Processing vs Reviewing

In my experience the most important thing we can do in our spiritual journey/healing is to process all the old emotions/feelings/past hurts/fears that we have trapped inside of us.  When we fully feel what we have been afraid to face, then we are free.  

When in 3D this can be a hard slog.  There are lots of tears, emotions, heartache, resistance, discomfort.....  until we get to the other side of what we so afraid to face, and feel the freedom and lightness.

I have found that the more I process, the easier it gets.  Processing recently is just a recognition of some repeated thoughts or triggers, and gently going deeper, going under these thoughts and judgements and repeating events, seeing things from different angles and bringing love and understanding to myself for the part I played in all of the events.

Whereas 10+ years ago, I would need to re-live the experiences, confront people, experience months and months of healing sessions, lots of tears and emotions and anger, and take baby steps towards resolution - it was really hard.

This week I had a new experience again.  Instead of processing my fear, I just reviewed it.

For most of my adult life I have been very afraid of driving on steep roads.  I avoid driving up or down people's steep driveways where ever I can and go the "long way" to avoid the steep winding roads that lead to many of the suburbs where I live.  I don't seem to mind if someone else is driving, it just a fear that surfaces when I am behind the wheel of the car.

A few days ago I had to drop my son off at a friends house.  I picked him up from school and then asked him what his friend's address was.  The suburb was at the top of my most dreaded windy road (if you live in Adelaide, then I had to drive from Unley to Belair).  This is only a 10 minute drive but it was my worst nightmare.  We were running late so I couldn't go around the "long way", I just had to buckle up and drive!  I felt unsettled, was gripping the steering wheel hard and was driving really slowly.  We made it to the top of the hill, but I wasn't going to drive to the bottom of the very steep driveway, so my son had to unload his drum kit and walk it piece by piece down the steep hill to the house.  I sat in the car while him and his friends set up the kit and contemplated my fear of steep driving.  I googled it and found out that Bathmophobia is a fear of stairs and slopes.  This didn't really sound like me, as I was only afraid of driving on steep roads if I was the driver.  I realised I had developed this fear due to past driving experiences.  I just gently contemplated this and felt a large energy around and in me.  The interesting thing for me was that I didn't have any physical reaction to this energy, I could just feel its presence.  It was my energy.  I knew I was processing this fear, but not in the usual way.  I wasn't feeling the emotion, I was just reviewing the fear.  About 10 minutes later I drove down the hill without any problems but the energy stayed with me for a couple of hours.  It was intense but did not have any affect on my body, there were no tears or anger or any other usual sign of processing.  I just sat with this.  And then it left.  I knew I was now OK to drive up the hill.  

Two days later I drove my son back up the hill to his friend's house for band practice.  I enjoyed the drive.  I went fast (within the speed limit) and curved around the corners having a lovely time.  

I don't think we have to go digging around for things to process or review.  They just come up in our daily life when we need to deal with them.  We do have to be aware of the repeated thought patterns or triggers that happen, and then gently look deeper.  It doesn't have to be difficult anymore.  We can evolve to a point where we are processing/reviewing and experiencing constantly.

We shouldn't have any things in our life that we are afraid of, don't really like, or avoid doing.  We can tell ourselves that we have good reason to not want to do these things, but having these restrictions always sets up boundaries for our growth.  When they come up, we just need to recognise them and then be gentle with ourselves while we overcome/process/review them.

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