ILP Entry Point

There was a thick fog yesterday. It swallowed the sun almost whole as I was sitting on the steps of our house, reading Tommyknockers.

When I was 18 years old I broke up with my first girlfriend. The ensuing months were arguably the most horrifying in my life thus far. I delved deeply in a personal crisis that turned to a full-blown existential, emotional and spiritual crisis. Now, some ten years later, I see that it was my Entry Point to a path of self-development, motivated by the very real pain I was feeling at the time.

What I call an Entry Point is the door through which we come to our practice. Usually the Entry Point is one single door, for example the door of human relationships. We experience so much pain that we are forced to resolve the human conundrum of suffering in a very personal level: how is this pain possible and how can I avoid it in the future. The Entry Point can be basically anything: problems (or revelations) with money, love, spirituality, philosophy or our physical body. Our very own and unique Entry Points are as numerous as we are.

The important this to remember is that the Entry Point is only the beginning. As we mature it soon becomes clear that as human beings all our parts are interconnected. This is the start of an ILP, Integral Life Practice. This is when we realize that no single path of practice is sufficient for us to live ever more liberated lives. By engaging in our own ILP we embrace the totality of being human in body, mind, shadow and spirit, and realize there is continuous work to be done - joyfully, mind - in all our aspects.

My Entry Point led in time to show the Entry Points of others, and how they were equally mine. If not not, later. As I am now working on my psychological shadows related to money and physical strength I see that this practice has many points of entry but no way out. It keeps on going, developing and liberating as it is evolving and that's how it should be, as Ken Wilber says, here "on the relative side of the street". On the Absolute side...well, I guess that is the Exit. To hold both in one timeless and time-bound human life is a noble thing indeed.