Spiritual Remembering, Ego Death and Reintegration: You Aren’t Alone

Experiencing a spark what some call “spiritual awakening”, which is what I prefer to call “spiritual remembering” can be, in a sense, like having your first orgasm. When it happens---you KNOW. You are no longer asking yourself “was that an orgasm? I don’t know… maybe. It kiiiind of felt like one…” because let’s be real it probably hit you so hard you can barely remember your name! It was unmistakable; you had never felt anything like it before. A a spiritual remembering can be like this, only it is A MILLION TIMES more intense, and you might return the world literally having trouble remembering your name, or what you even are.

Having a huge DMT rush in the pineal gland (third eye chakra), can be so intense for many, that they may lose all sense of their reality, their identity, their ego, even their sense of body and breath. This can happen after something dramatic—such as dying, (before later being resuscitated). For many, it can be hard to reintegrate back into the “physical realm” after experiencing this, for they no longer are the same person, if they even perceive themselves as being a “person” anymore at all. This is what happened to me.

MY FIRST SPARK OF SPIRITUAL REMEMBRANCE IN ADULTHOOD

It happened a little more than 2 years ago during my first ayahuasca journey. I lost all sense of identity and seemingly dissolved into nothingness. I could not feel myself breathing, I could not feel my body, I no longer knew what a body was, or what breath was, and didn’t remember or understand “I”--what that meant--or if “I” existed, or what existence was. “I” lost all thought. “I” appeared to be pure energy without form. It was absolutely terrifying until the medicine started to wear off and I realized “I” didn’t “die.”

The funny thing is I had tried so long to still my mind through meditation years before having that experience, because that is what spiritual teachers teach you you need to do to experience bliss, right?

But during that journey I wanted NOTHING MORE than to be able to have thoughts, because I wanted to know that “I” was still alive. I hung on so tightly to my identity—to my perceived “Self” and my perceived existence, to my perceived “life.” Years later, I still struggle to explain what happened that night in human words—and I know intuitively that there aren’t human words to describe all of what happened. My best attempt is this: I experienced what is called an ego death.

EGO DEATH

The ego is our thinking mind, as well as our identity in this reality; we need it in order to function in this realm. For this reason, when people experience ego deaths they often believe they are dying, or they actually ARE dying. I remember watching a TED talk about a woman who had a stroke in which the left side of her brain lost oxygen and temporarily died, and her ego went with it. What she described was very similar to what I experienced during this ayahuasca journey, after hours (which seemed like lifetimes) of being terrified and then finally giving up and surrendering---only to then experience complete bliss and freedom. Throughout my life I have met a surprisingly large amount of people who have died and then been resuscitated to come back and tell the tale, and the experience of dying that they described to me, interestingly enough, was always so similar to what I experienced after having finally let-go and surrendered.

Although working with my beloved teacher Grandmother Ayahuasca is what initially triggered the start of my spiritual remembering (at least in adulthood), one does not need plant medicine to receive this burst of remembering.

CHILDHOOD SPIRITUAL REMEMBRANCE

In childhood, I had many paranormal (meaning “outside-of-normal”) experiences long before I met Grandmother Aya. In high school and college I studied psychology enough to know that our brains rewrite memories and because of this memories aren’t guaranteed to be reliable, so I recently asked my mom for extra confirmation of what I remember from my childhood. One thing that she confirmed that I don't even remember is that when I was really little I pointed to a picture of deceased grandparents and said that I was visited by them at night.

I remember having dreams of things that would happen in the future, which I recently learned are called “precognitive dreams.” Maybe these were true, maybe invented, but I definitely have them in adulthood now, and document them, so it would make sense that I had them when I was a child as well.

One of my most intense experiences happened when I was about 9. I vividly remember waking up lying in bed having an “identity freak-out” in which I didn’t remember who or what I was. I felt like I wasn’t actually alive, and that I wasn’t actually a human. I lied there and kept trying to convince myself that I was a human. I looked at my hands with complete fascination and said “hands” to myself, then touched my face and said “face,” as if I were a newborn baby discovering my human body for the first time, but trying to process it cognitively in my 9-year-old brain. In adulthood, I learned that these experiences are normal, especially for kids. In adulthood I learned that I most likely had been astro-traveling at night for years, but forgot upon waking, which is why it often took me a while to “ground” in the mornings (although as a kid I didn’t know what grounding was), and why I often felt my whole body vibrate upon waking.

I learned that many if not most children have clairs (or ESPs, estra sensory perceptions), but unfortunately if they grow up in an environment in which their clairs aren’t validated, they will temporarily “forget” them (but they can always be remembered). This is because developmentally, children need to have their realities mirrored back to them through others validating their experiences. (I could write a blog on this alone.)

I grew up in a Midwestern dominantly Protestant Christian culture, in which “supernatural” perceptions weren’t seen as being real. In this subculture, for example, if a child had an imaginary friend, he was typically told, “that isn’t real, it is just pretend.” This child may be sensing a spirit, but if it is not validated by others, he will eventually (temporarily) “stop seeing” beings from the spirit realm and seemingly have his ESPs temporarily “turned off," until he remembers them later in life, or until he dies.

