I.
One of my favorite short stories is State Change by Ken Liu from his collection The Paper Menagerie. It’s a short, wondrously creative, joyously life-affirming story in the genre of magical realism. I recommend reading it directly, but here’s a summary of the premise and why it’s relevant to the topic of spiritual transformation:
In the world of State Change, people are born with their souls materializing into a physical object: a candle, a box of cigarettes, an ice cube. Your body must remain close to your soul-object to stay healthy and you must protect it because if your soul-object is destroyed, you will die. In this world, people can tap into the power of their souls through their objects: a poet whose soul is a candle might be able to write with extraordinary clarity and illumination when she lights it, glowing, radiant and alive. But each time she does so, she burns closer to death. A precious, exhaustible resource.
And—SPOILER WARNING—here is what we discover at the end of the tale:
A woman whose soul is a box of cigarettes—accidentally losing her last cigarette while drunk—is surprised to discover that her soul isn’t just the cigarettes; it was also the box all along. And now that her last cigarette has been smoked, she isn’t dead, out of life. No, now she is carefree, adaptable, full of capacity to hold new experiences. But she had to go through all the cigarettes to get here.
She had to experience a state change.
II.
I believe there are at least two different types of spiritual rebirths a person can experience. One type is received. It happens to you. Like being tapped on the shoulder with a sword and made into a knight, or anointed with holy water. You knelt as one thing and rose as something else, born anew.
This type of received spiritual rebirth, of course, can also happen without any ceremony whatsoever. The divine, the mystic, the unknown can touch your spirit directly and change you from within. A blessing received.
But there is another type of spiritual rebirth: the kind you choose. I want you to take a moment and think about who you are. Your soul, your personality. Do you have a visual metaphor for your spirit, for your sense of self?
(This is also a terrific journaling prompt by the way.)
Now, how much of the way you think about yourself is a choice? How much of it is contingent upon the past? (A story, in other words). Does that story still feel true? Is it true? Do you think it will be true forever?
These are questions a man must answer for himself. But it is important to consider that the answers here do not have to be fixed. What is true in one moment may change with time—just like how a boulder in the river is gradually worn down into a pebble, then into sand. This transformation is only perceivable at a sufficiently long time-scale; you need that birds-eye view showing what once was and what now is, without the obscuring granularity of everything that was in-between.
Gabi Abrao aka sigh swoon writes about identity in Notes on Shapeshifting:
“The first time that I integrated the mantra, “I am constantly shapeshifting, adapting, and evolving,” I was attempting to define what kind of woman I was…
I paced around my room and attempted to recall everyone I had ever been - every identity I explored whether built for myself or for others, every personality trait embodied, every whim followed or feared. When I felt that I had discovered a steady trait in myself, I’d fish my memory for another situation in which I countered that behavior. As traits canceled each other out, it was clear that there was no overarching theme. There was no recognizable archetype fit for a sitcom character. There was no “kind of woman.” Just a wide range of behaviors brought out at different times, for different purposes.
What a truth. No context had ever felt more honest or freeing than the lack of any at all.”
III.
I had a conception of myself, a visual metaphor for my spirit. Picture a round flask. Inside of it is an ocean. Filled up to the halfway point or so. Water and waves. In the center, there is a sharp rock, jutting out and towering above the waters. Something solid. At the top of the flask is a cork, sealing and protecting my spirit. “Above all else, guard your heart, for everything you do flows from it.”
This visual metaphor captures the predominant elements that constitute my spirit: water (primary) and earth (secondary). I am fluid, reflective, nurturing. But I also contain sharp edges, solidity, and some level of distance between me and the world.
I wouldn’t be able to pinpoint when it happened or what the catalyst was, but there became a moment when I started thinking this wasn’t really who I am anymore. That this level of distance and guardedness wasn’t quite right. That “bottling my essence up” was not, in fact, protecting me but instead slowly suffocating me.
And when that realization occurred, what also came to me was an instantly felt sense that it doesn’t have to be this way. I can, using the power of my mind, my will, and my own spiritual energy, shatter that layer of glass. I could be free.
I let this idea sit with me for a few days until the right moment arrived. Swimming alone in a tranquil backyard pool on a particularly quiet afternoon, I decided it was time to change. I prayed to God in the water, for guidance and love in the spiritual transformation I was about to embark on.
Then, I focused on my breathing and calmed my mind. I submerged myself in the waters and held the image of my spirit in my mind. I pictured a big iron spike, like the kind used in the railroads, appearing next to the flask. Then a hammer, swung by divine force, driving the spike into the glass and SHATTERING it.
I saw the waters of my soul rush outward, hungry for the open expanse of the world beyond. And as this occurred, so did something unexpected. That jagged rock in the center of my spirit, sharp and inhospitable? It was revealed for what it actually was: a mountain on an island. There was a base underneath it, rich earth and stable sands, full of capacity for life. Under the surface previously covered by water, the mountain was mossy, green and alive. And like a time lapse, I saw visions of life erupting everywhere, trees sprouting out of the ground, flowers blooming, birds and beautiful animals making a home there.
This is who I was meant to be. This is who I am.
All this happened while I was underwater, holding my breath. When I emerged and breathed in the clean air, I felt a sense of peace and clarity and joy. The shift was a success. Relief.
I wanted to seal this experience with something special. I decided to swim two lengths of the pool in one breath. It was the type of distance where one length would be pretty easy and two lengths would be pretty challenging. I took a deep breath, then pushed off and went for it, kicking so hard my swim trunks almost fell off my waist. I didn’t make it the first time. I gathered my breath in the shallow section, calm and relaxed as the sunlight danced with the rippling water.
As my heart rate recovered, I realized that the resistance tugging on my shorts was a hint. I slipped out of them, watching them float and slowly start to sink. Then, naked, honest, and trusting-in-God, I prepared to try again. I took a deep breath of the clean-sacred-air and kicked off the shallow end wall. I flowed through the water, so smoothly. Each powerful stroke propelling me forward. I was in my element, in pure flowing connection with the water all around me.
I hit the deep end wall and fluidly turned back and kicked off, shooting like a bullet. As I pushed through the water, my lungs began to burn. Push, pull, kick. Push, pull, kick. I raced towards the wall. Muscles surging. I was approaching the edge of my limits, desperate for air, and—
BAM. My hands touched the cool concrete of the wall and I burst through the surface. Air and gratitude filled my lungs.
It was done.
IV.
Since this spiritual transformation, the world has opened up for me in increasingly beautiful ways. Friends, family, romance, everything is flowing with more honesty, more love, and less friction than before.
I am grateful to God for the gift of this experience. And I am grateful to myself for allowing it to happen; for making the choice.
I think I realize now that my guardedness was, in some sense, a form of cowardice. Of lack of trust in my own discernment. And I do trust myself and my discernment. I trust my ability to see good and bad clearly and to assess the character of people—not for the purpose of passing judgment on them but simply to decide whether to move towards them or away from them. This is not to say that I do not guard my heart; but I now have a more default-open, default-giving position that allows love to flow more effortlessly from me. It feels good to give love, and the more I give, the more I seem to receive. Isn’t that such a beautiful aspect of how the universe is designed?
I share this story as a personal testament in support of a plain truth: that you can step into a turning point in your life whenever you are ready to.
You and fate are the co-authors of your life. You can decide when one chapter ends and another begins. All you must know is that narrative structure suggests the new chapter in your life be different in some meaningful way from the one before it.
May fate and your spirit always guide you well, leading you closer to truth, beauty, and all good things.
