We did it folks! Our first book in our Kinda Proud Pocket Books of Hope and Transformation  series is with the Publisher and will be ready to launch on;

International #EmergingProud day – 12th May 2019!

CLICK HERE TO JOIN THE LIVE ONLINE BOOK LAUNCH PARTY and hear all about the book, tune in for chats with some of the story- sharers, ask your questions live and hear from movers and shakers in the field!

Would you like your transformation story to appear in our book series? 

We are still taking submissions for the next 3 books in the Kinda Proud series;

# Emerging Proud Through Disordered Eating, Body Image and Low-Self-Esteem

#Emerging Proud Through Suicide

#Emerging Proud Through Trauma and Abuse

CONTACT US HERE to find out how to take part… 

Dr Steve Taylor says that;

“...the best way to explain the world is not through science or spirituality alone, but through an approach which combines them both” and we couldn’t agree more!

Steve has kindly also said this about our Kinda Proud book series, having been recently sent the manuscript for the first book, due out on the 12th May;

“The KindaProud pocket books are a wonderful resource, full of amazing stories of transformation. I was deeply moved and inspired by reading them”. 

I asked Steve if he’d like to let the #Emerging Proud community know a bit about his latest book, and why we need a worldview that combines both science and spirituality.

This is what he said…

Spiritual Science: Why Science Needs Spirituality To Make Sense of the World

            As an academic – a researcher and senior lecturer at a university in the UK – people are often surprised by my unorthodox views on the nature of life, and of the world. For example, when I mention to colleagues that I believe in some form of life after death and in paranormal phenomena such as telepathy or precognition, and that I’m doubtful about the conventional Neo-Darwinist view of evolution, they look at me as if I’ve told them I’m going to give up academia and become a professional footballer. It’s taken for granted that intellectuals and academics don’t entertain such unusual views. People are even more confused when I tell them that I’m not religious. ‘Have can you believe in life after death without being religious?’ they wonder. ‘How can you be doubtful about Darwinism without being religious?’

But it is very possible to be intellectual and rational while accepting the existence of seemingly ‘irrational’ phenomena. In fact, in my view it is much more rational to be open to such perspectives.

Our culture is in thrall to a particular paradigm or belief system which in its own way is just as dogmatic and irrational as a religious paradigm. This is the belief system of materialism, which holds that matter is the primary reality of the universe, and that anything that appears to be non-physical – such as the mind, our thoughts, consciousness, or even life itself – is physical in origin, or can be explained in physical terms.

It’s often assumed that we only have two choices in how we see the world: a “scientific” materialist view or a religious one. Either you believe in heaven and hell, or you believe that there is no life after death. Either God created all life forms, or they evolved accidentally through random mutations and natural selection. But there is a third alternative worldview: a spiritual approach that suggests that the essence of reality (which is also the essence of our being) is a quality which might be called spirit, or consciousness. This quality is fundamental and universal; it is everywhere and in all things. It is not unlike gravity or mass, in that it was embedded into the universe right from the beginning of time, and is still present in everything. It may even have existed before the universe, and the universe can be seen as an emanation or manifestation of it.

Spirituality isn’t often thought of in an ‘explanatory’ context. Most people believe that it’s the role of science to explain how the world works. But the simple notion that that there is a fundamental spirit or consciousness which is ever-present and in everything has great explanatory power.

In fact, this is the main reason why I think this approach is so valid. There are many phenomena and issues that don’t make sense from a materialist perspective, but which can be easy explained from a spiritual point of view. Conventional science can’t explain where consciousness comes from. It can’t explain the powerful effect that mental intentions and beliefs can have on the body (as illustrated by the placebo effect and the healing and pain-numbing effects of hypnosis). It can’t account for spiritual experiences, or near-death experiences. It can’t account for altruism, except to explain it away as a kind of mistake.

But as I show in my new book Spiritual Science, all of these phenomena make sense in spiritual terms. For example, our own individual consciousness can be explained as an “influx” of the fundamental consciousness of the universe, facilitated by the brain. Altruism can be explained as the result of the fundamental interconnectedness of human beings, which allows us to sense each other’s pain and suffering and respond to it. Spiritual experiences are a ‘touching into’ the fundamental oneness of things. Near-death experiences are possible because consciousness is not produced by the brain, and can continue in the absence of neurological activity. Telepathy is a communication between minds across our fundamental interconnectedness.

