Change, which can often be the result of growth, can occur on multiple levels: physical, emotional, cognitive and spiritual.
How do we integrate emotional, cognitive and/or spiritual growth when the physical plane of existence still presents itself similarly (or identically) to how it did before the growth occurred?
What I’ve found is that it’s in the decisions we make.
Do we choose a conditioned response to what we’re experiencing on the physical plane, or a new response — free of conditioning — that aligns with the change (growth) we’ve experienced?
Through a new, unconditioned response the physical plane is transformed — even if it appears the same, it is ripe with transformative energy because we are interacting with it from a different place, and this gives us space to experience things differently.
This started to clarify for me on a recent trip to Ireland, where I was faced with many situations that in the past would have queued up conditioned responses. The fact that I was in a different physical place, and also actively learning about and practicing Celtic Shamanism, seemed to make it easier to respond to these situations in a non-conditioned, neutral way.
Once back home, the physical environment (predominantly our home and my office) was the same as it was before traveling — and I could see and feel an old conditioned mindset trying to creep back in.
Being aware of this has helped with letting go of these conditioned responses.
That said, if we DO act out a conditioned response — all is not lost — especially if we were aware of the response while it was happening. Or maybe we didn’t become aware of it until after it occurred. Either way, it’s worth noting that these conditioned responses can be very strong and take time to transform or fully release, so it’s important to be kind to oneself if this happens, and not turn a moment of conditioned thinking into feelings of failure and suffering.