The Girl who Recognized the Girl in the Entrance Hall

I wrote about my experience but it’s a lot. Maybe too much. Maybe too explicit.

I Received A Message

I received a message here on Substack.

I’m 64 years old. The Girl in the Entrance Hall had a profound impact on me. I wrote about my experience and would put it in the comments but it’s a lot. Maybe too much. Maybe too explicit. Do you think it would be appropriate?

I read the message describing the experience, and I did think it appropriate. I believe it points to something important. A possibility in plain sight.

But I insisted on a separate post, word for word and anonymity. So no names, and even the initials changed. So this is (not) from ‘TS’ - see below.

*trigger warning - abuse, incest, cult.

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Pre-Note

I imagine this received message to be of immense value because it points to a possibility seldom, if ever, considered;

That each step in the journey of transformation to become enough might be a step further from the place we have set out for. That the journey is actually not a journey through time and space but a moment of no time in which we catch sight of what has always been here. A moment in which we somehow know that we have always been enough, and are an integral part of it all without condition.

And that this may be best realized with NO act of transformation or interference by us. By no-thing. By letting the experience of the soul make itself known.

I’ve long noticed that the person we appear to be striving for already exists. It is what The Entrance Hall eludes to. It has been my experience of two decades with the film camera. There exists the possibility of a moment of self-recognition that who we are is enough and belongs without condition. A re-sighting of the soul that had always been there, within us. And importantly, the possibility of an experience of a deep interior peace with this. With ourselves.

And I imagine that the shortest route to such an experience is nothing. No act on our behalf. No steps towards what already is.

Who we are exists, albeit hidden from our own sight. Underneath the underneath. This doesn’t require a journey of transformation. We don’t need to become (* see note below).

This original and extraordinary sense of ourselves is a naturally occurring phenomena. The soul exists, and it would be in our experience if we would let it. Though from where we stand, it may seem like such a thing is impossible.

In our search we probably hold the question ‘what might we do to make it happen’, when we could hold a very different question ‘what are we doing that prevents it from occurring’.

I’m pretty certain that the setting down of everything so that such a natural phenomena might occur, so that we might know, is so very different to the many acts of self excavation and personal transformation that fill so many lives.

And I do understand that this may be an unpopular idea, given the monumental and very personal investment in becoming. I do understand that this is antithetical to the way it is assumed it to be. A challenging opposite that is best experienced rather than written about. And I do understand that this idea may trigger some. Remember, this is exploration.

As an ever-possible experiment in this, I always revert to my long-held Inner View instruction, the one that sits under all Soul Biographies waiting patiently to be understood;

For This Moment, Be Still

Start With Nothing

No-thing. No Act On Your Part

And Then, Let It

Let The Experience Find You. Not You It

(*) note ‘on becoming’: existentially I imagine we are an unconditional part of it all, and always have been. Included and enough as we are. No matter the current state of our eyesight. This doesn’t however discount the many very human journeys of transformation we might choose to take - to become a better (fill in the blank) parent, partner, coach, gardener, trapeze artist, scientist, writer, money-maker, map reader, dog walker and so on.

Now for that message …

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Message From TS

I’ve been struggling for years with the aftermath of my childhood. Spiritual, physical, sexual, verbal, and emotional abuse.

Who might I have been if all that hadn’t happened to me? Wishing to be that girl instead. Learning to deal with the lasting trauma that affects every part of my life. No part of my life went unscathed. Learning to connect with my body, and take care of my body. Struggling to change the ways I look at everything. Wishing all or at least some of the past could be erased from who I am. It was so hard and a huge struggle to accept that I’ll always be an incest survivor, an ex cult member. That can’t be changed. It’s a fact.

I’ve been struggling for years seeing myself as broken, damaged, ruined, less than. And struggling to try and fix me.

Today sitting for a minute on that group Zoom call (note: this was a 20 minute call exploring ‘The Entrance Hall’ for this Substack list - see MeetUps) with no expectation, I discovered peace. An absence of worry and strife. An absence of struggle and sadness. What if there’s nothing wrong with me? What if I’m ok just as I am? The peace feels good, restful. I want to stay here in this peace.

The first time I heard The Girl in the Entrance Hall a few days ago, it reminded me of how I felt as a child. I thought everyone could tell just by looking at me that I was being horribly abused. And I was ashamed, and didn’t want anyone to see me. I was the invisible child of four kids.