In this way, the best way to explain the world is not through science or spirituality alone, but through an approach which combines them both.

Steve Taylor PhD is a senior lecturer in psychology at Leeds Beckett University, and the author of several best-selling books on psychology and spirituality. For the last six years he has been included in Watkins Mind, Body, Spirit magazine’s list of the ‘100 most spiritually influential living people.’ His books include Waking From Sleep, The Fall, Out of the Darkness, Back to Sanity, and his latest book The Leap published by Eckhart Tolle who has described his work as ‘an important contribution to the shift in consciousness which is happening on our planet at present’.

There’s further information, including amazon links on Steve’s website, here:  ​

https://www.stevenmtaylor.com/books/spiritual-science/

When Jordana recorded her message for the #Emerging Proud film she was still struggling with the after- effects of her medications, and finding her place and purpose. Although we know that there isn’t an ‘end place’ where life is just bliss after becoming conscious, once we learn to let go to the divine flow of life, we’re often taken in directions we never dreamed possible – that is exactly what has happened to Jordana!

Thank you Jordana for your beautiful update…so, where are you now?

Where Am I Today?

Home with the flu, and finding a moment to write this long awaited update of where I am after my STEs (Spiritually Transformative Experiences). 

There has been so much transformation in the last 11 years, I almost don’t know where to start, but here goes.  I had 7 Spiritual Emergencies starting 11 years ago. And although I knew they weres spiritual openings and not mental illness, I live in Spain, which is extremely behind in terms of true spirituality and human rights, and I was diagnosed as bipolar with cyclical episodes and forced to hide everything. I was told that if anyone knew what had happened to me, my career as a yoga teacher and healer here would be finished and I was forced to be on meds for 8 years.

It took me 5 years of seeking out help from American teachers, mediums, key people from the SE community, and the support of Shades of Awakening, for me to muster up the courage to stand up for my rights as a woman and as a spiritual being, ween off my meds with the help of my progressive Psychiatrist here, and to finally live connected to God, without being deemed crazy. I left my husband, my job and all that I had, $200,000 worth of material goods including my house that I had paid in full to build, to start new. And although it was extremely difficult to lose so much, yet freeing and liberating, it ended up being much harder than I anticipated, as women here and possibly everywhere, have very little respect and very little value. I have since realized that it’s me who is responsible for my own lack of self value, and I am currently working on that transformation… to be continued….

But all this didn’t stop me. I became the co-director of Shades of Awakening, working on a volunteer basis for almost a year, learning the ins and outs of the SE community, and how to navigate my own crisis, as well as the crises of others. I received my SE Coaching certification from Emma Bragdon, but found it practically impossible to make a living in Spain doing my healing work. I was burnt out trying to find work to support myself and my son in Spain, so I went to the beach one day and gave it all up, and let it all go. I said to the Universe “that’s it… I give up looking for work here, give me what I need…” and in that moment my phone rang and I was given a job at a Yoga Center. I worked there as a partner for almost a year for free, quickly running through my savings.

So I returned to the Hamptons, NY for the summer, to work with my adored long time clients from 20 years ago, to make ends meet. It was there, the summer of 2018, that I had a huge spiritual opening from doing a 40 day spiritual practice, but this time, I was conscious, grounded, I knew how I did it, and I was totally connected with Akasha, who presented herself to me, as the feminine aspect of God. It was beautiful, magical, and everyone saw the process, as I somewhat documented it on Instagram. My transformation was visible in the material plane for everyone to see, accepted, and embraced by people who normally wouldn’t believe in these things, and I finally felt supported. I realized that I didn’t want money to be my  motivation for work, but healing, and most of all faith, so I returned to Spain to make a go at this beautiful Yoga Center that was so generously gifted to me by Akasha.

