only let go of the fear and simply trust.

No one has power over me. No external circumstance has power over me.

Even in this current life situation I am in right now, even if it is all really hard, I can say no; I can say, stop, this is all going too fast; I need to pause and think about this. I’ve been having these crazy dreams lately, where I’ve been having to deal with all these huge things happening in one day, and this is leaving me anxious and strung out. But I am allowed to dictate the pace of life. I am allowed to slow things down to a pace I am comfortable with.

I can hone my skills of Leadership and Acceptance, so that ultimately, I can step into freedom.

Emotions are NOT the Enemy

What this Gift teaches me is that I am safe. Even when I am feeling overwhelmed, I am still safe. The tidal wave of emotions can wash around me, it doesn’t have to engulf me. The fear may seem like a tangible enemy I have to defeat, but it is just an emotion. I can allow it to be there. I can accept that it is what I am feeling, but fear does not hold a knife to my throat. It has no power over me. It is simply there, one emotion in the great panoply of emotions we feel as humans. 

Far more important are the emotions of love, joy, the exuberance and ecstasy of creativity.

Emotions are not my enemy. My dear friend Hayley, my Gene Keys Guide extraordinaire, said this to me, the first time we worked with this Gene Key …

“You let life and let love into your heart. Nothing and no one can really wound you.”

… and I carry her image of my open heart with me every single day.

Hayley also taught me that if I do not fall in love with something, I will distrust it, and the same goes for people in my life. She could see that, to me, authenticity is EVERYTHING.

This is something I am learning to trust more every day. My gut, my heart, they know when someone or something is right for me. I sense authenticity. I must learn to trust my intuition. I must learn to trust my body; she knows what is right for me. If she is saying slow down and be still, then that is what I must do. If she is saying this is too much, I need to stop, then that is what I must do.

I can trust these feelings, all of these emotions. They are not my enemy, they are my fiercest companions.

The Myth of True Love

Ultimately these people are driven by the myth of true love – that is what they are yearning for deep within their souls.

Hayley and/or Richard! I’m not sure which words were whose!

I got this line from my Ignite Your Life notes the first time I went through my Golden Path.

And that there is the truth of Discrimination for me … I yearn for true love. I have yearned for it my whole life.

And here I am, living the myth in my real life.

I must stop being afraid and give into life.

I am only afraid because I feel as if I am not in full control of events.

But when are we ever?

I am safe.

And that is all I need to know … I am safe!

All of the pictures in this essay are of waves … I love the sea, it is my happy place, and the power of waves always feels so elemental to me. My emotions are like waves, powerful, ever shifting, ever moving. So these felt like the right images for this turbulent teenage Gift of my IQ.

You can see more of my photographs on my Flickr page … there are LOADS of waves!!