Everand Logo

Welcome to Everand!

  • Discover millions of ebooks, audiobooks, and so much more with a free trial

    Only $11.99/month after trial. Cancel anytime.

    Your Soul at a Crossroads: (With Steps You Can Take Not to Lose It)
    Your Soul at a Crossroads: (With Steps You Can Take Not to Lose It)
    Your Soul at a Crossroads: (With Steps You Can Take Not to Lose It)
    Ebook127 pages1 hour

    Your Soul at a Crossroads: (With Steps You Can Take Not to Lose It)

    By Valerie Harms

    ()

    Read preview

    About this ebook

    YOUR SOUL AT A CROSSROADS

    When you are at a crossroads or crisis, youll find your best path if you can connect with your inner resources. When feeling fear or dread, its hard to think straight. But if you dont face your crisis, your life will stay stuck. Use the tools in this book to honor the integrity of your experiences, thoughts, feelings, intuitions, and dreams to find the paths just right for you.

    The writing exercises enable you to go from the dark night of the soul to the light of rebirth and renewal. Years of testimony from people in workshops verify how vital it is to tap into your personal sense of timing and explore the separate parts of your life through dialoguing. Then you find not only security and wisdom but also ideas for making your place in the world more meaningful. Also included are guides to symbols of renewal and the worlds religions and myths.

    I am simply swept away with admiration for your approach. What you offer is a new paradigm for how I think emotionally. Thank you for your deeply challenging work. ~ a workshop participant

    Valerie is an expert who has the capacity to share great truths. ~ a reader

    LanguageEnglish
    PublisheriUniverse
    Release dateJul 24, 2013
    ISBN9781475998535
    Your Soul at a Crossroads: (With Steps You Can Take Not to Lose It)
    Author

    Valerie Harms

    Author of nine books, a creativity counselor, and an independent Jung scholar, VALERIE HARMS has led writing and depth psychology workshops at centers around the country, plus Canada and Greece. A graduate of Smith College, for seven years she was a science editor at the National Audubon Society in NYC. Currently she lives in Bozeman, Montana, and edits Distinctly Montana magazine. (Website: www.valerieharms.com)

    Related to Your Soul at a Crossroads

    Related ebooks

    Personal Memoirs For You

    View More
    View More

    Related podcast episodes

    Related articles

    • Article

      Sacred Shapes

      Mar 24, 2020

      For centuries, theologians, scientists and mathematicians have pondered nature’s geometric designs: circles, squares, triangles, hexagons, spirals.… What is the significance of these shapes? Can they help us better understand creation? The idea that

      2 min read

    • Article

      Your Stars

      Dec 23, 2020

      Something is brewing in your unconscious mind this week that might lead you to have a profound insight into a psychological matter. Pay attention to your dreams at night for hints as to what this might be about. Whether it’s an attitude that might ne

      3 min read

    • Article

      Cosmology’s Century: An Inside History of Our Modern Understanding of the Universe

      Oct 8, 2020

      James Peebles details the journey through the last 100 years of astronomy and cosmology that have left us pondering the universe’s biggest questions. Peebles offers a unique insight and perspective into how the cosmos has evolved over the last 13.8 b

      1 min read

    • Article

      Konda Mason Has Love Capital

      May 16, 2018

      Konda Mason Has Love Capital
      19 min read

    • Article

      What the Animals Taught

      Nov 7, 2017

      What the Animals Taught
      5 min read

    • Article

      Exploring Your Shadow

      Jun 22, 2022

      Exploring Your Shadow
      4 min read

    • Article

      Beyond Birth and Death

      Nov 19, 2019

      Beyond Birth and Death
      7 min read

    • Article

      The Rules On DOPAMINE DRESSING

      Jul 22, 2021

      Have you ever noticed certain clothes just seem to make you feel better? It might be an emerald green top that can’t help but put a spring in your step. Or that black tailored blazer that makes you feel more confident and in charge. Welcome to the wo

      1 min read

    • Article

      True Love

      Nov 21, 2023

      True Love
      4 min read

    • Article

      Soul Shifts

      May 19, 2022

      Soul Shifts
      1 min read

    • Article

      What Love Meant in 4500 B.C.

      Feb 21, 2022

      What Love Meant in 4500 B.C.
      2 min read

    • Article

      The Summer Eclipses

      Apr 2, 2020

      The Summer Eclipses
      8 min read

    • Article

      The Third Eye

      Mar 9, 2020

      The Third Eye
      2 min read

    • Article

      21st Century Samsara

      Jan 19, 2021

      21st Century Samsara
      5 min read

    • Article

      Why Don't You?

