by Orly | Jul 21, 2022 | Blog
In 2014 I was early in my journey of setting up a business, but I was struggling. I came across a free ebook that described the nine personality types of the Enneagram in terms of being a business person. I printed off the ebook and started reading through the descriptions starting with ‘type 1′. When I got to ‘type 5’ — the investigator — I was blown away. I read about aspects of myself that i had felt were what was wrong with me — the things I’d felt ashamed of, like holding back, being a loner, endlessly studying and searching .. and realised I wasn’t alone — that there were huge numbers of people who thought and felt like I did.
This was the start of a deep journey in which I learnt about all of the types and for the first time I started to understand people. As I lay in bed at night, thinking about all these types, and piecing together a lifetime of interactions and confusion, I felt like my life was a massive puzzle that was falling into place.
One of the biggest gifts of learning about the Enneagram was that, in understanding myself and others more clearly, I could feel love and appreciation for what each person, including myself, was experiencing.
What followed was a journey back to the world, as I had removed myself from the world and ‘society’ to an extreme degree.
The best way to learn about the Enneagram is, much like I did, to read the descriptions of each of the types and to see what resonates.
The Enneagram describes a path of spiritual evolution.
In the past year I have started to learn a completely different way of understanding the Enneagram that precedes the personality structure approach. This is Fourth Way teachings and the Enneagram describes a process of evolution which I am beginning to study as ‘an objective way of awakening’.
This ancient symbol has a lot of depth and is something I expect I will be studying my whole life.
Anyway, this is a very simple (overly simple) introduction. I LOVE the Enneagram and I recommend it as a powerful tool for self awareness and guidance.
by Orly | Jul 20, 2022 | Blog
I used to be really rigid when it came to decisions. I valued reliability and liked to see myself as reliable. When i made a decision I would stick with it, regardless of the pain or the clear signs to stop or change direction.
In some ways this served me. I stuck with things until I learnt the lesson, allowing me to experience completion. But mostly it served to keep me stuck. It also contributed to a fear of commitment and a difficulty with making decisions.
I’ve learnt over the past couple of years in particular, and particularly thanks to two of my teachers, that not only is changing my mind okay, it can in fact be admirable. We risk being judged, feeling stupid, wasting time or money, disappointing other people, and taking responsibility for our life when we make a decision and change our mind.
Changing our mind means feeling into what is right for us, and adjusting accordingly. My tenacity and unwillingness to let go of an idea / decision in the past was because I was living mostly in my head. My decisions were generally a response to thinking and not feeling. I didn’t even know HOW to feel for most of my life. Bringing consciousness to my feelings is something I now practice every day. It is an important part of my process of awakening.
What about you? What is something you have ‘decided’ to do (or not do). Can you entertain the opposite? And when you make a decision, how much do your feelings play a part?
Let me know.
Thanks,
Orly
by Orly | Jul 20, 2022 | Blog
At the start of this year I set myself a challenge to get me up and running. I committed to ‘A lesson a day’ (though I didn’t set for how long) and for the first two months I did just that. But then I got a new job and other parts of my life needed attention so I let myself off the hook, and have been doing them sporadically now.
One thing I was happy to discover through this practice is that I have enough lessons to last a lifetime .. particularly considering I continue to learn every day.
I’ve been writing my lessons on the Medium platform which I love for the ease of both writing and publishing and subsequent editing. But in the meantime my blog has been languishing and my friends who want to hear what I have to say get locked out from my account after a while unless they sign up.
So it’s time for me to start sharing my lessons here on my blog (as well as Medium).
I’ll start with Lesson #1.
Stay tuned.
Orly x
by Orly | Jan 9, 2022 | Blog
I wrote and sent this to my email list (and Medium) so I am putting it up here rather belatedly since it sets the scene of what is to come.
—–
We’re ticking over. The big clock is shifting from 2021 to 2022. Numbers feel significant to me. They mark a passage .. make a stamp.
Each year I choose a word which forms a framework for that year. It creates a significance. We create our meaning. It becomes an exploration through all aspects of life. A focus. A holding space.
This year my word was determined as I drove north for a holiday with my sister and sister-in-law .. our ritual connection, debrief and dreaming time of magical creation .. and a word I have had some resistance to became my focus — GODDESS.
2021 has been my year of the GODDESS which included the appreciation of the many amazing women in my life, both near and far. The goddesses of this world give me hope. Living into Goddess felt like living into abundance and creation and possibility. It felt like a healthy sense of empowerment and lifting each other up. It felt like an uprising.
As we click over into 2022 I am considering the word to carry my through next year. I don’t have to make any definite decisions, but it feels good to consider.
Right now I’m sitting with AWAKEN. I love this in lots of ways. It feels like an opportunity to feel more alive, to be more present, to become more conscious, to rise up, to fully embody my life. And to share all the things I’ve been studying (SO MUCH!) these past few years.
I’m thinking of doing a #365day challenge of A Lesson A Day, where I share something I’ve learnt every day. It can be like a ‘decluttering’ so that I can get clarity on my lessons and share them as a gift to others.
I start tomorrow. Eek!
I’m preparing to share a ’system of evolution’ that I have created. I am calling it a Framework for Creative Evolution and it contains five elements that together form a catalyst that can help you get unstuck and rise up in your life.
Sharing this system, my creative work and holding mastermind groups for inspiration, motivation and connection is part of a multi-dimensional transformational journey.
