Writing Ourselves into Alignment By Harmony Kwiker

Writing Ourselves into Alignment

By Harmony Kwiker

The first time I recognized that there was a book inside of me, I felt equally elated and insecure. I had just experienced a recent breakthrough in my own growth and development when the words of the unwritten book started to pour through me. Each time I sat down to write, the inspiration was vivid and prolific, with a clear message of how to live and love from the True Self. 

Although I thought I was ready to fully complete this book, the inspiration repeatedly came to a screeching halt at chapter three. For a year and a half, I would sit down to write, completely inspired, only to meet the wall of uncertainty about how to move beyond the first three chapters. This was 20 years ago, when online connections were much more limited, and I went in-person to talk to a publishing house that was well known for its spiritual, self-help publications. I handed the acquisitions editor a printed copy of my short manuscript, and I watched as she read it over. 

Insecurity and fear crept up inside of me as I anticipated her feedback. When she looked at me, she asked, “Are you planning on going to graduate school?” 

I responded with naive optimism, “Um. I’m not sure,” I stammered. “I’ve been focusing on writing this manuscript since graduation.”  

“The world isn’t ready for this, yet,” she encouraged. “I’d suggest that you go to graduate school and then finish writing this.” 

I left her office and immediately started researching graduate programs in spiritual psychology. After I earned a graduate degree, I resumed writing my book, still efforting to push past the familiar wall of uncertainty. I was in a place in my life where I felt stuck and lost, and the vibration of my state of being was embedded into the manuscript. While I was out of alignment, I was not yet embodying the message of my book; therefore, the message of the book could not be fully expressed through me. 

Nonetheless, I submitted my manuscript to another major publishing house in the self-help genre. I was ecstatic when the acquisitions editor told me that she wanted to pitch it to her team, yet a familiar sense of insecurity and fear crept in as I awaited her feedback. A few weeks later, I received an email saying that they were going to pass on my manuscript, and they thought my book would read better as a memoir. Having read small parts of my story from my book proposal, the editor thought that my story would empower and inspire readers. However, I was too scared to be vulnerable and could not access a sincere interest in writing a memoir. 

Feeling deflated, I put the book aside and focused on my clinical work as a psychotherapist and on cultivating my own alignment. I had given up on being a writer when seemingly out of nowhere, two years after my last attempt, I was walking my dog on a path along the creek near my house and inspiration entered my consciousness once again. I could see a clear image of where to begin my book–a memoir–and I could hear the first sentence, “A pervasive sense of embarrassment and fear followed me down the busy San Francisco street in the Castro district.”

I went home and the words of the book started to pour through me. Tears flowed down my face as I wrote, and shame melted away as I put my own story of learning how to embody the True Self into the words of my book. I decided that I would share even the darkest parts of my past, knowing that I didn’t have to publish it if I didn’t want to. Ultimately, I decided to self-publish my memoir, Reveal: Embody the True Self Beyond Trauma and Conditioning, because I wanted to fully stand in my story and own it. 

As I became more internally aligned, my external world reflected my progress. Two weeks after publishing Reveal, I met my Beloved, and a few months later I was offered a position as a professor of transpersonal counseling at Naropa University. As I deepened into my Self, inspiration came to me again. I was at the chiropractor’s office, laying face down in silence, when seemingly out of nowhere I heard the first sentence of my new book, “Our conditioned sense of self develops quietly, in the privacy of our own mind.”

This time, as I sat down to write the entire book flowed through me in three days. Although the content took a lifetime to cultivate, once I was aligned, there was no wall to hit. I submitted Align: Living and Loving from the True Self to another major publishing house, and this time I felt complete trust in the process. Within a few weeks, I signed a contract with Mantra Books. 

To recognize that we have a book within that wants to be written is a sacred gift. Tending to our own inner world as we discover the fullest expression of our book honors this gift. Once we hear the muse of inspiration, any aspect of ourselves that is off-center from the message we are being called to offer must be reckoned with. To be in process with our inspiration, to let go of linear time and fully open to what wants to come through us, we learn to show up for our humanity as writers. Writing as an act of alignment is a practice of self-awareness, self-compassion, and self-trust where our inner world is reflected in the pages of our book. 

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As a professor of transpersonal psychology at Naropa University, Harmony Kwiker teaches therapists how to facilitate deep transformation and healing. As a daughter of healers, she’s been guiding people on the courageous and exhilarating path of integration, transformation, and a return to wholeness for over 15 years. Now, in her vulnerable self-help memoir, she gets personal about her own journey of of transcending old pain and trauma as she forges a new path that breaks through the confines of her conditioned self.

Follow her on Twitter @alignwspirit

Find out more about Harmony on her website https://harmonykwiker.com/

ALIGN: LIVING AND LOVING FROM THE TRUE SELF

There is a fundamental core within each of us where our true nature resides. Our learned patterns of relating to ourselves and the world cause us to get pulled off our center, coming out of alignment with our True Self. While these conditioned patterns were at one time useful, continuing to live from them prevents us from experiencing the ease and beauty of our own true nature.

In this remarkable exploration of the human condition, Harmony Kwiker provides a clear and comprehensive map to rediscovering how to live and love from the True Self, including how to come back to wholeness by accessing your subtle energy body, how to embody your alignment in all of your relationships and how to explore sexual intimacy in a sacred way.

BUY HERE

 

Tags: featured, women writers

Category: On Writing