      Apr 5, 2020

      Why Don't You?
      1 min read

    • Article

      Nature Notes

      Jan 30, 2020

      Nature Notes
      4 min read

    • Article

      The truth HURTS

      Jun 11, 2019

      The truth HURTS
      4 min read

    • Article

      Shadow Work

      May 21, 2021

      Let’s be real. You’ve got to be a tough cookie to join a YTT programme. When one chooses to immerse themselves in the world of yoga, one is challenged on every level: mentally, emotionally, physically, and spiritually. Don’t get me wrong, it is an in

      3 min read

    • Article

      What Is The Grail Message?

      Apr 30, 2020

      THE THREE VOLUMES of In the Light of Truth contain a total of 168 lectures whose contents, building upon one another, give a picture of Creation in entirety. The Author’s all-embracing view is based on well-known natural laws, which reveal the hidden

      2 min read

    • Article

      Who Let The Dogs Out?

      Aug 31, 2021

      Who Let The Dogs Out?
      3 min read

    • Article

      Sketching The Mandala

      Jan 22, 2018

      Every morning Carl Jung sketched a circular drawing in his notebook. The Swiss psychiatrist and psychoanalyst had parted ways with Sigmund Freud, and his nerves were frayed. Jung’s first mandala, which he drew in 1916, seemed to him at the time to re

      1 min read

    Related categories

    Reviews for Your Soul at a Crossroads

    0 ratings

    0 ratings0 reviews

    What did you think?

    Tap to rate

    Review must be at least 10 words

      Book preview

      Your Soul at a Crossroads - Valerie Harms

      Copyright © 2013 by Valerie Harms.

      Cover photo by Donnie Sexton

      All rights reserved. No part of this book may be used or reproduced by any means, graphic, electronic, or mechanical, including photocopying, recording, taping or by any information storage retrieval system without the written permission of the publisher except in the case of brief quotations embodied in critical articles and reviews.

      iUniverse books may be ordered through booksellers or by contacting:

      iUniverse LLC

      1663 Liberty Drive

      Bloomington, IN 47403

      www.iuniverse.com

      1-800-Authors (1-800-288-4677)

      Because of the dynamic nature of the Internet, any web addresses or links contained in this book may have changed since publication and may no longer be valid. The views expressed in this work are solely those of the author and do not necessarily reflect the views of the publisher, and the publisher hereby disclaims any responsibility for them.

      ISBN: 978-1-4759-9852-8 (sc)

      ISBN: 978-1-4759-9853-5 (ebk)

      iUniverse rev. date: 07/23/2013

      Contents

      PART 1

      FINDING THE PATH

      1. Standing at a Crossroads: Introduction

      2. The Cave of Unknowing

      3. Dark Night of the Soul

      4. Mysteries of Timing

      5. Synchronicity: the Flow of Life

      6. Pulling Apart the Threads of Life

      7. My Life at a Crossroads

      8. Bliss and Malaise

      9. Reaching Inner Wisdom

      10. Personal Mantras

      11. Visions of the Road Ahead

      12. The Earth’s Soul at a Crossroads

      PART 2

      HELPERS

      13. Symbols of Renewal and Rebirth

      14. Dreams & Rebirth

      15. Animals of Transformation & Rebirth

      16. Rebirth Motifs in World Myths and Mysteries

      Epilogue

      Contact the author at P.O. Box 1123, Bozeman, Montana, 59771. See www.valerieharms.com for information about workshops and consultations.

      PART 1

      FINDING THE PATH

      Robert Johnson: "Standin’ at the crossroad baby

      Risin’ sun goin down

      I went to the crossroad baby

      I looked east and west"

      ~ Crossroad Blues

      C. G. Jung: As a rule, the individual is so unconscious that he fails to see his own potentialities for decision. Instead he is constantly and anxiously looking around for external rules and regulations to guide him in his perplexity.

      ~ Memories, Dreams, Reflections

      James Hillman: The soul is beyond measure.

      It is invisible and best approached like a mystery—with curiosity, devotion, intuition, and daring imagination.

      ~ The Soul’s Code

      1. Standing at a Crossroads:

      Introduction

      Spiritual Independence

      In this book break away from outside noise and turn inward. Learn to think for yourself and discover your inner resources. Let me help you find the meaning of your life within you, not out there somewhere, using the techniques that have aided me for decades. If you are confused about what your next steps are and you try these exercises, they will give you new qualities and insights to bring into your life… and world.

      Everyone has difficulties—some inordinately hard—but all essential to their fate. We struggle in relationships, work, health, and with how to live meaningfully. Sometimes we’re high, sometimes low, always in flux, but when we die to one way of life, we are reborn into another.

