"If you were not friends with the vast nothingness inside, why would you keep casting your net into it and waiting so patiently?"
That's Rumi, a Coleman Barks translation.
And you're listening to the Falling Into Soul podcast. I'm your host, McCall Erickson. It's an honor to be in this space with you, sharing my experience and nuanced understanding of the alchemical processes that awaken and keep the soul well in an ever changing and challenging world.
This is Episode 18, Becoming Nothing. This is a spoiler alert, in case you were wondering where the alchemical processes lead, when you see them through, the process that I outline in The Second Half of the Mountain, it leads to you becoming nothing, a nobody. And it absolutely must. And I'll tell you why.
First of all, when I say becoming nothing, I mean actually becoming nothing, not just doing nothing, or having an intellectual understanding of nothingness and its place in the creative process, not just hanging out with nothing for a while and making friends with it. It's not just about walking empty handed, for a while, it's about becoming nothing, as a foundational baseline surrendered way of being, if we are to know the soul, and its will in this life, we must first know the nothingness we must know ourselves as nothing, to the luminous emptiness that bears the soul's truth, the place in us that exists before words and form.
The alchemical journey strips us bear and delivers us to this place. It strips us of everything we are not, so we can be who we are. But we don't really know who we are, most of us. We have to give up thinking we do. Who we think we are is mostly born from our conditioning, our trauma, and programming in this world.
I love these words from my friend Monica Cassini on Twitter recently. She said,
In our culture with the level and degree of societal conditioning, the only way to heal and be free, is to first be totally destroyed. Once we've been wiped out completely, all that conditioning wiped away clean, we discover We are an animal whose nature is in sync with all.
Yes, yes, yes, the alchemical journey destroys us to reveal us. Who we truly are is born from the nothingness we first become to find it.
In order to access the soul's purpose, the soul codes, your particular soul codes of who you are and why you're here in this particular life at this particular time in history, you have to first shed away all the conditioning and programming you have about that. You have to heal the trauma that keeps you from it. And I've talked about this a lot in this podcast and you will see it in many texts about the spiritual journey.
This is what's also known as the dismemberment journey, the journey of being completely torn apart, piece by piece to be rebuilt organically. This is the process I outline in The Second Half of the Mountain. It's shamanic in nature, which means it works not only on our physical being and our five senses, but on the extra sensory perceptions of the subtle body, the soul body, the dreaming body, the collective conscious body.
There's a few lines I want to read from the book the Shamans Body by Arnold Mindell, this is on page 48 he talks about this dismemberment journey this de-programming journey, this shamanic journey that strips us down. These are his words.
"The symbolism of having the limbs and intestines taken out and later replaced, reflects the experiences many people go through over a period of 10 or even 20 years. During such difficult times, you are forced to undo yourself to go to pieces to free yourself from the tendency to think of yourself at any given time has one type of person with one type of task. Either you become fluid, or nature erases you in its own way."
Hmm, that's so good. To free yourself from the tendency to think of yourself at any given time as one type of person with one type of task. Yes, yes, that's the journey. We try to pick and choose. We try to fit ourselves in our truth into boxes and labels. But our true nature is fluid and moves in and out of form freely. Our true nature is complex and paradoxical. It cannot be pinned down. We live it. And we feel it. In the fluid truth of the moment.
I read this recently on Instagram by Leesa Renee Hall, she posted this, I really love her account. She does amazing things for people, highly sensitive people, how to be a highly sensitive person in this world and retain boundaries retain good boundaries. And she posted this, which I think reflects this journey. She said, "When I became nobody, I finally found me."
"I tried to be seductive, erotic and sensual. But that didn't work. So I tried to be powerful and glamorous and sophisticated. That didn't work either. Then I tried to be a rebel, gutsy and edgy, fighting loudly for the cause. But that didn't work. I then thought I was supposed to be nurturing and motherly, a healer. So I tried to be that. Due to my background, as an athlete, I thought I was supposed to be a warrior, a champion a victor. So I tried to be that. I thought that if I simply built and created things leaning into my inner artists, then maybe that's me. Or if I performed cracked jokes and acted all mischievous, then maybe that's me. Finally, I tried to be regular and ordinary thinking that my upbringing as a Canadian meant I was supposed to be unassuming and in the background. But when I stopped trying to be all these things, when I became nobody, that's when I finally found me, the me who has an insatiable thirst to uncover truth, the me who craves independence, so I'm free to discover the rough depths of my inner terrain, the me who has a need for solitude, and a desire for connection, the spontaneous and consistent me, the non conformist and traditional me, that I can be both rugged and gentle, that I can be both an optimist and a skeptic, that I can desire both stillness, and the call to adventure, that I can be both restless and grounded. These nuances are at the heart of who I am. And I embrace my complexities with grace, curiosity, and gratitude. You?"
Again, that's the Lisa Renee Hall, l-e-e-s-a, Renee, r-e-n-e-e Hall, I thought that fit in so perfectly. When we stop trying to be who we think we are, we can finally be the all that we are.
