by Trish Regan and Doug Hackett

Most of us wish to find the deep inner peace and joy that often seems just out of our reach. We have found that it takes a commitment to the inner journey, to the awakening of our spirit, to find that inner peace ... the core of this awakening is essential joy, the joy of finding our essential Self.

The joy we seek lies at the core of our Beings ... a place from which we can express the richness of our gifts and talents, unencumbered by fear and timidity. We want joyous, satisfying relationships in which we, and our partners, can flourish and that catalyze the best within us. We wish to contribute to harmony on the planet by expressing our highest potential. We wish to make life a wondrous journey, full of the passion of discovery of our inner spirit and full magnificence.

Some feel that we should not be concerned with joy at this critical time in our human history. They say that joy is frivolous and that it is selfish to seek this state of Being. We say that joy is essential to life because it touches our very reason for being and expresses the essence of the meaning of life. In joy, we resonate with the essence of the Source of Creation and utilize that energy to bring into harmony all of the aspects of human life that are pulled asunder by hate, greed, power and violence. In joy, there is no room for fear or need to control others. In joy, we are one, and the resulting sister/brotherhood of humanity supports our desperate desire as a species for peace. Now, more than ever, the resonant power of joy can bring us together ... the deep, profound joy that unites us as a family in the knowledge that we are all one.

We are not writing here about the superficial joy of “happiness” or personal greed ... a false concept of joy in which we escape from the challenges of life and hide our heads in the sand of denial of our emotions and the need for inner growth. The key to true joy is to learn to celebrate those catalysts for growth, and to integrate the lessons they bring, with the full knowledge of who we really are as spiritual beings experiencing life as expressions of the Source of Creation.

For when a person comes into the expression of profound and meaningful joy, everyone around them is affected, producing a ripple effect that changes the world.

As human beings, we get caught up in the mundane things of life, often ignoring or forgetting about the deep meaning of life and our purpose for being here at all. We trudge along with our business, keeping our noses to the grindstone, completely ignoring the Light above us and within us. We miss the magic of life and the wonder and awe of this world when we entangle ourselves in the details, missing the magnificence of the essence. Touching the true essence of life and of our reason for being here brings essential joy and bliss into an existence that could otherwise be empty. We fill our lives up with busy activities, not allowing the natural flow of our soul’s quest to find itself. This can lead to disease and death. What are we doing?

Doug and I were graced with a gift from the universe many years ago. At the beginning of the year of 1999, we asked what our next step was to be on our path of finding true fulfillment and joy. What we “heard” excited us...it was this, “All of the abundance of the universe is yours if you do these three things. One: let go of all your fear and practice radical trust; Two: surrender to your soul; Three: radiate your light into the world.”

We had been working on finding the inner balance between the masculine and feminine aspects of ourselves so that our basic needs could be fulfilled within this balance and now the next step in our quest for joy unfolded before us. This has been our journey and each step toward the fulfillment of these three gifts has led us more deeply into essential joy.

Radical Trust
Radical trust means to let go of all of our fears. We learned that our basic fear is the fear of annihilation. If we do not know that we are one with the universe, then we fear that we do not inherently exist, hence we are alone and helpless. Therefore, the first exploration leading toward joy is to search for the deep truth within and our connection to our souls.

The only true fear we have when in infancy is the fear of falling and of loud noises...all other fears are either learned or absorbed from our ancestors, our parents and the society around us. By taking the inner journey and being willing to discover these deep inner fears, we can face them directly and allow the consciousness of our souls to help us to let them go.

We fear loss of our power (physical, mental and emotional.) By becoming aware of our deep inner beliefs and being willing to face our unconscious content, we can change these crippling beliefs into positive and enlightened expressions that free us and create safety and comfort and joy.

Surrender to the Soul
Surrender is not just giving ourselves away to someone else’s (or the universe’s) will, it is getting out of the way so that our souls can flow through us. It is letting go of living our lives just by the tenets of our ego’s desires and allowing the magnificent energy of the universe to lead us to our highest destiny.

True manifestation is getting clear about what it is that we wish to create for our lives, asking for it and then letting go of our attachment to it. When we are attached to the outcome of our request of the universe, then we are open to the unfoldment of even more that we can imagine. We surrender to a larger and more expansive vision and to the gifts that are waiting for us that can be far greater than our little minds can grasp. That is true surrender which leads to true joy.

Radiance
When we were told to radiate our light into the world, we suspected that it meant that we should shine our brightest inner radiance and that this would be an easy thing to do. What we discovered was that we had many resistances to doing so. You may too.

The thought of being the best we could be and expressing that seemed easy enough, but what we encountered were fears that would show us there was inner work to be done. There were fears of inadequacy, fears that if we shined we would have to be perfect, and fears about the judgements of others...visibility would light up our weaknesses for all the world to see.

Through deep inner work and being willing to uncover these fears and open to the best within us, we can eliminate these fears and shine our light as brightly as we wish.