To fall or to fail, and not fall apart

Many of us have secretly wished, at one time or another, for the same magical wish—the ability to survive failure, effortlessly.

Because there isn’t one, and for good reason.

Our falls and failures are initiations; no matter how ugly, impossible or hopeless they may feel. They are doorways; opportunities to integrate more of our self, into more possibility.

Does that sound too simplistic? Or is it simply romanticizing moments and events we’d rather not deal with or go through?

I see your questions, and raise you another: Do we have a choice?

So how do you fall without falling apart? And I’m not talking about the smaller stuff of life, like missing a big work meeting, or your closest friends forgetting your birthday. Well, perhaps I am. Because put a handful of small “falls” back to back to back in the space of a few days, and by the end of the week you feel like you’re coming apart at the seams.

The human ego prefers anything, just about anything, to falling. It loves the status quo, which is a place of comfort, safety and security. It attaches to past and present, and fears the future.

For you not to fall apart, it is the ego that has to fall apart.

It is when the ego is at its most deconstructed that we can can hear things or look at them in a new way, even if it is half-hearted, half-seen, half-heard. This is when we can begin—finally—some honest reconstruction, and get closer to our true self.

This process is often referred to, in cliched terms, as ‘facing the fear’.

So you see, to not fall apart, parts of you have to. Challenges often come with the promise of death; death of the known, death of your personal identity.

Sometimes, falls or failures destroy us.

It takes faith—”magic”, if you will—to accept, to surrender, to see that the fall is destroying us to re-create us.

To move forward, there is always something that has to be let go of, moved beyond, given up or forgiven.

Only then do you crack open to the deeper understanding that connects you both to your inner consciousness and, at the same time, to the world.

You then come back to the “known” world with this depth. The fall is now a part of you; except that you did not fall apart, but became more whole.