A DIFFERENT STREET

Written By D'Elle Milton

If we choose to remain in our old patterns once we realize the detrimental results or self-sabotage required to do so, we have essentially given up on ourselves. No amount of another's effort, faith, comfort or support will alter this behavior. Excuses abound and will always be readily available. Familiarity, safety, brokenness and just plain 'failure' are all wonderful caves of self-comfort available to those who choose to stay locked into their pain.  

It is a valid choice . . . no one has the right to take that away from anyone else. Perhaps it is a karmic debt or retribution for past sins. Whatever our justification, we have the incredible ability to become self-righteous in our suffering.  

The first steps out of our self-created hell can be the most difficult ever attempted. Breaking through the membrane of self-hatred and doubt takes strength and courage we may not choose to access. Whatever our decision, there is only the truth left at the center of our experience of life. That is the mirror we face at the moment of transition. When confronted with the various points of choice that were pivotal in the direction of the life we created, the moment of truth confronts us all....   I fell, I rose, I fell again.... the next step is either accept defeat or choose a different road.   

Portia Nelson said it perfectly in her poem, There's a Hole in My Sidewalk, Autobiography in Five Short Chapters:

Chapter 1

I walk down the street.

There is a deep hole in the street.

I fall in, I am lost . . . I am hopeless.

It isn't my fault.

It takes forever to find a way out.

Chapter 2

I walk down the same street.

There is a deep hole in the sidewalk.

I pretend I don't see it. I fall in again.

I can't believe I am in the same place.

But it isn't my fault.

It still takes a long time to get out.

Chapter 3

I walk down the same street.

There is a deep hole in the sidewalk.

I see it there.

I still fall in . . . it's a habit . . . but, my eyes are open.

I know where I am.

It's my fault.

I get out immediately.

Chapter 4

I walk down the same street.

there is a deep hole in the sidewalk.

I walk around it.

Chapter 5

I walk down a different street.

D'Elle Milton

D'Elle Milton is a novelist and lifelong student of philosophy, psychology, and the frontiers of consciousness. Her fiction lives at the intersection of speculative science and metaphysical inquiry — where neuroscience, artificial intelligence, and virtual reality open onto questions humans have been asking for millennia. Her work explores what happens when the walls between individual experience and shared consciousness begin to thin. She writes and publishes independently from California's central Sierra Nevada foothills, just outside of Yosemite National Park.

She is the creator of the Awakening Tarot Trilogy — EVOLVE: The Next Step, Elevate: Beyond Belief, and enLIGHTen: HERE & NOW. The images, while bowing to tradition, offer a unique approach to the symbol system, and each deck and companion book presents a distinct perspective and a comprehensive continuum of discovery.

Timely and deceptively simple, the Dialogue Series is visionary fiction that introduces mythic characters along with a map for creating a Conscious Community.

A Dialogue of Mythic Proportion explores multidimensional experiences through the perception of a shape-shifting dragon, a purposeful Sasquatch, and an innocent lamb who learns to love — unconditionally. They bring the sentient beings of the forest together to find an alternative to the threat of mass extinction. 

A Dialogue of Resonance is the story of an unlikely community finding each other and communicating through a mycelium network at the edge of catastrophic change. Working together, humans and animals find synergy and more than they imagined as the enemy takes on a new disguise. 

A Dialogue of Conscious Community presents a forward-looking perspective many are beginning to recognize as the best approach to survival: cooperation and collaboration rather than competition and greed. Resonance, coherence, and unconditional love creates a foundation that offers infinite possibilities.

She is also a teacher, a musician and singer/songwriter. She has been a travel writer and food critic and loves conducting ceremonies like a “Wisdom Keeper Croning,” Birth and Commitment celebrations, and custom designed events for many life transitions. She is also a Core Shamanic Practitioner, a Birth and Death Doula and facilitates confidential, transformational intensives at her retreat just outside of Yosemite.

https://wordpictures.media
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