Letting go of the last vestiges of the world as I know it

Ten years ago I was living a very different life than I am today. Ten years ago I was at the zenith of my corporate Canada career. I was serving as a Division Head in a prominent company making a 6-figure salary. I lived a fast-paced life. I lived a life full of plenty—plenty of responsibility, plenty of stress, plenty of material possessions, plenty of debt, and plenty of ego-appeasing rewards.

Amidst the fast-paced living and life of plenty was a festering and growing awareness that I was unhappy. Even though I tried to blame everything and everyone around me for my unhappiness, I knew at a deep level that my soul was dying. And I knew that if I did not change my life, not only would I never be happy, but I had a sense (albeit delusional) that my soul would die. My fear of change had lessened to the point that I was now more afraid of my life staying the same.

So in August 2009, I did the unimaginable. I left corporate Canada—all its appeal, all its societal accolades, all its monetary rewards, and all its entrapments. I decided in August 2009 to set myself adrift and explore a new way of living and seeing the world I was living in.

Within 1 month of my departing corporate Canada, my extraordinary transformation accelerated. I was guided to ministry and to re-initiate my study of psychology. First came my study of theology and divinity that led to my ordination as an Interfaith Minister the following year. In parallel, I began studying psycho-spiritual psychotherapy and was eventually certified as a Sacred Attention Therapy Therapist in 2015.

During the 6-year period from 2009-2015, I sub-consciously and unconsciously divested myself of much of my way of life prior to 2009. As new ways of living and seeing the world I was living in came into focus, an entirely new way of living started to take hold. As the years went on I felt and grew more in alignment with my true, authentic self and calling. A trust in life grew over me that allowed me to experience more peace in any one day than I had experienced in the entire 40 years prior to leaving corporate Canada in 2009.

But one last reminder of my corporate Canada days hung around, and that was my debt. My lifestyle prior to 2009 was one that not only numbed me into complacency but made me think that it was quite normal to have debt. As my lifestyle began to change significantly, post 2009, so too did other factors, like income. It became less and less likely that my debt would be paid off under my new lifestyle. So what to do?

Of the numerous options available to bring all aspects of my life, finally, into alignment, I chose an approach to financial restructuring that allowed me to divest myself of my debt. It was an emotional decision to take the approach I did and it was blessed with many gifts of awareness and opportunities to deepen into my inner work to unravel the teachings being offered to me.

Yes, there was guilt. Yes, there was shame. Yes, there was relief. Yes, there was the myriad of sensations and feelings associated with having lifted a very heavy burden off my back—one that had been hanging around for more than a decade. But another awareness came to the forefront that took precedence over all else.

The decision to divest myself of my debt from my corporate Canada days was a final step in letting go of the last vestiges of the world I once knew. I now felt in full and complete alignment with a new way of living and seeing the world I live in. The alignment was freeing. In part because a perceived burden had been lifted from my shoulders, but more so because now I was living in alignment with all other aspects of my life.

I was reminded of the ancient teaching that when what we say and what we do is not in alignment, dis-ease results. I realized that for many years following my departure from corporate Canada I was still in a state of dis-ease because what I was saying and what I was doing was not in full alignment. While the initial steps to bring myself into full alignment, to let go of the last vestiges of the world as I knew it, was bumpy, what has come out on the other end has been freeing, rejuvenating, grace-filled and full of divine peace worthy of our Creator’s love for all of life.

Robert Meagher has been ordained as an Interfaith Minister and certified as a Sacred Attention Therapy (SAT) Therapist. Robert is the Founder and Spiritual Director for Spiritual Guidance and Co-Founder of the Center for Human Awakening.