Latest / The Spiritual Shitshow Podcast / Mystic in Plain Clothes
Transcript
- 0:00Hello, and welcome back to the Spiritual Shit Show.
- 0:02My name is Julie Nguyen, and today I wanna tell you a story that still feels like a dream when I remember it, and it's actually taken me a long time to figure out what the heck the experience is.
- 0:14But now that I am on the other side of healing, I'm in my new era of, what happens after healing, and I love this notion that it's not about the great awakening, it's the great remembering.
- 0:29And the more that I learn, the more that I do this soul work, the more humbled I fucking am by all of it.
- 0:38Because here's the thing: there is such a thing as a spiritual ego.
- 0:44There's this part of us that can take our healing gifts, our intuition, our sensitivities, our abilities to see angels or do tarot card readings or whatever, our connection to spirit, and we can quietly turn it into identity.
- 1:04It's the egoic part of us that wants to feel important, that wants to feel chosen, that wants to become somebody, that wants to be seen.
- 1:15When my gifts first started opening about 15 years ago, I could feel energy.
- 1:20I could sense people's guides.
- 1:22I could see them.
- 1:23I could see angels.
- 1:24I could see colors.
- 1:25I could receive messages.
- 1:27I could also hear messages from animals, dogs.
- 1:32I could feel and see angels and loved ones, and I could see ghosts and spirits that were hanging around, and these gifts were real.
- 1:43And at the time, so was my desire to matter.
- 1:48I will say it again, where I am in my journey now is fucking humbling.
- 1:54Humbling.
- 1:56There was still a very human part of me, just actually up until recently, and it's probably still there, it's just not as loud, where there's part of me that's searching for the role, that's searching for the identity, that's searching for the,"Ooh, wow, this is who I am.
- 2:11This is what I do," searching for something to replace the old identity that I had lost.
- 2:17So spirituality become another place where my ego could whisper,"This is what makes you special.
- 2:24This is what makes you important.
- 2:26This is what makes you somebody." And I say this with so much compassion for that version of myself because 10 years ago, I wasn't trying to harm anyone, and I definitely wasn't trying to overstep any boundaries.
- 2:43I was just trying to find myself more Sometimes when we are trying to prove our gifts, we can overstep.
- 2:49We can forget humility.
- 2:51We can forget boundaries.
- 2:53We can forget that no gift makes us better than anyone else.
- 2:59And this story that I'm about to share was one of the first times that I got humbled in a way that I didn't understand at the time, but I understand it now a little bit more.
- 3:11All right, so I'm gonna take you back to the year 2020.
- 3:14I was overseas teaching dance, and it was literally right before the world changed.
- 3:20There was this strange feeling in the air.
- 3:23it just felt odd.
- 3:24It w- there was something, I couldn't name it.
- 3:27And the moment before everything shifted, when something was coming, but none of us fully knew what it was yet, I had this really crazy, mystical experience.
- 3:39I was supposed to fly home the next day.
- 3:41My luggage is packed.
- 3:43I'm ready to go home.
- 3:45And my translator for this trip sent me a message, and she said,"My teachers know you're in town.
- 3:52They changed their train tickets home because they want to meet you.
- 3:57Can you come out tonight with us so we can talk mystical talks?" And I paused, because when I travel internationally, I am tired.
- 4:07I'm not out exploring the city past 7:30.
- 4:10I'm actually in bed at 7:30 tucked in like a grandma.
- 4:16So my first instinct was,"No, I don't wanna be tired.
- 4:18I wanna go to bed." But then something deeper inside of me said,"Go.
- 4:22My God, go." So I went.
- 4:25I met my translator in the lobby.
- 4:26We took a cab through the city.
- 4:28We turned down an alleyway.
- 4:30Very unfamiliar place.
- 4:31I've never seen it before.
- 4:33We got out of the car, and we walked into this random tea shop, and this alley that we were on was empty.
- 4:42It was dark, empty.
- 4:44And the moment I stepped inside of this tea shop, number one, I was confused.
- 4:48I'm like,"Where are we?
- 4:49Who are we meeting?
- 4:50What is happening?" But I just felt like I was walking into this strange portal.
- 4:57I had entered this room, that people came to meet me.
- 5:03I looked around the space.
- 5:05There was a long wooden tea table, and at the head of it sat a woman with long hair, steady eyes, gorgeous, stoic, strong.
- 5:18She just had a presence I've never really felt before.
- 5:22Kind eyes, and looked at me like she knew.
- 5:26And at the back of the shop was a man who I later found out was this woman's partner, and he was the mystic.
- 5:33He was the teacher.
- 5:34And when I arrived, he was working on somebody, and he was doing his healing work, and it almost looked like chiropractic work.
- 5:42And then I looked to the left of me, and there was this other guy who stood in a focused posture.
