The vibration of this incredible creature been weaving through me today even before I go. You know the song right:
There once was an ugly duckling
With feathers all stubby and brown
And the other birds in so many words said
Get out of town, get out, get out, get out of town
And he went with a quack
And a waddle and a quack
In a flurry of eiderdown
That poor little ugly duckling
Went wandering far and near
And at every place they said to his face
Now get out of here, get out, get out, get out of here
And he went with a quack
And a waddle and a quack
And a very unhappy tear……
Well, It seems when I heard this when I was really little, something about this story somehow went Right deep into me. I identified with this little “ugly duckling” way too much and took on that persona and it stuck! I believed I was somehow less than and began to feel separate from the experience of Love I had in the womb as I grew in the perfection of nature with no interference. I felt so very different and separate from everyone and I just wanted to be a part of the adventures and play with everyone. And so I began to develop a Whole series of beliefs about all these ways I was "not……enough”. I could write for days and weeks about what all the dots could stand for but they stand for a LOT of things basically!
I didn’t see my Divine beauty, I thought and believed I was Ugly in So very many ways, in the totality of who and what I was from the way I looked to the way I sounded, I everything that went into making me who I am. I compared myself to Everyone and every single time I put myself at the Very bottom of the heap, I would find Something in which the other person was better than me and therefore I was not deserving of love and I only caused myself incredible deep suffering.
I believed if Only I could do X,Y or Z THEN I would be ok and people would Love me, people would give me this external expression of love and validation I craved and then everything would be ok. However, life just Kept offering me people and situations that rejected me and enhanced my not….enough lies that I had created. I couldn’t see the illusions and thought all of this was Real and I didn’t understand how and why I was seemingly rejected so often.
I couldn’t see that I was NEVER rejected by the Universe, I was NEVER rejected by the True, Divine experience of LOVE. I was Always Loved, Always held. I was So Very far from Ugly - Period. But my filters and perceptions and beliefs somehow prevented me from experiencing that Truth and I felt this Gaping hole in my heart that Only appeared to grow bigger as I tried to fix it or heal it.
I am now 42 and since that little girl heard the story of the Ugly Duckling, the journey back to my experience of Incredible Divine Love has been long and convoluted and challenging with so very many twists and turns – it’s taken a ridiculous amount of books and workshops and and teachers and practices and time and effort. I am human and yup, I see where I Still crave love and attention from external sources but Actually my experience is in falling in love with myself and healing and mending and caring for and nourishing myself and connecting deeper and deeper to the Divine and experiencing Love that Only ever unveils itself in More. THIS experience of Pure Love from Source is what the sore aching place in my heart wanted and tried to find in other ways.
What’s the end of the story? Did the “ugly duckling” ever realise she really is actually a Swan?
Well I guess it’s very much an ongoing adventure....
My daily experience is generally of seeing the Extreme Magic in this Divine creation that “God Loved So much that She couldn’t resist the urge to create”. I generally want to kiss Every single molecule in my being. I have times when I trip out on the MAGIC of creation and how do these fingers fly to type these words, how does my heart know how to beat, how does the hairs on my skin prickle when I hear music….. What is Not perfection? What is not beauty? What is not So incredible that it could move me to tears?
And then there are of course Many times that I Forget this truth of divine perfection and the old habits come in with old unhelpful labels and vibrations that try and lower me BUT I see these old traps quicker and faster and I can Choose to return to my experience of the truth of radiant living. And yes, Even now I Still regularly experience the external world offer me so very much rejection as it tries it’s best to push me and test me and sometimes the tears still flow. I know there will Always be people and situations that will turn from the limitless LOVE that I bring and offer but I bring it anyway, I can not hide this expression, I can not stop.
I experience the Truth that I was NEVER an “Ugly” duckling or ugly anything, None of us are. NONE of us!
Even the label of Swan is too limited. There are No labels, no solid definitions to explain it, just this
Limitless Roar of LOVE……..
(Photo I took years ago that I Love!)