Jump on board and I will support you on your own transformational journey.
Anyway .. the Green Goddess is inspiring me right now.
I am facing a fear and practicing one of the 5 elements in my system — Courage — taking the leap so to speak. I’ll never get this right and if I hold onto it it would never get finished. I know that I kill things when I edit .. and turn them from vibrancy to a dull order.
This is my new challenge. (maybe ..)
A post a day.
The thought terrifies me.
I can see the exposure, the pressure, the shame.
It’s almost midnight. 11.26pm as I type, here in Sydney time.
At 4.00am in the mountains of the U.S one of my favourite goddesses is holding a ‘Rebirth’ call. I’ve been in lots of magical spaces that she has held for the past few years — not all of them in real time — and she has inspired and delighted me on my journey of rising up.
It feels perfect timing for being in the Rebirth Portal right now.
The planet is awakening. The goddess is stepping up. This is such a privilege.
We’re all in this together.
Thank you for being here with me right now!
Amen.
by Orly | Nov 2, 2021 | Blog
I wrote the following poem at the start of this year .. a stream of consciousness exploration. After randomly clicking on it I decided to read it to my writing group, intending first to tidy it. As it happened I couldn’t bring myself to even look at it before our meeting, and jumped into the vulnerable sharing of it in its imperfection and despite the fact that one of our group members features in the poem.
Acting despite my fears, walking into the fire so to speak, is something I’m finding is liberating and expansive and it is how I am currently approaching life. My desire is to continue to bust through my fears and expand in my experience of life. And with that said, here is my poem.
12 January
Eight years since Ian died
Waking up to strange dreams
A group of us in Bellingen
The ‘rescuers’ taking over
Mum driving my car too fast and off the road
Kathy taking charge of dinner plans
I got quite annoyed with the game last night.
Apparently we’re playing tonight
But I didn’t agree to that
And Vanessa agreed to the opposite
She specifically said ‘one night only’
And I’m with that
Drinking and playing card games
If fun for some
Let them have their fun
Even though they will think the more the merrier
This ‘rescuer’ dynamic is toxic
Or at least unpleasant
It creates a victim
Fuck that
Bloody James Bond
Got me angry the other night
And dreaming of snakes
He’s a snake.
I’m losing interest in Peter more and more
Which is quite a release
I meant to say relief
But it is a letting go
It is a relief
It’s the pattern I grew up in
Learning to give up my power
In exchange for being rescued
This victim creation .. the helpless, hopeless, confused,
Defenceless, surrendered creature
Was the result
Reliant on my captor for help and support
Until I broke free on my own
But I still couldn’t function
In ‘normal’ circumstances
I’m seeing it more and more clearly
And still, she tries to win me over
To buy her way into my affections
To be needed and for me to need her
But I’m getting stronger
The rescuers can take their big capacity
They can take their desire to jump in
They can take their bullying tactics
Disguised as love
But the love is not love
It’s an unconscious pattern
A desire to receive love
I will only disappoint a rescuer
When I reject his desire to help
Because it puts me down
And assumes I can’t do it myself
So what do I do
To meet someone I desire
Without the pattern being activated.
It wasn’t activated with Ian
Perhaps we were both victims
Who had turned into loners
Rejecting the desires of others
To take control and be our hero.
Instead we became each others hero
With neither the victim
And neither the judge
And both accepting of both the other
And the self
We did it. It worked.
We slipped out of that dynamic.
But I fell into the hole with Peter
For way too many years,
Prepared to give up everything
To be his slave and disciple
In return for love.
I made it back to me
Back to Goddess
To Earth Mother.
Which is where I am now.,
Yes, I’m back to the Goddess
This is where I needed to be
Not wanting rescuing
From a snaky spy
Or a capacious and distracted
Uncommitted and unfaithful
Self centred and rejecting
Lover
For that is no lover at all
I would have been miserable
It took me so long to see it.
But it’s getting clearer.
And I now see the guilt
And where it comes from
For all I gave to you
Feeling obliged and dutiful
To my rescuer
Feeling resentful and rejecting
Of my captor
For where is the love
When we become a possession
Where is the love
When we aren’t truly free
Yet she’s done so well
She insists that she loves me
Even when I’m not the obedient servant
Even when I free myself
Does she understand what I write
Does she reflect
Does she have regrets
She was acting on autopilot
She believed she was doing good
Just as I did also when
I let Joey make decisions
That were not his to make
Turned him into my rescuer
And my judge
Can I make amends
Now as I step out of the victim role
And rewrite my life
Now as my life
Begins again.
And as for tonight
My final night in this house
Before a new life begins
I still have the decision
Do I perform my duty
Or do my own thing
The jury needs a voice
It needs an answer
Does Joey need me there?
Or can I tell him of my experience
That might be more an education
I’ll write out the two lists
And get clear on my answer.
Do I dare
Disturb the Universe.
Rescuers be damned
We’re all in this together
And now I’ve written
And gotten some clarity
And I’m feeling a bit better
And my poem is very long.
Time to finish my email
And send it out
Onwards and upwards
I join the Goddess
And save first my own life
And then the world.
Amen.
Save first my own life
For I had given it up
It was no longer mine
It’s time to take it back
To not allow the ‘boss’ to feel
He is doing me a service
For this is my life
And I rescue myself
I’m obliged to no-one.
The judges can judge.
It step out of the triangle
And become the witness.
