Life Maps: What was your "aha!" moment?

The face of the Great Yin
According to Taoist mysticism, she is the wise initiator of spiritual seekers.

She was born together with heaven and earth, I don't know how many years ago. Her numinous transformations are inexhaustible.—Tao Qian

Let's face it: life is confusing! Questions such as—Who am I? What am I supposed to be doing with my life? Is there such a thing as enlightenment? If there is, how do I get there? How will I know if I've chosen the right path?— can add to the confusion.

What brought you to the "aha!" moment that changed your life path and that turned you into a seeker of higher consciousnes? I have a feeling that we share many similar stories.

• Were you meditating when it happened?

• Did it start with a traumatic event such as an accident, near-death experience, health issue, the death of someone you loved, or was it a joyous occasion such as the birth of a child, a marriage, or a spiritual experience?

• Were you alone or with someone?

• Were you out in nature or sitting at a corporate conference table, or where?

• Did it include any visions or guidance from other realms?

• Did you take immediate action or let it percolate for a while?

• How has it changed your life?

• Are you happier now, or more confused than ever?

These are just some of the questions that come to mind in thinking about my own experience. Maybe you have more to add. Share as much as you wish or as little—it's up to you.
The purpose of sharing your "aha!" moment is to give others a snapshot of a personal Life Map that might help them recognize and connect to their own Life Map to higher consciousness. Often, people are either reluctant to trust their intuition or afraid to take action. Hopefully this forum will serve as a jumping off point to new self discoveries for those who wish to find the key to their higher consciousness and transformation.

My "aha!" moment

For me, life was going along just great, or so I thought, until 1980 when my only sibling suddenly committed suicide at the age of 35, leaving a wife and two children behind in his self-destructive wake, to say nothing of all the other relatives and friends who struggled to deal with such a shock.

While I was still reeling from this traumatic event, I discovered that my marriage was falling apart and didn't know if we could put it back together.

It was at that point that I began to question my own existence and to seek some form of wisdom that could bring me back from such despair. I began my quest for answers and found solace in Viktor Frankl's 1946 book Man's Search for Meaning and dozens of other books whose titles now escape me.

I also began to have vivid dreams that I remembered upon waking, and started keeping a dream journal. Every detail seemed to offer pieces of a puzzle for unraveling clues about who I was and how I could find my purpose for living.

Fast forward to June, 1992 as I lay inside a tent camped next to a beautiful mountain stream. It was around 4:30 a.m. when I woke to the first rays of morning light and the chirping of birds. After a few minutes, I heard the wind start to build until it was so loud I couldn't hear the birds anymore. The entire side of the tent where I had been sleeping suddenly disappeared and I felt myself being pulled out of my sleeping bag and into a swirling vortex in the ground. Leaves, branches and dirt flew everywhere and I screamed out to my husband, but as I looked over at the other side of the small tent, which was perfectly intact, he was peacefully sleeping and heard nothing.

The next thing I remember is going into that swirling vortex where I experienced my first initiation, a Shamanic journey into a different reality that I had previously known nothing about!
Over the next few years I found great wisdom from teachers who led me along my path, hand in hand, to places and realms I've never been before. Through them I found my Aha! Life Map and continue that journey as a healing energy practitioner and writer of The Sacred Circle of Life.