Find Your Light and Let it Shine

Lately the phrase “let your light shine” has crossed my path several times. While I know the wisdom of those words, lately it’s evoked the question “what is my light exactly?”

It’s not that I’m lacking awareness around my strengths, it’s more that I’ve been feeling a lack of passion for anything in particular to pursue. I’ve always envied those people who knew from early on that they wanted to be or do a particular thing, whether it’s rock climbing or wrestling with the physical laws of the universe.

There have been many things in my life I’ve pursued with vigor, some successfully, some less so, but there has always come a point where flame died out, lacking any desire to keep burning.

I remember back in the early millennium, I had an industry article published about a national award I had won three years in a row for my contributions in the field of customer service (within the transport sector in the UK); it said something like “Shona Shines”. While it created many opportunities I was acutely aware that I didn’t want to claim the label of customer service strategist as ‘my passion’.

Having gone down this path, uncovering root causes for poor service, I discovered there were bigger issues to tackle. This led to the wider field of the customer experience as a whole, which in turn led to bigger issues around corporate cultures and structures and the role of the individual within those. This in its turn led to bigger questions about society’s systems and structures as a whole.

When I decided to start focusing my questions and thoughts through these articles over three years ago, my conclusion was that any change begins within each one of us. We are the ones with the power to change the world, when we change who we are being within it.

So it seems strange, having embarked on this ‘journey to me’ as I call it, while I am much clearer on who I am, I still struggle with this issue of my ‘light’ or passion.

What unlocked this question for me was rephrasing it from “what is my light?” to “what lights me up?”

That is a much easier question. In fact, when I made a list of my heart’s desires, it became obvious why I struggle with the question. The things that light me up are not activities per se, they are more subjective experiences.

What I am passionate about are things like:

• having an ‘ah ha’ moment in each day
• catching a wave of inspiration and riding it
• helping others feel into their own intuitive guidance
• assisting my children’s desire to feel their freedom and express who they are in the world
• expanding my horizons through travel and connecting in with people who live in quite different places and circumstances to mine,
• letting each person have their own truth
• having enough space to feel the inner stillness within me on a regular basis (if not consistently)
• and advocating for transparent communications, more evolved leadership and healthcare, education, government and economic systems.

Looking back, while I didn’t always have this one burning thing I wanted to pursue, I have always pursued whatever felt like the most interesting and enticing of the things before me at the time. When I look now at my list of passions, I can see why I’ve not been able to give it a label. The list, like me, is subjective and always evolving.

I think perhaps that is the most important thing, to go after the things that appeal and beckon, rather than leave them on the dusty shelves within our cluttered minds somewhere.  It really doesn’t matter if what you want to pursue is an activity or simply something that starts as a question in your head, it’s being courageous enough to go after it that is important.

So what is your list? What are you passionate about?

Once you have your list, keep pursuing those things you are passionate about. Take any opportunities that come your way to expand within them and upon them, then you will have found your light and are letting it shine. Keep following and growing the light and it will lead you through your best life.

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