- 5:50He was still and grounded, and it was like he was practicing some sort of energy work, almost like Tai Chi, focused.
- 6:00He was focusing on energy.
- 6:03And then there was this other man, this younger, playful, bright, almost like bouncy 20-something-year-old kid with a lot of curiosity and a lot of energy.
- 6:13He was just like a puppy dog.
- 6:14Everyone was dressed normally, plain clothes, no robes, no costumes, no grand display of spirituality, just people in a tea shop.
- 6:24and somehow that made the whole thing feel more powerful and, ah, it just generated a curiosity.
- 6:33When I walked in the door, there was also another man who looked at me but was looking over, up, and above my head.
- 6:42And he asked my translator,"Is she Catholic?" And she looked at me.
- 6:49He was like,"She, he wants to know if you're Catholic." And I said,"I don't know.
- 6:53That's like a loaded question for me.
- 6:55I have a very Catholic lineage and, but I'm not necessarily a practicing Catholic." And I said,"Why?" And he's still just holding this glance over the top, like up to the back corner of the room.
- 7:10And he said,"She brought a lot of people with her tonight." And he said,"But I'm asking if she's Catholic because a lot of them are wearing robes, carrying staffs." And in that moment, I was like,"What is happening?
- 7:22What is happening?
- 7:23And also, who are these people?
- 7:25Where did they come from?
- 7:26And how can he see them?" it was just so wild.
- 7:29So eventually, this teacher, this mystic who they sat me across, was ready to meet with me.
- 7:36I said hello.
- 7:38His eyes were so kind.
- 7:40My translator's there, so I am already anticipating the whole conversation is gonna run through my translator.
- 7:48And he said to me very clearly in English, Do you know who you are?" And I think I just stared back at him stunned.
- 7:57what is, what do you mean do I know who I am?
- 8:00And then he said,"Do you know where you come from?" And then immediately my spiritual ego came to the forefront and I was like,"Oh my God, he's gonna tell me like, I'm some, I'm like, I'm a star seed.
- 8:14I'm a Pleiadian.
- 8:15I'm an I'm Arcturian." I'm somebody special.
- 8:17I'm a healer." And I asked him, I was like,"What do you mean?
- 8:20Like, where do I come from?
- 8:21like a galaxy?
- 8:22a, am I a Pleiadian?" And he was like,"No.
- 8:25No, no, no, no, no, no, no, no.
- 8:27None of that." And then he just looked at me straight again and he said,"Do you know who you are?
- 8:34And do you know where you come from?
- 8:37Like when you leave this place, do you know where you go back to?" And then of course I'm like, uh, yeah.
- 8:43Like I think like to my star seed collective, like I'm special." And also I didn't know how to answer him.
- 8:52I wanted him to give me a title.
- 8:53I wanted him to tell me.
- 8:55I wanted like a little notch on my cosmic resume.
- 9:00I wanted a beautiful spiritual explanation for why I mattered and why he wanted to see me and talk to me.
- 9:09Do you know who you are?
- 9:11Not what you do, not what gifts you have, not what people call you, not what pain you survived, not what role you are trying to become.
- 9:23Who are you and where do you come from?
- 9:27Not as a label, not as a spiritual category, not so you can give yourself on Instagram this really crazy title of I'm the divine creator of Christ consciousness here to activate consciousness and activity and blah, blah, blah, blah, all the things.
- 9:44Not as something to make you more important than someone else, but as A remembrance that you come from the same light as everyone else, that there is no hierarchy to the light, that eventually all light returns to the light, and none of us are closer to God than anyone else.
- 10:01We are all sparks of the same creator source, every single one of us.
- 10:07Different expressions, different blueprints, different stories, different wounds, different medicines, but the same source.
- 10:15I sat there and met with this mystic and his students and his partner for probably two hours.
- 10:24He did say,"You still have sadness, and I can help you with the sadness," and he gave me a healing.
- 10:32But as I reflect back on that from where I am now six years later, I am being reminded that sometimes we use our gifts to place ourselves above other people.
- 10:43I love you, I'm sorry, please forgive me, thank you.
- 10:46And sometimes we place other people above us because they seem more gifted or more healed or more enlightened or have more gifts or are more spiritual.
- 10:55What I'm realizing for myself is both are distortions.
- 11:00The pedestal is still a pedestal, whether we are standing on it or kneeling before it.
- 11:06And that night in that tea shop, I saw something different, which I am embodying today.
- 11:13I saw people who knew, but they did not need to be seen in their knowing.
- 11:18They worked during the day.
- 11:19They sold tea.
- 11:20They moved boxes.
- 11:21They handled shipments.
- 11:23They lived ordinary lives.