And then to my surprise, my partners one by one left the project, leaving me alone just before Christmas, with this huge responsibility of running the center by myself. I think I was in so much shock, that there was no time to think, and I could only move forward one day at a time with faith that Akasha would bring me everything that I needed. And she did, as today I have 2 amazing partners, support from my students, and we are creating an incredible healing center motivated by love, with an amazing like-minded community. I am teaching Hatha Yoga, Kundalini Yoga, a combination of the two, which I have coined ‘Vibra Yoga’. I am doing bodywork, coaching, spiritual mentoring, teaching philosophy, empowering people to heal themselves through 40 day spiritual practices at my center and online, and guiding support groups for people in SE, with the opportunity to enter into the mental health system here with my healing practices; things I would never dreamt of doing!!! And whilst economic abundance still seems to elude me, I have never been happier, offering my services on a donation basis, so my motivation is not money, but union and faith that Akasha will provide for me, as she always has when I let go of my ego, my control, and my false sense of reality, which is everything that isn’t love. And I wouldn’t have it any other way.

Although these last 11 years have been so challenging, so difficult, and so intense, I am incredibly grateful for all of it, for all of the conflict, for all of the lessons, for all of the growth. Evolution does come from suffering, otherwise I fall asleep. But the less I react, the less painful it is, the more connected I am, and the more life is bliss. Now my only wish is to show others their way… yet I let it go, and remain open to receive what Akasha feels is best for me.

In love, faith, and gratitude!!!

One Love,

Jordana 

Click HERE to go to Jordana’s Yoga centre website 

If you’d like to share an update of your #Emerging Proud journey, or would like to ’emerge’ for the first time, please do get in touch!  ❤

Have you experienced a spiritual emergence and were subsequently diagnosed with a mental illness by a licensed practitioner? 

Would you like to take part in a research study? 

Dissertation Research Project – Spiritual Emergence

After a long winter in deep processing and letting go of more layers, my purpose comes clear once more. To hold space for as many people as possible through their time of transition. My long journey through the layers of my being, coming in touch with my soul, and deepening my spiritual connection has come in may guises, with everyone a teacher along the way. 

And so it gives me great pleasure to screen for a second time, the film “Emerging Proud: coming out of the Spiritual Closet”, showcasing many a beloved speaking of their own journey of becoming, and every one reflecting something of my own inner journey. I pray this is an inspiration to many at this time that they are awakening to a deeper truth despite the stigma of being crazy. We are the ones who see and the ones who hear.

So pleased was I to join the training for Emerging Kind as it gave me a safe starting point to begin being of service to the many people undergoing profound transition at this time. Throughout last year I held a peer group, and felt the support of my peers for the first time, safe in the knowledge that not one of them was going to raise an eyebrow or give me a label. My soul has no labels. I am part of the One. As are we all…

Following the screening I will once again provide an Emerging Kind peer support group on the first Tuesday of every month, open to those who feel to share their experiences in the safety of a gentle, caring supportive space, free from labels and limitations.

Join me on Tuesday 2nd April 6.30-9pm at the Friends Meeting House, Temple Road, Llandrindod Wells. A informal discussion will commence after the screening with refreshments provided. Do come along and share your story.

Find out more by emailing me at: carolinemaryandrews@hotmail.com

I look forward to connecting with you.

Caroline

Great news folks – our Emerging Kind online group is open for new members!

Do you identify as having had a spiritual crisis / emergence / non-ordinary transcendent experience?

Do you feel it would be helpful to take part in a safe space sharing group and gain reciprocal support with your peers?

This group is hosted by our lovely trained Peer Experiencer, Ellie…

If you are interested in finding out more, or confused as to whether your experiences ‘fit’ with the terminology, please watch the #Emerging Proud film, and if it resonates then do get in touch with Ellie at: epmeditation@gmail.com

Have you signed up for our #Emerging Proud day 2019 celebrations?

CLICK HERE TO SIGN UP NOW 

12th May 2019 will see the launch of our Kinda Proud book series, and you’ll get a sneak preview of the first book!

