Soul Shifts: Transformative Wisdom for Creating a Life of Authentic Awakening, Emotional Freedom & Practical Spirituality

There are pivotal moments in the lives of all seekers when we realize that we've been traveling on our path of growth toward happiness and fulfillment, but, simply put, we want to go faster. How we have been living, working, and loving just isn't enough or even acceptable anymore. We know we're being called to something more significant and expanded—we can feel it. At these times what's needed is not simply more change or an adjustment in our outer life, but profound transformation. We don't just want to rearrange the pieces of ourselves so that they look better temporarily. We want nothing less than rebirth. We are ready for Soul Shifts.


In all religions, on all spiritual paths, one of the most sacred and mystical physical places is the threshold one crosses to enter the temple, cathedral, prayer hall, synagogue, teepee, or space of worship. A threshold is a doorway between worlds, a mystical border between the everyday and the Divine, and, therefore, a place of potency and grace.


In most Eastern cultures, one honors this understanding of the threshold by never stepping directly on it, but always stepping over it, and by leaving one's shoes outside as a sign of reverence and respect. On my pilgrimages to Indian temples, I have often seen a temple attendant squatting on the ground next to the threshold leading into the temple proper, to make sure no one, particularly no uninformed Western tourist, makes the terrible mistake of stepping on the raised divider.


Many years ago when I began my spiritual journey, I was taught that whenever I entered a temple, or a hall in which the teacher was seated, I should bend down to touch the threshold or entrance with my right hand, and then raise that hand up to touch my heart. It was also suggested that I do this on the way out of the temple or hall. No one explained the significance of this to me, but I did it anyway because that was what everyone else was doing—and because I was always a very dutiful student!


In time, however, as I had the direct experience that my teacher was giving me the gift of entrance into my innermost realms of consciousness, I understood that gesture of respect, and why my hand went from the floor to my heart. For me, it became a way of saying, 'May what awaits me in this room, over this threshold, go directly into my heart.' On the way out, it was a way of saying, 'I am so grateful for the grace that I have received while in this sacred space. May it unfold fully within me.'


This metaphor of stepping over the threshold is a beautiful mirror for your journey of personal and spiritual transformation: You have been on a path since the moment you were born into this world, and you've already courageously crossed many significant thresholds. All seekers must travel these invisible roads within, distances that cannot be measured in miles, yet are the hardest and most challenging part of the human adventure: the distance from the habit of turning away to the insistence on turning toward; the distance from the frightened part of you that says, 'I don't want to look at myself, I don't want to face things, I don't want to feel things,' to the fearless part of you that finally proclaims, 'I will do whatever it takes to be free.'


We step over the threshold of our resistance, back into the sacred space of trust.
We step over the threshold of our fear, back into the sacred space of vision.
We step over the threshold of our confusion, back into the sacred space of truth.
We step over the threshold of our forgetfulness, back into the sacred space of remembrance.