And becoming nothing, the nothingness, the emptiness is a stance, it's an alignment, an embodiment that makes space for us to be everything we are, not just the agreeable parts, not just the things we want to be, not just who we think we should be, but all of it, all of it. And if we're still trying to be something in particular, at the expense of other important and genuine parts of us, then there's still process to go through, there's still alchemy to go through. If there's still something material or spiritual that the ego can hang its hat on as our identity that we can pin our worth to, then we're not quite there. We're not quite to that full alignment with ourselves. But when we have nothing, when we truly embody that nothing, we are getting closer to the soul, closer to the true, precious rare things about us, arising to be lived and experienced.
And this is why it's so important to become nothing first before we can start creating and manifesting with the greater stone, with magical will. Because magical will and the will of the soul is born from the nothing. It is born from the nothing space. We need that level of fluidity and that level of surrender, that level of really being okay with ourselves, having no identity, having nothing to pin our worth on, we really need to be okay with being nothing first, being detached from what our soul work is or our soul purpose is. We need to be detached from that in order to discover it. Whatever we do from there, whatever we do in alignment with the soul and spirit comes from the grace of the nothing space. It comes from the grace of the nothingness.
But here's the thing to know. This is the magic. The nothingness is not nothing. It just feels like nothing to the ego. It's the ripe transmuted organic matter of your soul. Everything real, next and new in your life will grow from it in time. The nothingness is the organic matter and energy of the soul that just hasn't come into form yet. And that feels terrible to the ego. Because the ego loves form, the ego helps us align within form in this physical world, but the hard thing is the ego doesn't get to choose how, or what form or when. We surrender that part entirely, and give ourselves over to the organic processes that come from the nothingness.
This is incredibly difficult to do. The ego has to give up all attachments, physical and spiritual both to get to this place, it feels terrible to the ego. I can't stress that enough. To be alive in this world with no purpose, no direction, or goals, no identity, no labels or anything to do, or find meaning in, it feels terrible to the ego at first. And this is why it's so difficult to achieve this level of alchemical transformation, because it is a death to the ego. It's the death that brings freedom.
When we can become nothing and live from within that nothing space, we come into alignment with our deeper meaning and purpose. It is revealed in time, it might not look the way we want it to, it might not happen how we want it to, it might not take the form we thought it would. It most likely won't. But it will come and the ego doesn't get to feel at all good about that at first, because it defies all ideas the ego ever had about what it would be like.
And of course the ego reincarnates into this new alignment with the soul and spirit. The ego is a part of this and has an important role to play, has an important role to play in anything that is created from this new alignment. This embodiment of the nothingness, this embodiment of the beyond, the ego becomes in service to the soul and spirit for the creating, and healing that comes next, in a new way, a new incarnation. But at first, yes, it feels like death. It feels like the end of the world as you knew it, the end of your life and your purpose and your meaning as you knew it.
So this is what I call reincarnating into your own life. And you know, you can know you are doing that if the alchemical processes are leading you in to the nothing.
I can't tell you how many people I've worked with, on the second half of the mountain journey, guided and mentored through those really rough distillation processes that just looked at me in exasperation at one point saying, "Why am I even doing this if I'm not going to get anything for it? Why am I doing this if it just leads to nothing?" But remember, that's the point. When we are in that nothing, the real thing can be born. And not until then. Not until then.
This song is called Nothing At All. It came through me when I was beginning to realize that I had to befriend the nothing space, dip my toes in its water and eventually, when I had the alchemical strength, give myself over to it entirely.
When the last tear falls
When the last sun goes down
When no stone is left unturned in the cold cold ground
When I’ve done all I can
At the end of every rope
And I’m floating I’m falling with nothing to hold, I will hold
to nothing at all
Nothing at all
Nothing at all
Nothing at all
Nothing at all
Oh, it’s clear and it’s pure and it’s free where I fall
Into nothing at all
When you kiss my lips
I forget just who I am
The sky is the ground and we fly where we stand
And who we were once before
And all we thought we believed
Now the only thing that stands between you and me and everything
Is nothing at all
Nothing at all
Nothing at all
Nothing at all
Nothing at all
Oh, it’s clear and it’s pure and it’s free where we fall
Into nothing, into everything
How many times have I been afraid of the empty, the empty space
Beyond all the not quites the almosts the maybes
The times I thought it was my time
Isn’t this my time, this time, this time
Let me fall or watch me fly
It’s all the same to me now
Through it all I’m living anyhow
Ohhh, I’m living anyhow
In this nothing
There’s room for everything
The flying, the falling, and the all
Thank you for tuning in and being with me in this space. If you would like to support the show or find more of my work, go to McCallErickson.com. From one beautiful abyss to another, until next time, be well in Soul.
Show links:
The Second Half of the Mountain
The Shaman's Body, Arnold Mindell
Monica Cassini
Leesa Renee Hall