In this first edition of our Pocketbooks of Hope and Transformation Series, we feature 16 stories of people who’ve had NOTEs (non-ordinary transcendent experiences). From challenging visionary experiences to overcoming dark nights’ of the soul, these stories showcase ordinary people from across the globe who experienced something extraordinary that pushed them beyond the edges of their known world. For many, their experiences brought about big life changes – for some their sanity was questioned, but for most they’ve been an invitation to step powerfully into a life of greater purpose and meaning.

CLICK HERE TO SIGN UP NOW 

What are people saying about this book?

Too many talented individuals have literally been ‘hexed’ into believing they have a permanent pathological brain condition by a culture and mental health system that does not understand the growth potential of a psychological crisis or the potential pathways to recovery.

During the production and distribution of our film CRAZYWISE I have heard from hundreds of individuals who have successfully navigated a severe mental emotional crisis. Many had to take the often disorienting and frightening journey into extra ordinary states of consciousness without any help or guidance. (In fact, CRAZYWISE has now been translated into 16 languages voluntarily by several of these individuals which has allowed it to be seen in 54 countries.)

I have often thought of what we can do to change the common consensus about a psychological crisis from a pathology to an opportunity. How do we support those in crisis and encourage more of those who have navigated a crisis to share their journeys of transformation and come out from under the cultural cloud of stigma and shame to share their process?

By making these initiatory but difficult experiences a cause for pride and celebration of strength and courage this remarkable book series does just that!

Phil Borges

Co-Producer/ Director CRAZYWISE

Join the conversations – join us LIVE! 

CLICK HERE TO SIGN UP NOW 

Have you experienced Spiritual Crisis/Emergence and live in the Oxford area of the UK?

Are you looking for a ‘safe space’ peer group in which to share your experience to navigate the challenges, feel validated and less alone?

There is a new *Emerging Kind peer support/sharing group at the Mind Wellbeing Centre on Cowley Road hosted by Alan

If you think that this group might be of interest to you, please contact Alan for more details at: alan@emergingkind.org

*Emerging Kind are a group of people who have experienced spiritual crisis/ emergence and have been trained to arrange and facilitate peer support groups around the country for Experiencers to meet and share.

Like Samaya, so many of us get nudges from our ‘Soul voice’, pushing us to live a life more authentically aligned with who we truly are. Doing so can cause chaos and pain as we choose to move away from fitting in with the social dictations we’ve often been brought up with. It’s learning to recognise that the pain of these messages can be the thing that liberates us, if we really listen, as Samaya recounts through her personal journey here….

THE VISIT

It was spring of 1993 when I got my first visit.

I was fifteen and having a tumultuous time trying to make sense of it all, when an inquisitive voice from deep within surfaced and started pulling me and my life into pieces.

It was my soul’s voice, which was asking me to start making meaning of what was worth valuing and loving, so I could start building my life with those things at the very heart of it all.

This was a task that I had not been prepared for and had no idea how to even start tackling. At that time, I hadn’t known anyone who had gone through anything quite like this.

What did I love?

I had no clue.

But the voice was there and it was insisting.

It was not barging.

It was not lessening.

Like an uninvited guest whom did not seem to be aware that they were gate-crashing.

If anything, they seemed to feel right at home.

This persistent enquiry that came almost out of the blue, pushed me into an intense process of searching and deconstruction that ended up leaving me exhausted, depressed and quite vulnerable.

What was worse, I was not coming up with the goods, and that was slowly killing me on the inside. At fifteen I felt like I had no clue about the things that really mattered, what I loved, what was worthy of love, and true value in my life.

Not just anyone’s life, but mine.

Most people I knew seemed to live life according to a book written by society and not their own soul.

Where was I going to get help from?

This deep search was not yielding successful results and it started affecting my external life so much so, that at 15, I seriously contemplated taking my own life and got really close to overdosing myself to death.

I was only to be saved, last minute, by a phone call from a friend who had previously also tried taking her own life.

I did not mention on that call what I was about to do, and my friend, who had slowly moved away from our friendship after her own attempt, admitted she did not know why she rung me, she just knew she had to do so.

I definitely look back on that call as an angelic intervention.

On the same day of the call, my soul came back with yet another message.

This time however it did not bring a question, but a piece of advice.

