“Spiritual Bypassing” is a phrase we are increasingly seeing and hearing in conversations – whether on social media, in healing communities, or in person at an alternative healing session.
“Ascension” and “Shadow Work” are also words you might, and often these words are used together. You might even see these words in marketing or promotional posts.
If you are looking for the meanings of Spiritual Bypassing, and Ascension, and Shadow Work, I’ve wrapped it up in a bullet list below. (And keep in mind, there is so much more to this conversation – you can leave your comments below if you have great words to add to this bullet list or a different view).
What does Ascension mean?
Ascension means:
- finding self-love as we find ourselves now
- trust in self
- conscious thought and feeling
- the return to self
- nurturing oneself, all parts of oneself
- self-love
- self-awareness
- self-resourcefulness
- self-realisation
- so many other wonderful feelings and insights about life and increasingly becoming awake to the inner-self: heart, body, mind, spirit, soul
- moving away from living unconsciously, to living consciously
What does Spiritual Bypassing mean?
Spiritual Bypassing means:
- using “love” and “light” and “healer” identifying words to elevate yourself, while –
- resisting using the mirror to see your flaws or harm you cause others
- blaming others whilst promoting yourself as correct
- believing your work is done or that life is now simple and all positive, simply because you are enjoying feeling of “love” and “light” or have learned the art of “self healing”
- believing that there will be no negative situations in life so long as you focus on positivity and speaking and thinking loving thoughts to yourself, others and situations
- denying that there are going to be times of difficulty because of more pleasant feelings of love and light
- believing that the Law of Attraction means you’re supposed to attract everything pleasant and nothing but pleasant
- the obvious one: signing off your messages with “Love and Light” even when your content is not very authentic to this sentiment!
Of course Spiritual Bypassing is valid and we are seeing the light shone on some inconsistent, even hypocritical, behaviour of people who call themselves Healers. That’s good and productive, right? Interestingly, I’m finding that most often than not, the people who use the phrase Spiritual Bypassing and even criticise Healers, are also Healers who have discovered, been in a community and / or started teaching the work of the “Shadow”. More on that below. In the meantime …
What is Shadow Work? What is Inner-Child Rescue Work?
Shadow Work, also called Inner-Child Rescue Work, means:
- we speak to the Wounded Child that is within each and every one of us, that has experienced trauma and threats of danger, and has had their Fight or Flight hyperarousal state activated not only at that time, but in many times thereafter by unrelated “triggers”
- we embrace ourselves as a whole individual with all our memories and life experiences, and all our scrapes and wounds
- we collect the parts of us that we abandoned due to toxic shame or fears and introduce these younger parts to our present self who is offering love, compassion, and unconditional acceptance
- we find ways to love ourselves through all our thoughts, feelings, words and behaviours, as we realise in every moment we are growing and responding to past hurts or experiences and every day we learn a new way to love another part of ourselves
- we redefine “ascension” as LOVING MY WORST VERSION
All of this is helpful as reaching a place of unconditional love, such as what we do in Shadow Work, assists our nervous state to return to where it needs to be, Vagal State, via breathing, tears, laughter, mindfulness, meditation, music, as these are all generally included in a session with a Shadow Work facilitator.
Other ways to reach Vagal State – or activating the Vagal Nerve (the rest and digest nervous system) – outside of Shadow Work, is by breathwork, meditation, sound and music, frequency therapy, dance, prayer, angel communication, gratitude, better thoughts, freedom, adventures and much much more!
Below is a photo of me with the contented face and posture of Equine-Assisted Meditation. You consciously sit, breathe, and feel all the touch points between human and horse. You notice the sounds and happenings around you, yet hold the calm breath and maintain complete sense of centre and stillness. And before your session ends, you and horse make a silent affirmation to carry that sense of calm with you throughout your day.
Shadow Work facilitators will openly and frequently remind us that there is no Magic Pill to live a truly easy and continuously joyful life, and that they are no guru themselves. They remind us that there is no one session that will cure all our hardships and challenges. Indeed, the challenges will continue coming, daily, and we will always be doing “the work”. Indeed, Shadow Work is helpful to carry with you in your toolbox for the simple reason that as you continue about your day, you take small moments to give yourself praise, reassurance, understanding, compliments and of course – love!
I’ve been channelling angels and light beings for over 10 years and I have not yet succeeded in living in all love and all light all the time – and to believe this is my only correct way of living is to spend my awake hours in fantasy land instead of experiencing all the juiciness of parenthood, marriage, farming and business ownership! But I have to say that I can both channel love and light AND feel love and light myself in more and more moments, as a very real person who can also experience illness, suffering, hardship and hard-earned recovery … not just once, but on an ongoing basis. This is life!
Often times I have been both soothed and challenged by how accessible my guides make it sound to ascend, while I’m living daily life with food intolerances and allergies and farm pets injuring themselves and the likes, yet I’m still in love with what they say about ascension and using positive vocabulary, setting intentions etc … Why do they say it? Why do I love it? Because HOPE and MAGIC activates my vagal pathway! And we need Breath, Digestion, Rest, Laughter, Creativity and Sleep to survive.
Life is not going to be easy for anyone and we have much to learn in this lifetime, and accepting that as a fact is part of ascension.
Accepting and loving being human as an incredible experience with all its mess and all its joy, is ascending.
My relationship with my spiritual guides, the light beings and the angels has been phenomenal. Even though they are so full of love and light. They are also very realistic yet still know how to turn a bad day into a belly laugh. I can be feeling truly unwell and the voice will suddenly come in from the angels guiding me that I will be fine and they are there for me with love and light … and instantly, I feel much better. Love and light is powerful.
Sometimes the words “love and light”, “ascension”, “trauma”, “triggers”, “inner-child rescue” get used as poison darts on social media to put down other healers. And sometimes, authors and lightworking mediums can click “post” too soon on some new work that is very exciting to channel. We need to learn self-awareness and stay grounded when we’re teaching the work of the light, and/or the shadow, and running a business as a Healer.
For me, ascension is a very real concept that I have learned about in an incredulous connection as a medium.
Personally, I find many people reach the ascension via both spiritual positivity called “light and love” as well as the shadow work with grief-release … accessing all ages and applying self-recognition and self-love is the next revolution in the wheel of ascension. It’s all good and all pieces of the puzzles fit together! It’s not one or the other, it is all.
At the moment, social media is going a little cray with people putting down ascension, spiritual messages, positive affirmations. Is that what brought you here today?
My advice is to try to recognise that if people are on the journey of self-awareness, that is one very important step for them. And love them for where they are at.
Let me know your views below, I’d love to hear from you.
Big love to you all.
