On friendship

During a spiritual awakening, it can be difficult to relate to other people. They can become the movie screen we project all of our internal battles onto.

Deep experiences of friendship and unconditional love is the reward for moving beyond our own issues. I’ve written an advanced article on common pitfalls of friendship for psychics here.

Photo by gustavo centurion on Unsplash

“…The friendship is not a reward for our discriminating and good taste in finding one another out. It is the instrument by which God reveals to each of us the beauties of others."

― C.S. Lewis

A spiritual awakening can be hard on human relationships.

At various points in my spiritual path, I have been betrayed in large and small ways by all those who were close to me across two countries in the course of a month, lost all human emotions for anyone I had ever known, been unutterably lonely in the midst of nonstop high-quality companionship, and dissolved into the consciousness of every stranger in my immediate vicinity on a crowded train. These are really common and relatively mild experiences that occur during a spiritual awakening.

I’ve talked in other articles about my baseline psychic abilities. I was born an empath and have transient experiences of claircognizance, clairsentience, and telepathy.

None of these abilities have made it easy to make or keep friends. But I am very glad I did.

Friendship for skeptics

Most scientists can rationalize friendship.

We’re a primate species, we have mirror neurons, assortative mating, and evolutionary biologists say our selective advantage is diversification and collaboration.

Spirituality makes you more aware of the subconscious, and biological impulses, not independent of them. I feel all these biological pressures more keenly and clearly than I did before my awakening. Just like you, I am driven to find and make friends. But now, for me, it is a conscious choice, not subconscious compulsion, when I do.

I have a high IQ, I’m physically attractive, highly intelligent, and empathic (leaving aside my psi abilities). I’ve transitioned several social classes, lived and worked more than seven countries, and I have a professional degree where I was formally trained in relating to others. All of these factors have made it very easy for me to make and keep acquaintances. Companionship can be an algorithm if you let it.

But true friendship is not a one-way mirror. Simply seeing what someone else needs, and giving it to them in a kind way then being consistent and loyal can lay the place setting of friendship. But true friendship is a meal with many courses. It must be savored.

A true friend must return the energy you give them. If you have high abilities or you have othering spiritual experiences, you must find a way to communicate with someone so they can see you, accept you, and find a way to reach you as well. Try watching this really beautiful exchange Spike Jonze and Cristopher Langan have across the divide of their different abilities.

Friendship for spiritual awakening

The reality is most people do not wake up, nor do they have any interest in awakening. So if you are going through an awakening, you will need to learn how to have higher-vibration relationships with people who are not interested in spirituality, higher consciousness, or your inner work. This can be really difficult, especially if you have one or two really nice relationships with someone who does display unconditional love.

I really like the stuff Rumi wrote about his later-life companion Hafiz. I am not an Islamic scholar, so forgive my synopsis. Rumi had a great love named Shams of Tabriz who he felt very strongly about. Those emotions appear to have triggered his awakening (I had a similar trigger). Shams disappeared or died and Rumi grieved the loss of this companion. But after awakening his later writing speaks with joy of all his companions as reflections of the divine.

“Your grief for what you've lost lifts a mirror up to where you're bravely working.
Expecting the worst, you look, and instead, here's the joyful face you've been wanting to see.
Your hand opens and closes and opens and closes.
If it were always a fist or always stretched open, you would be paralyzed.
Your deepest presence is in every small contracting and expanding, the two as beautifully balanced and coordinated as bird wings.”

― Rumi

The truth is, once we get through our own shit, those around us can reflect the divine. The divine will speak through them, animals and people in loving and subtle ways. A beautiful modern example is Jed McKenna’s lovely series of three articles about a Edwin, small-engine mechanic near where he lives.

If you are having a spiritual awakening and are struggling with personal relationships I cannot recommend A Course in Miracles enough. I am intensely grateful for this resource and it was immensely healing and helpful to me in altering my personal relationships so I could stabilize my awakening.

We need other people, we need to connect, and we need to work together. Other people can play out our subconscious beliefs and toxic patterns for us and if we know how to use the mirror they provide, without getting stuck in judgement, we can progress much faster. This book teaches this skillset.

It is worth fighting through the bullshit of our own psyches to find the light of the divine in our companions.

Spiritual awakening for skeptics and friendship conclusion

Spiritual awakenings can be unutterably tough on relationships. When we start dissolving our egos, and gaining spiritual insight the reasons we have chosen to relate to the people in our life can be laid bare.

Spiritual awakening is a solo endeavor, that does not mean we undergo it alone, or that we remain alone at the end of it. Just that we must face all the externals, as internals.

Toxic or unsustaining relationships are almost never about someone else, it’s always about us. Why we have chosen the relationships we did, and how we are going to treat ourselves and the people we spend time with. How we attach to other people and what they do and say. What kinds of boundaries we set and how we communicate them. Its endless, really.

But as you progress, so does the quality of your personal relationships and you begin to find true beauty, companionship, and intense connection. We can create true friendship with others, the divine, and ourselves.