I was told that this did not need to sit as a heavy load on my shoulders. That I had a lot of my life ahead of me and that the answers did not need rushing,

I just needed to give myself permission to take my time.

This made a lot of sense to me and I somehow tried to go on living my life.

Fast forward fifteen years, I found myself living in a new country that felt like my spiritual home, living as a practising Buddhist.

Till then, soul would communicate to me in many indirect ways through music, art, books, poetry and other people, through their eyes, their movements, their words.

But very rarely did I get to channel direct messages from it just like that time when I was fifteen and scared to face myself and the big world.

One day, following the end of an intense work stint in the psychiatric wards of a London hospital, I got another visit.

My soul was there to touch base with me again, picking up from where we had left off and bringing up the question that it was no stranger to me.

“What in my life was worth living for?”

Yet by now another 15 years had gone by, I was older, yet despite the many more experiences under my belt, the depth of that enquiry yet again brought up a ton of fear.

Perhaps because this time around the question had lead me to another more relevant enquiry.

This new enquiry had to do with what value I was actually giving to the world, rather than what was being given to me, which is how I had seen it the first time around.

But I had yet to fully make my life my own and to tap into the potential that was lying within me, underneath it all.

I realised that I had not learned how to serve my own soul by showing up in the world in a way that fulfilled me.

The meditation I had been practising for years had helped me tap into myself, yet was now gradually getting me to want to create a more personable life, full of meaning, depth and purpose.

A life of creativity that stemmed from a deep connection with my soul, in a way that brought me and others joy.

I was being urged to create a much more personable life that lived on a daily communion with my soul and purpose.

Where I wouldn’t have to be tested like this over and over again.

This realisation and desire to align with my soul’s creativity and start living my life as a work of art, had become really clear.

I had come here in the world to create after all.

But first I had to take a little detour again.

I was triggered into yet another depression which lasted a period of 2 years.

I had to stop work and immerse myself into my healing, face my demons, get to know my fears and sabotages so I could understand myself better and go the distance.

I realised that I held the belief that I did not have much to offer the world.

That I couldn’t create and build good things.

And I feared that I was going to move through life without fulfilling my deeper purpose.

During that time, I was hanging on for dear life and often the intensity of the situation got me exhausted trying to stay afloat.

During an intensive silent meditation retreat with an esteemed teacher, I asked to be given permission to return home early because I found myself starting to plot throwing myself in the Scottish lochs and drown in the river.

Upon my return, what hit home with me was that if I was going to put all this energy to try and get the strength I needed to take my own life, I might as well put that energy into healing and keeping myself alive.

This realisation ended up becoming the actual fuel that helped me make my turn around.

I then started discovering many more gifts which soon made it apparent that my depression had turned into my actual medicine.

Shamans and Medicine men and women around the world say that when we lose our way, for a human to be truly born and married into their spirit and true self and find our true path, we often have to reach a state of emergency, where we are forced and initiated to activate our true spirit self.

It’s like the urgency, brought to us through an illness, a loss, an intense life experience, forces us to truly become ourselves.

Since these two visits, I am pleased to say I have been on a very different life trajectory.

There is a noticeable change and grounded-ness in my own soul and path, despite the various challenges that have presented my way.

It has not meant that life has become easier, but my capacity to process things is more robust, whilst I seem to maintain a more continuous and deeper communion with my soul, as well as my spirit path.

I have a lot more fun creating, which doesn’t seem so scary anymore.

And as far as my soul conversations go, these days they are more fun and enjoyable, reminding me daily we are here to play and fulfil our destiny by leaving our energy signature and blueprint in the world and shining our light bright.

Would my light shine as bright had it not been for the darkness I had encountered?

I will leave this for you to decide.

I have learned that my darkness is not to be feared, as it holds the most healing medicine, able to transform me over and over again to my deepest, truest self.

Thank you for reading my story. I hope it guides you through your own tough times and inspires you to choose to be returning back to your light, time and time again.

Love

Samaya Adelin

www.samayaadelin.com

If Samaya’s experience resonates with you and you’d like to share your story to be considered for publication in our KindaProud Pocket Books of Hope series, please CLICK HERE to find the contact details for our Reps ❤