We become hypervigilant about our worth and safety. We start believing our survival, healing, and redemption depend entirely on our OWN effort, willpower, or performance. We find we can’t truly REST. We stop ourselves from fully receiving gracious gifts. We’re always “on”: managing, fixing, optimizing, proving. When we make ourselves our own savior, we internalize the belief that we are responsible for our own rescue. Which can sound empowering, until we realize it quietly expands into a second burden. “If I must save myself, then I must also help everyone else learn how to save themselves, too.” We inadvertently make OURSELVES responsible for the health and healing of others. E.g. “If I can do it, I should be able to do it for them, too.” This is where the rescuer impulse is born. It’s the projection of our self-savior “You Can Do it!” narrative onto others. It’s a weight that is impossible for any ONE to carry alone. We lose access to grace, surrender, and genuine interdependence. We become isolated in our own self-sufficiency. We can’t ask for help without feeling weak. We can’t receive without feeling indebted. We can’t be vulnerable without feeling like we’re failing, and that unconsciously puts us at a disadvantage. We create a fragmented sense of self-ideation. Part of us becomes the savior-self: the protector who fixes, manages, and knows. While the other part of us becomes the one needing saving: the vulnerable, emotional, tender places we label as broken or unworthy and try to keep hidden in the dark. These parts can’t step into the Light because the savior-self is busy preventing the very thing that would heal them; being TRULY seen, heard, and understood in the LIGHT of truth and love. Even with the things we carry from within the deepest and Darkest Places of our Watery HEARTS. We humans can sometimes confuse spiritual maturity with self-reliance. We think enlightenment means we’ve transcended needing anyone - even GOD. But in my experience, true spiritual maturity, in what I can describe as a Christ-like-Sophia consciousness; is truly bearing the capacity to BE HELD while holding others; to RECEIVE while giving; and to be SEEN while, in turn, witnessing the WORLD with the Spirit of Compassion in Truth and Love in Jesus name.

“Where am I the problem?” Not coming from a commitment to shame, but rather it comes from a commitment to LOVE and TRUTH. As an empath, my first reflex is to look inward before I look outward. I replay the conversation. I audit my tone. I search for what I missed. And sometimes that’s wisdom… but other times it can be a Traume-Trained Habit… “If I can find the flaw in me fast enough, maybe I can prevent rejection, conflict, or abandonment.” Carl Jung describes a four-stage evolution of the inner feminine from Eve, to Helen, to the mother Mary, and then Sophia. Eve is survival and attachment. Helen is projection and idealization. Mary is devotion and value. But Sophia is the integrated wisdom: the inner guide that can hold complexity without collapsing into self-blame. And I think this question, “how am I the problem?“ is a Sophia question… when it’s asked with love. NOT “What’s wrong with me?” But rather, “Where am I abandoning myself? “Where am I over-functioning?” Where am I trying to EARN safety by TAKING ALL the responsibility?” Sophia leads us through what I can only describe as a “Passover the place dark waters,” the crossing where we stop confusing empathy with self-erasure. Where we stop calling self-betrayal “being understanding.” Where we let truth be the thing that saves us, even when it costs us comfort. So yes, I still ask myself if I am the problem. I’m learning to ask it differently. “Where am I unconsciously participating in the pattern through over-responsibility, rescuing, mind-reading, or abandoning my own needs?” Instead of condemning myself… I am choosing to COME HOME to myself. AMMN 🙏🏻🐞🌻🕊️🌈🫶🏻

We will be revisiting week 14 as we prepare for the next meeting on Thursday for the 52-week Bible study group. Sending love and prayers.

Daylight savings time changes things up. Bible study is now 8pm Az-PST /9 pm MST

Week 2, Day one scripture from John 3:16 says, "For God so loved the world, that he gave his only Son, that whoever believes in him should not perish but have eternal life." Questions for reflection on this in the journal include: 1. Think of 3 people who are difficult to love - what one specific act of kindness could you show to each of them this week? 2. When did you last feel deeply loved by God? Set aside 15 minutes this week to revisit that memory and write down how it changed your perspective; and 3. How could you demonstrate God's unconditional love to someone in your family this week, especially when they might not 'deserve' it? These are very important questions, and I love how other scriptures can be brought into the conversation as we lean in and reflect on the Lord of Compassion with Love, Truth, and Forgiveness burning at the Center of Our God- Savior- Kings Watery Heart. The following Daily Scripture for week 2 are as follows: Day 2: John 4:7-8 - God IS Love Day 3: Romans 5:8 - Love through Sacrifice Day 4: Psalm 136:1-3 - God's Enduring Love Day 5: Jeremiah 31:3 - God's Everlasting Love Day 6: Ephesians 3:17-19 - Comprehending God's Love; and Day 7: 1 John 3:1 - Children of God