Part 3: Returning to the Heart – Listening for the Soul’s Call

We are not meant to live numb.

We are not meant to mute our sorrow or override our joy in service of appearing “together” or “normal.” These masks we wear—held in place by cultural expectations, systems of power, and inherited fears—only serve to distance us from what is most sacred.

Our feelings are not flaws. They are guides.

When you feel something stir in your chest—tightness, ache, trembling, tears—you are standing at the threshold of your own becoming. These are not signs of weakness. They are signs of aliveness. The voice of the soul never shouts in concepts or formulas. It speaks through sensation. Through silence. Through longing.

And it always, always calls us home.

But in a world so devoted to disconnection—disconnection from nature, from each other, from our own truth—it can feel radical to listen. To feel. To allow.

When we resist, we separate. We cling to certainty. We distract ourselves from the pain we fear will consume us if we let it speak. But that pain holds messages. Deep ones. And when ignored, the cost is great: we become untethered from our essence, from our community, and from the Earth itself.

We begin to see the symptoms everywhere—relational breakdowns, ecological destruction, and the rising tide of emptiness many feel but cannot name.

The indigenous phrase “All Our Relations” speaks to something essential: we are not meant to live apart. Healing begins when we remember that we belong to one another. To the Earth. To the divine. And to ourselves.

We cannot chase light while denying the truth of our own shadow. We cannot rise without feeling where we’ve fallen.

The voice of your feelings—whether a whisper or a scream—is not a detour from your path. It is the path.

So listen.

Let the soul’s cry guide you. Let the wisdom of your heart rise up from the stillness. You are not broken. You are awakening.

And as the voice within grows louder, may these words remind you:

“The time of waiting is over.
In darkness and stillness you have prepared.
Wrapped in mystery you waited and listened.
The call stirring to the depth of your soul.

A voice quietly whispers…..it is time….it is time.

Joyfully you now stand, poised for flight.”
— P. Nerad©1998