When adults tell children that what they are perceiving isn’t real, they are UNINTENTIONALLY causing more harm than good—because they most likely were also told when they were kids that what they were perceiving wasn’t real. It is a cycle, and adults often times have the purest loving intention and believe what they are doing is best to raise “psychologically-healthy” children, and I don’t blame them.

REMEMBERING IN ADULTHOOD

Getting told that what you experience “isn’t real” as a child can be, for some, one way to get a weakened pineal gland (third eye). Another way the pineal gland can become weakened is when it is calcified and clogged full of toxins—physical and energetic (which are technically one in the same). I grew up consuming all kids of toxins as a kid---including fluoride which is a well-known pineal gland calcifier. I also polluted my mind by watching TV shows that I later came to believe significantly contributed to my unconsciousness a.k.a. "not remembering" what I am—(another future blog post).

But here’s what’s amazing—the pineal gland, like anything else, can be HEALED, or perhaps what you could call “reactivated.” I believe that is why after I worked with Grandmother Aya that first time, my clairs started “coming back” and I started experiencing the paranormal again, even when not under medicine of any kind, (which I will have to save for other posts.)

I have spoken with many adults who experienced similar “spiritual rememberings” in adulthood, whether triggered from death, trauma, plant medicine, meditation, breathwork, extreme amounts of silence and isolation, or often times seemingly happening out of nowhere.

COPING AND INTEGRATION

Spiritual remembering is amazing, but it can be extremely difficult to come back into the "real world" (which ironically is actually a holographic illusion!) and reintegrate into society. Last week I received very clear guidance on a night hike that told me, “Many are remembering now. Your job is to support them through it because they will be very confused and ungrounded like you were.” I heard that message loud and clear, because I was indeed extremely ungrounded after going through my “remembering” in adulthood, to the point where I questioned my sanity. There were times when I felt extremely alone and disconnected from others—like I couldn’t talk to anyone because I thought no one could be able to “understand.” Fortunately, I did find people to help me through my integration process, but I know that not everyone has this luxury, especially those who do not live in communities where any form of spiritual support is available.

So I decided to write some reassurances, advice, and informational nuggets listed below that may help you if you are going through a “spiritual remembering,” or know anyone else who is:

1) WHAT YOU EXPERIENCE WITH YOUR THIRD EYE IS REAL. It is not “just a trip.”

2) WHEN YOU ENTER OTHER REALMS, DO SO RESPONSIBLY AND WITH PURE INTENTION. Whether via astro travel, lucid dreaming, meditation, breathwork, or whatever, the realms you enter are real, and you have an opportunity to do beautiful work in them.

3) YOU ARE NOT GOING CRAZY AND YOU ARE NOT THE ONLY ONE GOING THROUGH THIS. It may feel like it though.

I met a woman in Sedona who experienced a bit of an identity crisis and had a hard time coming back into society after having a “spiritual remembering” from spending a long time living in silence in an ashram in India. When she came back to the U.S., she said she had a hard time even buying things at the grocery store, because she had no idea what she liked/disliked because she lost her identity and had to build a new one. She then said that she coped by isolating herself because she felt so overwhelmed by other humans.

Although isolation at first may be a necessary part of the reintegration process, when the time comes for you to reintegrate, a good way to ease the process is to seek out those who are going through similar experiences, even if you have to do so indirectly by reading a book about others who are awakening. Online support groups are also available. Just the feeling of not being the only one “remembering” is very beneficial for the psyche.

3) STAY GROUNDED by earthing for at least 20 minutes per day. You can do this by barefooting outside, or doing one of my favorites, lying face down in the dirt and feeling Mother Earth support your body.

4) BE PREPARED TO PURGE YOUR LOWER VIBRATIONS AND DO YOUR SHADOW WORK. Spiritual remembering/awakening is not all rainbows and butterflies. When higher vibrations anchor in, the energies that are no longer a match for who we are becoming have to leave us. This can be quite intense. You may experience what is called “ascension flu.” You may even start purging lower vibrations for your ancestors. A lot of darkness can show up in your external and internal realities (which are reflections of each other). Stay present through it, and know that remembering/awakening/ascension is a PROCESS. It's about the journey.

5) SPIRITUAL AWAKENING/REMEMBERING IS NOT THE SAME THING AS ENLIGHTENMENT. When the majority of people reach Enlightenment, a.k.a. the highest state of consciousness (which is my subjective definition), they leave their last physical bodies to re-emerge with Source (unless they have karma connected to teaching that they have to finish fulfilling). I am aware that there are many different theories on this, and you are free to believe what you wish. I, however, only know one person who I believe to legitimately be enlightened and still be on Earth in his last physical body---and he is humble and does not call himself “enlightened.”

I hope this helped you. Make sure to be gentle with yourselves, and know that spiritual remembering/awakening/ascension is happening collectively as Gaia ascends, and our solar system moves into a higher-vibrational part of the galaxy. It is important that we support and hold space for each other through this. <3

#ascension#awakening#spiritualawakening#egodeath#enlightenment#remembering#spirituality#love#integration#reintegration#multidimensionality#clairs#ESPs#extrasensoryperception#ayahuasca#meditation#thirdeye#pinealgland#holdingspace#support#rise#integrity#presence#bliss#death#oneness#nothingness

Written by: Pooja Bareis