I‘ve never really bought into the concept that humans truly have free will, and there’s a variety of spiritually-based reasons for that, but one of the biggest reasons isn’t spiritual at all.

In order to have have free agency of our own will, we have to be a free thinker, and the truth is, very few of us actually are.

Humans, bizarre little ego-centric creatures that we are, believe that we have the freedom of choice in all that we do, as though we have total internal autonomy over what goes on inside our minds. And of course we would think that–we mistakenly believe that the rational mind is the king of our world.

Most of us spend very little time examining our motivations for the choices we make and the beliefs we hold, our biases, our fears, or put any kind of thought into how all of that unexamined subconscious shit informs our so-called rational choices.

Learn how to identify your belief systems

Reason vs. Logic

Humans are rational creatures, not logical creatures. Reason and logic are not the same thing.

All a rationale is, is an explanation about how you came to your conclusion. It doesn’t mean it’s the right conclusion, or that it’s a logical conclusion, and it definitely doesn’t mean that you’re being honest with yourself about your motivations, or that you understand the psychological factors that are driving your behavior.

People tell themselves all kinds of stories about why they do what they do. Many of them are lies.

True free will–and true free thinking–can only be found when we begin to uncover and understand our subconscious mind. Until then, we are susceptible to all kinds of bias, propaganda, and distorted belief systems.

As an acquaintance of mine on Instagram once wrote: if you’re not facing your shadow, you’re getting fucked by it. – @rainierwylde

Learn more about shadow work and it’s role in spirituality

Everything Does Happen For a Reason, but Not the Reason You Think

So what does all of this portend for the concept of a divine plan? For a lot of people, the idea of free will within a chaotic universe is too big and too scary, so they take comfort in the idea that everything happens for a reason. Is this true?

Everything definitely happens for a reason, but not necessarily a divine one. It’s just cause and effect. The reason people aren’t free thinkers is because they haven’t deprgrammed themselves from their cultural conditioning, biases, and traumas.

“Ash, are you saying that life doesn’t really happen for you, it happens to you?”

There’s a difference between choosing to use situations in our lives as opportunities for growth and self-reflection, and assuming that every single situation is a reflection or some kind of thing that was meant to catalyze you. Some of this shit is completely senseless and the only reason we need to heal in the first place is because we were traumatized in the first place. If we hadn’t been exposed to trauma, we never would have been fucked up to begin with.

A lot of spiritual teachers and healers act like if we can just convince people that their trauma happened for a reason, then the trauma will magically go away–but it doesn’t work that way. Your trauma has not just affected you energetically, it has physically altered your brain. Not to mention, we still live under oppressive systems which continuously expose us to trauma, so we will never be able to fully heal ourselves or the world until those systems are dismantled.

Learn how trauma affects your brain.

So where is “God” in all of this?

God is the natural universe. God is nature. God is the physical plane of existence which we inhabit, the spiritual plane which we cannot see, our own spirit and soul, and the space in between. Our “free will” to think and act however we choose is God’s unconditional love… but the trauma that we perpetrate on one another as a result of our unconsciousness and the society that was founded upon and perpetuates that trauma–the matrix, as some might call it–is entirely of our own creation. That’s us playing God, learning how to be the creators of our reality. And what we have created is a virtual hellscape.

This separation from nature and our divinity is the original trauma, like Adam and Eve being kicked out of the garden. It’s what a lot of people view as “free will”. And this is what Neale Donald Walsch was talking about in Conversations with God when God said, “My will is your will but your will is not my will.” We are going god/source/nature, therefore our will is also of god/source/nature, but we also believe ourselves to be separate from god/source/nature and act out of alignment with the natural order. This is separation consciousness and it’s what has created the social constructs we live within.

So what’ is the answer? We are to heal ourselves, which allows us to expand our conscious awareness of our thoughts and actions, and in turn, that allows us to heal our world. It brings us back into alignment with our highest selves, with nature itself, and with God itself. That is what it is to self-actualize, to know ourselves as the creator.

Thanks for being here,

Ash

 

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