      I thought long and hard about change and renewal when I learned that five people I knew became wheelchair bound. All were very active: one fell out of a tree as he was cutting off a branch, one woman off a cliff, another slipped onto a rock while walking her dog, one had a botched surgery, one had a bicycle accident. Also, we all know of war veterans coming home without limbs. I interviewed such people and will introduce you to some of them but first imagine how their lives changed. The external changes were visible but the even more dramatic interior ones were hidden. After talking to them, I didn’t feel so scared anymore of such handicaps. I never forget though that they live with their struggles and healing every moment of the day.

      This book aims at helping you find renewal, resurrection, and transcendence after life delivers a blow.

      In October 2010, all 33 of the Chilean miners, who’d been trapped for 69 days, were rescued. Chile’s president said, They have experienced a new life, a rebirth. Some say Chile too had been reborn in the world’s eyes. Symbolically the men were kept in the dark (a vast cave), had to learn to get along, keep themselves fit and positive, while a rescue was highly uncertain. Surely this is a form of the dark night of the soul. As with soldiers, their domestic life beforehand was very different from what it was like after the trauma. Who knows if they can lie on a comfortable bed, dream, or love anymore? Although grateful to be alive, all must change their lives.

      Most of us know someone addicted to alcohol or trying to beat cancer or struck down by the loss of a loved one. Others have dared to speak of abuse in their family or by their immaculate priest and have had to live with the trauma. Unfortunately for celebrities, they must suffer under a media barrage as they to a greater or lesser degree to undergo inner changes.

      The fire of falling in love burns you and life is forever changed. The way that intense love obsesses mind/body/spirit is a psychological condition, as relentless as a physical illness.

      When we go through such experiences, our old identity dies. As Jean Shinoda Bolen says in Ring of Power, We enter the underworld or underground and do not know whether our burial is in a womb or tomb, a burial of all promise or the beginning of new life, not knowing whether this will be the end of us, or whether Sunday will come and with it resurrection and transformation.

      What are the tools one can use to go from the dark night of the soul to rebirth and renewal? Some people will muscle through by getting what solace and inspiration they can from traditional services—whether Christian, Jewish, Muslim, or Buddhist. Others will find support in therapy, art, literature, science, and nature.

      As one, among many, who has time and time again felt inspiration and guidance emerge from my own soul, I’d like help you find the many resources dormant within. Years of testimony from others in workshops verify how vital it is to center and act on such guidance. For is it not better to live the life that your soul intended for you to live, not one dictated by others, but one that is accessible to you at all times if you only took the time to deepen? In doing so you can move from trauma to fulfillment. Like a firmly rooted tree with a thick trunk, you will not be buffeted by storms but you will grow in strength and beauty.

      I advocate a spirituality that utilizes depth psychology in which honor is given to your own feelings (no matter what they are), intuitions, and imagery in relation to daily events, conflicts, and unexpected happenings. Attention paid will result in greater wisdom and change.

      When we are at a crossroads or crisis, past traditions often lose their power to guide us; then we are turned back to the resources of our own individuality. At a crossroads you first may feel anxiety, dread, or the numbness of denial. But if you don’t face your crisis, your life will be limited, you will stay stuck. If we take time to go within and use tools, we come to a place that is beyond dread and diagnosis, an inner place that we reach by going down our well (of experiences, thoughts, emotions) to the underground waters where flow images, insights, and a sense of unity with all life. It is the place of transcendence where, after a long inward journey, self-transformation and renewal begin.

      Rumi ~ There is a light seed grain inside you. Fill it with yourself or it dies.

      A word about brain science and genetics

      We know the human animal is a phenomenal biological being. We have an individual genetic structure as well as brain that governs not only our sensory perceptions but also motor skills, vocabulary, and the systems we take for granted—nervous, digestive, circulatory. We have interacting bones and muscles and chemicals that influence emotion—oxytocin, serotonin, cortisol, which we can observe in ourselves.

      But even with all the research into the brain, scientists or evolutionary psychologists do not know what our personalities will do with our particular package of chemical releases, experiences, genetic code, or what truly constitutes consciousness or the unconscious. If we only think in terms of our functions, we lose sight of our subjective selves. A good definition of the unconscious is all that is not known. No one can know it completely, which brain scientists are the first to admit. We all are surrounded by it. But we make inroads through our subjective feelings.

      My purpose is to urge you to follow the roads of your deepest feelings to your own meaning. When you do depth work, you not only find personal wisdom, but also something extra—ideas

      Enjoying the preview?
      Page 1 of 1