The True Purpose of Healing: Coming Home to Yourself

Thich Nhat Hanh, an amazing spiritual teacher and modern-day mystic, wrote in The Heart of the Buddha's Teaching: Transforming Suffering into Peace, Joy, and Liberation 

“Your purpose is to be yourself. You don't have to run anywhere to
become someone else. You are wonderful just as you are.”

The question of what is my purpose and meaning in this life is a core question that every healing journey has the potential to awaken within us IF we are willing to let it connect with us.  

When we first start a healing or awakening journey, our main purpose is typically not to change our whole outlook on life and understanding of its meaning. For many of us, including myself, at this stage, we simply want to stop feeling horrible - physically, emotionally, mentally, and/or spiritually. We just want to feel better and maybe liberate ourselves from all the ways that we feel stuck, and if we are being honest, to improve our daily life from a comfort and enjoyment level. From the dis-ease we are experiencing, we wake up to a desire to experience something different, more than what we have. 

Our personal heart wakes up and we feel the yearning to dream for more, more abundance, and more “happiness”. We want to feel that we have more authority in and over our own life- physically, emotionally, mentally, financially, relationally, career wise, and yes the idea of spiritually is most likely here too, but in a different way than what Thich Nhat Hanh is pointing to. We want to BE ourselves so that we have a life that we feel like is ours. A life that we actually like and feels exciting to us. We want to BE ourselves in a way that lets us feel good and experience the things we want. We want to BE all the things that our personal heart has dreamed of but felt cut off from touching. 

AND these are all amazing worthy pursuits and a necessary first stage of healing and awakening to wake up and see all the ways we are acting and being that are not really us so that we turn around and decide to develop real, tangible, changes in our life that reflect more who we want to be or are and not who we were conditioned to be or believe we have to be. Each step we take challenges the old way of being and allows us to remember that we have more power then we think we do and that we can really do what so many teachers say, change our thoughts, change our reality. 

But this is not the finish line of healing and awakening. Excavating and establishing a personal self and self-respect is actually the starting place. There is another stage of healing and awakening that starts to bubble up as we are on this path of not just “fixing” what is wrong, but seeking real balance. We begin to feel an interesting mix of emptiness and yearning that calls to us to BE our real self. The emptiness is a subtle feeling of confusion that even though you are changing your outer life to reflect more of “you” there is a desire to go inward and to connect with a different version of you. That is what I believe Thich Nhat Hanh is pointing to, our purpose is to be ourselves within. Once we start to seek that version of us, it will change everything. That version of us will ripple out into every moment, every choice, every interaction, guiding us into courageous actions that match our mystical heart, not just our personal heart or what matches the survival/tribal versions of us. 

In episode 46 of Soulful Practices Podcast - Beyond Healing (Part 1): Discovering the Purpose Within You, I dive deeper into the essence of Self that I believe Thich Nhat Hanh is pointing us toward engaging with and how the awakening to this version of us that is already present and waiting for us is the underlying purpose of life and the gift that comes from a healing journey.

You can watch the full episode on YouTube, Spotify, and Apple Podcast.

Just imagine the shifts, changes, and transformational changes that would happen if more and more of us are free from unhealed trauma and shadow protective programs from running our choices. What would that look like personally? What would that look like collectively? What new “earth” would that create within you and around you in ways that you can see and in ripples that you will never see? 

I believe that is our true purpose to help create both a personal and collective life that honors, respects, and empowers all Beings to fully be their True Self and together we help everyone rise up to living, loving, and leading their beautiful, authentic lives. But it starts with you, giving yourself permission to be yourself. To give yourself permission to stop trying to be or act like someone else. And remembering your are wonderful just as you are and to begin living life from this place instead of fear, wounds, or old ways of being that no longer match.

PS: If you find yourself struggling with a harsh inner critic that dismisses your worthiness of joy, laughter, happiness, and self-love, I have a free mini-training, Healing the Inner Critic, that might be the perfect starting place to help support you. Click here to access the training and start the journey of healing today.