Today on that call, hearing ‘The Entrance Hall’ again, I realized that the horribly abused girl is NOT who I am. I am just me. People don’t see me through a lens of all the abuse. They just see me. They see that I’m patient and kind, and funny. I’m empathetic and loving. Compassion and mercy bubble out of my heart for others. I have a gift for seeing what other people need and I try to give that to them. What if I could see myself that way. I may not be able to change my past but maybe I can stand on top of it instead of buried under it, always trying to claw my way up out of it. Yes all that abuse caused my complex PTSD but I don’t have to struggle against it, I can stand on top of it. In this peace maybe I can see myself differently and be ok with who I am.

So sitting there on that Zoom call for a silent minute, with the invitation of ‘no conditions’ (that translated for me into no expectations or pre qualifications, or judgments, or pre conceptions). It felt like letting go. Releasing the worry, strife, struggle, sadness and depression. What was left was peace.

When I think about it now, I stopped rocking in my chair so as to be still, then splayed my fingers over my sternum. I closed my eyes and just breathed. Peace deep inside. I haven’t had much experience with this, but I like it!

The ‘abused girl is not who I am’ thought came when hearing ‘The Entrance Hall’ again during that Zoom call. That whole thing, every line, could be about me.

As I heard it, it was as if a bright spot light shone on me and bared my innermost heart. I’d been seen!

And then the line ‘but what I see is not that. And if she could see what I see, I imaging that her life would be so very different.’

I’ve been wanting my life to be so very different for a very long time. It came into my head that no one thinks about the abuse when they look at me even if they know it happened. They see who I am now, not who I was as an abused child.

Fast forward 50 years. What have people said to me about who I am? Gentle, kind, funny, fun, great listener, good friend, patient, compassionate, empathetic.

It was like stepping through a door out of a dump into a clean beautiful room. Like a portal opening right in the middle of where I was and taking me to a completely different place.

My heart and mind were prepared from the first experience with ‘The Entrance Hall’, so a few days later on that call hearing it again and the other things you said (which I can’t remember) followed by that minute of stillness with no conditions, all added up and I was ready to take a leap.

I continue to feel peace. Tears moisten my eyes as I pause to enjoy it. Then a smile. Thank you for sharing ‘The Girl in the Entrance Hall’ and those moments on the Zoom call.

ps. I shared ‘The Girl in the Entrance Hall’ with my sister. I didn’t tell her anything except that it had had a profound impact on me. She wrote back later - ‘Profound impact on me as well. I just listened and I'm sitting here bawling and talking to Jesus.’

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Postscript

(written by Nic) I imagine many have the capacity to sit utterly still with another, so that that other may recognize themselves and know in that moment that they belong without condition. Everyone on that Zoom call was a contributing factor. We all sat utterly still. And in a moment of no time, something profound happened but not actually attributable to anything any of us did. To us, not because of us. It was the absence of any act that allowed what has always been here to occur. The experience of the human soul.

My present sense of it all is that this is what is going on.

(I am reminded of these words from Nicole, from a moment in which nothing was being done)

Cannot Be Unseen

Does it last for every moment thereafter, such knowing, such peace? Of course not, I imagine all experience to fade in and out of focus. I have observed, however, that once such an experience has been seen it cannot be unseen. One somehow now knows this is a possibility. And if one were to recognize that essentially in that moment nothing were being done for it to occur, that this might break the assumption that we need to do anything. And that to me seems important. A change in course might be set. It often is.

Maybe this is far simpler than we had ever imagined, this being entirely at home in our own skin. At peace.

Of course, it is not for me to say that this is the way it is, but I might have raised a question - what if … ?

Feel at liberty to wonder about this freely. Even comment.

No doubt, there will be more on the subject here on this Substack.

Thanks to (not) TS.

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A Relevant Soul Biography

This short film from the Soul Biographies Collection seems relevant. It starts;

It’s 2am. You’re wide awake.
Feeling alone. Unseen.
And inexplicably lost.

Discontent despite all
that you have around you.

The people. Your life.
Your dreams.

You wear a face that tells
the world you’re OK,
but you’re not.
You’re bone achingly tired
from the relentless
game of belonging …

Back soon with something vastly shorter. I may even attempt to condense everything said here into a single paragraph. Imagine that.

I absolutely get the irony of taking so many words to point to something that doesn’t suit words. We’d probably be better simply setting the camera up.

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