How can a labyrinth help you get in touch with the deeper parts of yourself, resolve past issues and uncover your life purpose? In this original Awaken Blog article, author and spiritual mentor Toby Evans describes some of her own labyrinthine journey with examples that could help you on yours.
Merging With The Mystery
published March 5, 2018, Awaken Center for Human Evolution Blog
* by Toby Evans
Growing up in the era of “Trixie Belden” books, the long-running series of pre-teen detective adventure stories, I was inspired to explore our neighboring woods honeycombed with caves alongside my sisters and a small group of friends. The caves were old abandoned lead mines high up on the bluffs of the Mississippi River in our Midwestern Iowa town. The portrayal of Trixie’s fearless spirit catalyzed us to form our own “Tom Boy Club Explorers” and approach life like a mystery that was waiting to be solved. As a ten-year-old, I took “Toby” as my secret club name. The name redefined my shy personality and stuck with me, adopted even by the nuns throughout my Catholic education.
Taking dares beyond my comfort zone and crawling deep into unknown and sometimes precarious places, fostered my confidence and ignited my growing intrigue with the unseen realms. It shaped my belief that there was more to life than the ‘cover story’ that the 3D world presents as reality.
Delving into the invisible realms as a young adult, I excavated the ‘Mystery” through my art, (painting and nature assemblages) as well as writing songs. Telling my stories to others was another means to dissolve the veil of separation. The words of my songs and the experiences I shared resonated with individuals who were searching for the entrance point into their own ‘inner caverns.’
Merging with the ‘Mystery’ went to a different level when I began hearing the voice of my Higher Self and wrote down the guidance in a form called “automatic writing”. I did this privately, filling blank books for 5 years before the voice informed me that the ‘trust walk’ leading to integrating the ‘Mystery’ requires being ‘on call,’ willing to receive and the transmit in any given moment. This coincided with re-locating to Missouri and transitioning from a public-school Art teacher to a modern day, shamanic Earth Steward, obsessed with creating one of the largest, Classical seven-circuit labyrinths in the United States.
My behind-the scenes adventure was captured in Keeper of the Circles: Answering the Call to Wholeness, published in 2005, and accompanied by a CD of 11 of my original songs. This brought me full circle—back to writing as a way to share the multidimensional stirrings that had been accumulating like irregularly shaped jigsaw puzzle pieces. The installation of the labyrinth provided the ‘puzzle board’ needed to begin putting the pieces together. Keeper of the Circles is a soul journey into my personal call to wholeness, but it speaks to the universal path that every spiritual-seeker must navigate when it is time to awaken and step into their unfolding soul missions.
With the installation of The Prairie Labyrinth in 1995, our five-acre field of native prairie grass was transformed into a potent portal that began instructing me as to how it was to be used. As a self-reflective tool to enhance walking the labyrinth, I was guided to create the Chakra Labyrinth Cards. They combine two of the oldest spiritual traditions: The Seven Chakras and the Labyrinth. As a meditative centering practice, they are designed to help you identify and release what no longer works in your life, inspire you to receive what you now need, and renew yourself in Spirit. They are a catalyst to remind you to trust the ‘Mystery.’
Every person in the ‘waking up process’ learns to follow the bread crumbs that begin to appear before them in an attempt to solve their personal piece of the collective ‘Mystery’: discovering their soul’s purpose. The key that unlocked my ‘soul assignment’ was building and maintaining the Prairie Labyrinth. It opened up a treasure trove of understanding, including the soul contract I had to bring expanded awareness to the mystery of Death. You can’t teach something without first-hand experience. I had to follow the vein into the darkest tunnels that we each have to traverse as humans: that of coping with losing family members and beloved pets. Winding into that layer led to a section of the ‘death story’ that had remained hidden to me. I came face-to-face with an aspect of the afterlife that is typically not considered, accepted or talked about; that loved ones, ancestors, friends or strangers that have died, may still be here, impacting our lives more than we realize.
This invisible truth did not become apparent until I established a daily routine of walking and maintaining the counter-rotating paths within the labyrinth. The center was a natural vortex, drawing in earthbound spirits who were attempting to cross over to the World of Light. I found that walking the labyrinth was a way to open the portal and release them, but amazingly, finger-walking the embossed Chakra Labyrinth pattern (included with the card deck) could also be used just as effectively as a portable portal to assist the earthbound spirits.
The portal properties demanded that I develop my own ‘Soul Detective’ skills to help others, but especially the earthbound souls in clearing their baggage to reunite with their Higher Selves in the crossing over process.
One of the most surprising discoveries was becoming conscious of aspects of myself from other lifetimes, wanting my assistance in resolving or releasing the emotional upheaval that was occurring at the time of their deaths. They remained in a ‘Groundhog Day’ type of looping pattern. It was only in acknowledging them and coming to forgiveness, that they agreed to cross over. Because of this personal discovery, I was able to recognize similar patterns of attachment in those who were coming for Past Life Regressions. In our current bodies, it is hard to fathom that an aspect of us from another time could still be here, but at the close of the ‘Polarity Integration Experiment’ with the Earth graduating into 4D, many of us have agreed to be part of the ‘ground crew’ here to untie the 3D sandbags that hold us in the lower timelines.
The earthbound soul’s reasons for remaining here along with guidance and insight on how to assist them is provided in my recent book, Dead, But Not Gone; Are You Part of the Soul Bridge To Guide Them Home? It is an invitation to be part of the soul-bridge that is forming to clear the old energy from the planet and provide “lift” for the collective Ascension process that is well underway.
In these unprecedented times of carrying more light, everyday people are beginning to merge with the ‘Mystery’: seeing, sensing, hearing, and feeling things from multidimensional levels that they can’t control or easily explain. This includes the awareness of souls who have not crossed over. Assisting them is a valuable service intended for the good of all beings; a service that many will have reason to investigate or become involved in as the planetary vibrations continue to rise.