The Ordeal —Climbing the Mountain

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I had given up everything I once thought I was.

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The roles had fallen away:
Mother. Wife. Sister. Daughter. Provider.
Gone.

     And in their absence, I began to hear...myself.

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And in the stillness of the desert,
another layer emerged —
the beliefs.

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Not just behaviors,
but the architecture beneath them.

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I found the blueprint of my bondage.

The Christian conditioning.
The patriarchal imprint.
The conservative, Western, materialistic worldview
that shaped my perceptions,
silenced my intuition,
and named me “good” for being obedient.

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It wasn't just my life I had to let go of —
it was the lens through which I saw that life.

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I realized that my actions had been shaped
by deeply embedded programs:
what I believed about love, God, success, womanhood,
and most of all — myself.

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I had been told what to see.
What to hear.
Who to be.

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And I listened.
I followed.
I had blind faith,
as a “good Christian girl” was supposed to.

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But now… the veil had torn.

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And I turned toward curiosity with wide, reverent eyes.
Believe nothing. Entertain possibility.
What if it was all… illusion?

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What if everything I had been told to believe —
was bullshit?

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I let it go.

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And in doing so, I became dangerous
to those still clinging to the script.

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Their projections, their judgments, their labels
rained down like arrows.
But I no longer bent beneath them.

My soul had grown its shield of knowing.

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Their opinions had once been scripture.
Now they were just noise.

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I asked new questions:

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Why did I smile at the predator?
Because I was taught to.

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Why did I silence my voice?
Shove my emotions?
Because I was trained to.

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Why did I thank those who harmed me?

Because I was trained to survive.

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And so, with a sacred emptiness in my pack
and curiosity as my compass,
I set out.

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I traveled the world — not to escape,
but to remember.

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India. Nepal. Cambodia. Indonesia.
I climbed Annapurna.
Lived in an ashram.
Walked barefoot in the deserts of Rajasthan.

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I sat with Buddhists, Taoists, Pagans, Hindus.
I opened to plant medicines —
Ayahuasca. Huachuma. Psilocybin —
and let the Earth itself become my teacher.

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I let go of old sight.
Old hearing.
So I could see with the eyes of my soul.

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I tuned out every voice
that was not my own inner knowing.

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And I remembered things I had forgotten:

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     How to play — not to perform,
     but for the pure joy of being.

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     How to protect myself — not with armor,
     but with boundaries forged from truth.

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How to express who I am —
raw, holy, and real.

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This was the climb.
     The great ordeal.
              The death of the false self.

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And I did not just survive it —I awakened.