On the Ancestral Path : What Are We Holding On To?
In order to accept new things into our lives, we have to let go of the heavy things we are holding on to.
An individual born and raised within this modern society will find that the Kemetic paradigm is far more difficult to grasp than one can imagine. It has become so foreign to us that we sometimes don’t see the purpose behind the value it carries in relation to the values we have been conditioned to hold as true. It is not an easy task to let go of the patterns that shape our lives and determine what is to become of our future, especially during our adult years, because by then we have only been exposed to what society has deemed “necessary” in order to maintain a sense of control regarding our thoughts, behaviors, and emotions. Although the Kemetic paradigm comes to give that control back to the individual, he finds himself rejecting many aspects of it simply due to the fear of losing parts of himself in a world that does not make sense according to what he has been taught in the modern society. This is the logic that prevents or delays the evolution of the individual towards accepting the values that belong to him.
It is not unusual to notice characteristics of the hypocrisy and contradictions associated with shifting from one paradigm to another. For the individual to move beyond exhibiting those traits, he must first fully understand, apply and practice what is known as detachment. Whether it’s regarding a person, place or thing, the ability for one to detach himself from any given equation is key and very vital to achieving an honest progression along the Kemetic spiritual path. But because the majority of us are led by our emotions, we can easily convince ourselves that striving to achieve something greater is not worth letting go of what we're holding on to.
We often find ourselves in a dilemma when our lives appear to take a different direction than what was planned or desired, specifically after putting all of our energy towards realizing the vision we see for our future. This dilemma manifests itself within our thinking, that in many cases may cause confusion, lack of motivation, and self doubt. Interestingly, these aspects of our consciousness can be allocated to our refusal to detach ourselves from who we thought we were and what we thought our purpose in life was. Nobody can escape destiny. So in turn, we try to escape the acceptance that our destiny may not be the one we imagined.
The struggle to regroup and go in a new direction is the most difficult to engage. overcome. We would like to think that we have choices in the matter. But do we really? The answer to this question becomes clear when we attain the same less desirable results in our lives. But even then, we would rather look for different reasons to repeat the same act than detach ourselves altogether and move forward on our journey without fear or resistance.
Living outside of the comfort zones we create is where the fear and/or resistance comes in. It can be observed within the Kemetic teachings that the comfort we seek should have nothing to do with the physical or material world, but everything to do with knowing our purpose and fulfilling it without conditions. This philosophy plainly suggests that we strengthen our ability to let go of anything that comes as a distraction, which in many cases is put there by us to serve as an excuse as to why we are not reaching our goals. But ironically, knowing this does not make things any easier because two familiar questions remain: who am I, and what is my purpose?
Some individuals are fortunate enough to know the answers to these questions early on in their lives. A great part of their knowing is due to their understanding of the world and the exposure they may have had to the many realities of it. But many of us, who were born and educated to reflect foreign/modern values (which are constantly changing), may spend the rest of our lives trying to figure out these questions, while in the interim finding ourselves unhappy and trapped in the vicious cycle of denial due to a lack of understanding the importance of detachment.
It is important to know that what works for someone else, may not necessarily work for you, regardless of how passionate you may be about it. Self honesty urges us to simply let it go and find what works in our favor, what we are destined to become. But as long as we hold onto what doesn’t appear to fit our character and our qualities, we may never realize the goals we set for ourselves in the first place. Can we live with that?