- 11:26And when they gathered at night to practice, to listen, to serve, to heal, to help others to remember who they are, they were just mystics in plain clothes.
- 11:36I didn't enter that tea shop that night with people wrapped in mala beads and felt hats and fur coats.
- 11:44They showed up in their everyday wear: jeans, a button-up.
- 11:50Mystics in plain clothes.
- 11:53That is what my translator called them after we left.
- 11:55When we stepped outside after this incredible, mystic, magical, dreamlike experience, it was wild because the alley was wrapped in fog And there was this crazy thick mist hanging in the air, and the cab pulled up through to pick us up like a scene from a movie.
- 12:18It just all felt so surreal.
- 12:21And as we drove away, I felt like I was leaving one world and returning back into another, which in many ways I was about to, because when we got home in 2020, things were gonna start shifting and looking a lot differently.
- 12:37I also remember thinking that when I showed up,"Ooh, I'm special.
- 12:42These mystics know I'm here, and I am somebody special." And I walked out of this mystical meet and greet, and I was like,"I am a fucking baby." I literally feel like I have a spiritual diaper on.
- 12:55My translator, of course, was giddy and happy.
- 12:58And when I asked her, I was like,"What was that?" She said,"Those are my teachers." And then she explained,"They are mystics.
- 13:06We have many of them here.
- 13:08During the day, they work in the tea shop, move boxes, and at night they gather and they practice, and they are mystics in plain clothes." Mystics in plain clothes.
- 13:16I have never forgotten that because it stripped something away from me, which again, I am learning how to embody now, which is this idea that spirituality has to look a certain way, that wisdom has to dress itself up, that healing has to be branded, that mysticism needs a costume, and it doesn't.
- 13:37The mystic is not separate from ordinary life.
- 13:40The mystic is inside ordinary life, inside the tea shop, inside the alleyway, inside the person moving boxes, inside the mother making lunches, inside the tired body paying bills.
- 13:54The mystic is inside the grief, inside the grocery store, inside the human being who remembers, even for a moment, that they are more than the roles that they are playing.
- 14:06The mystic is the part of you that remembers that you are light.
- 14:10The mystic is the part of you that remembers that you are here to experience, to love, to heal, to forgive, to serve, to create, to remember.
- 14:22The mystic is not more special.
- 14:24The mystic is the one who just is curious about what it is to become more of themselves.
- 14:30And these particular mystics were in their knowing.
- 14:35They knew who they were.
- 14:37They knew where they came from, And they knew how and why they came here to serve.
- 14:44And that is the part I keep coming back to.
- 14:46The point is to not become more important, and I think the more you deep dive on the spiritual path, the more humility is required.
- 14:56The journey's actually really humbling.
- 14:59The point is to become more of who you are.
- 15:04For you to remember your energetic blueprint and to remember that you matter.
- 15:10Your soul experience matters.
- 15:12Your soul song matters.
- 15:14Your gifts matter.
- 15:16And everybody has gifts that are different.
- 15:19I can see angels in light and do soul channeling, and in so many ways, my husband is such a better master at all of it.
- 15:27He's got such an incredible intuition.
- 15:30He can access parts of his brain that frickin' are crazy.
- 15:35He's so smart, and he's so humble.
- 15:39So in many ways, I'm over here trying to become someone and something and sell my gifts to the world, and I have my husband who's already mastered all of them, so he doesn't need to sell any of them.
- 15:52And that is humbling.
- 15:53The medicine is you.
- 15:56That is the remembrance.
- 15:58Can I become honest enough to know who I am?
- 16:02Can I become humble enough to stop performing?
- 16:06Can I become present enough to serve from love instead of importance?
- 16:11Can I remember where I come from without needing it to make sense to anybody else?
- 16:16Can I remember that there is no hierarchy to the light, that there is only light remembering itself in different forms?
- 16:24And maybe all of us are mystics in plain clothes, walking around in ordinary bodies, living ordinary lives, carrying ancient stories, forgetting, remembering, forgetting again, remembering again, living our human lives while something eternal moves quietly beneath the surface.
- 16:49Selling tea, moving boxes, raising children, grieving dogs, paying bills, holding hands, saying sorry, beginning again, everyday life, holy life, mystical life, all of it happening right here in plain clothes.
- 17:09So I'll leave you with a question that he gave me on that very mystical night Do you know who you are?
- 17:16Do you know where you come from?
- 17:19Do you know why you came here?
- 17:21And not as a way to become special, but as a way to come home to the truth of who you are.
- 17:28Because we are not here to rise above humanity.
- 17:31We are here to remember the light inside each one of us.
- 17:36Thank you for listening, and for those who are listening, I am just closing my eyes for a moment and humbly bowing to you, for you are also the mystic in plain clothes.
- 17:51Thank you for being here.
- 17:52Till next time