Photo description for the visually impaired: Sage Justice is wearing a vibrant orange, full length linen wrap dress, while sitting on a purple swinging bench surrounded by hundreds of lavender, violet, and purple flowers both on ground and hanging from above, in coastal California. Sage is wearing a coffee colored, brown suede, bohemian style hat, while looking up the heavens with her hands raised as if to ask the universe, “What gives?”
Soul Choices by Sage Justice
For every harrowing challenge I’ve faced in life from childhood trauma, to being born with a painful genetic disorder, to financial disparity, I have been told by spiritual people, “Remember, your soul chose this.”
In May of 2024, I took the 31-day challenge on Instagram to create awareness about Ehlers-Danlos Syndrome, specifically, our type, the rare and life-threatening vEDS (Vascular Ehlers-Danlos Syndrome). I made a series of 90 second reels (bite sized bits) of information on some of the various aspects of our defective collagen connection tissue disorder and how it affects our day-to-day living. Four different, very kind, loving, and well-meaning individuals reached out to offer to help me find the subconscious mental cause to my physical genetic mutation. In other words, illustrate to me, their belief, that on some level, I was choosing to have this genetic disorder and that if they could help me to see that, I would stop suffering from it.
Sage Words is a reader-supported publication. “I’m a paid subscriber because Sage Justice is an Inspiration and I want to support her continued work.” - L. E. Mastilock, author. To receive new posts and support my work, please consider becoming a free or even better, paid subscriber. Thank you!
Here’s an excerpt from one of the offers:
“I would definitely explore the root cause of your condition even if you were born with it. See why and when it started and what it’s doing for you. I believe even something you are born with has a purpose, a root cause and a reason. It could have developed in the womb or in a past life. Everything can be improved with Rapid Transformational Therapy even if you were born with it ❤️You can’t fix what you don’t understand and unless you go back under hypnosis and find out when, why and how this disorder started, and what it’s doing for you, it’ll be carrying on what it’s supposed to do for you. Our brilliant subconscious mind creates mental, emotional and physical symptoms in our lives for various reasons. And the reasons behind these are not understood or seen through our conscious mind. With Rapid Transformational Therapy you can gain an understanding which will be liberating and will definitely help with your symptoms. 😍Please give it a try! You have nothing to lose and everything to learn and gain. ❤️” – Rapid Transformational Therapist
My reply to someone when they tell me I have nothing to lose by trying a service they charge for, is to remind them that I have money to lose and time to lose, and since time is money, even when someone offers something for free, I’m losing money. Of course, if it actually is helpful, then think of the gains, the time saved from medical and symptom management, which I have, for decades; and it’s provided a layered understanding and depth of nuanced truths and absolute falsehoods, some of which I hope to successfully share here to help others discern what is and isn’t a waste of our time.
When people suffer, they will try anything. It’s so tempting to keep chasing magical cures, get rich quick schemes, and other snake oils that we use to rub away painful realities, but we have to balance the woo woo with the practical. For example, there are times when I have a headache and I know it’s from stress and other times it’s from dehydration or it’s muscular skeletal from my Chiari Malformation. Being present allows for discernment, which dictates treatment. Not every single pain is based on a past life, subconscious, punishing belief about oneself. Life is about choosing our “hard.” Sometimes, pain is just the natural consequence of over working a muscle— a matter of being in the flow as a writer and having my neck down for too long, which brings on a musculoskeletal migraine.
When the Woo Woo Works
I began my journey into the magic of the mind in the 1970s; and by 1986, I was fully on board with all things metaphysical. I’ve consumed everything on the subject of the subconscious mind, from the placebo effect to Law of Attraction. I’ve spent years in therapy, dissecting how my disorder “serves” me (and how I can get my needs met in a less painful way), rejecting my disorder as an “identity,” then surrendering to shadow work and integrating all parts within to create wholeness and integrity. I’ve embraced and written about taking “radical responsibility” for one’s life; and I’ve also found decades of comfort in energy and body work, like reiki, massage, hypnosis (self or otherwise), meditation, mindfulness practice, self-awareness, and yes, the power of mind over matter.
How do we hold these two opposing concepts: that our pain is not all in our head and yet the thoughts in our head can influence our feelings, which can impact our pain? By acknowledging that the pain is real and not necessarily something we caused, while acknowledging that pain is also energy and energy can be manipulated. There is an irony to going years being told by doctors that your disorder is all in your head, knowing that not to be true, and yet finding relief in using the head, the mind (amongst other tools like medication) to ease pain and heal faster, making anyone who suffers ask the question, “Is it possible that it really is all in my head?” The answer may be Schrödinger's Cat. Perhaps the mind can create what isn’t there and not create what is, all at the very same time.
When we keep in mind the Venn Diagram extremes between the monks who can sit in the freezing cold to meditate and regulate their body temperature through their mind, and those who have yet to grow taller, or change the color of their skin or gender just through the power of their mind alone we might find ourselves, the average people, in the middle of that diagram in which, with training and practice, we can learn to regulate our blood pressure and relax our body enough to sometimes ease our pain.
We can alter our brainwaves and be guided through hypnosis to ease suffering and to investigate any possible cause or correlation to our conditions, all of which can be useful information. Even with my own genetic mutation, there is now research suggesting that it can exist dormant and become activated by environmental triggers. Knowing this can help future generations avoid the triggers that can make the condition more severe. It’s imperative that we remain open-minded without victim-blaming people for creating their illnesses with their minds because it serves them in some way (gaining sympathy, not having to work because they are unable to work, providing an identity, etc.). To this, I must say from my own experience: there is little to no sympathy for people who complain about chronic pain and illness, being unable to work creates poverty and/or an uncomfortable dependence that any able-bodied person would do just about anything to avoid, and no one in the age of the Internet needs a singular identity to have their needs met and feel a sense of belonging.
I think that’s why so many people with chronic pain, illness, and fatigue outright reject mind-over-matter techniques that could actually help them, because it can invalidate their physical anguish and make one feel they are to blame for their own pain. Even if we live in a universe where we are active co-creators, not one of us is a sole creator of our life or circumstances. We can only control three things (and even those are debated as to how much they are truly within our sole control) and they are: our thoughts, our words, and our deeds. While we are focused on ourselves, others are focused on themselves; and quantum entanglement ensues, keeping us all connected and co-creating each other’s realities and experiences. Talk about a mind f*ck.
What New Age Gets Wrong
In 1984, Louise Hay established Hay House Publishing and wrote a book entitled, You Can Heal Your Life, which I read so many times that the pages came loose from the binding. I was determined to master mind over matter and heal my body. Hay House went on to publish many well-known authors who are now seen as the primary promoters of LOA (Law of Attraction), including Deepak Chopra, the late Wayne Dyer, and the teachings of “Abraham” as channeled through Esther Hicks. I read them all and studied every book I could get my hands on to master manifestation; I found value in each and every book even when there were contradictions or oversimplifications.
I attended Agape International Spiritual Center, the popular LOA church in Los Angeles (Beverly Hills), California that was led by the Reverend Michael Beckwith, who was featured in the film, The Secret, as well as services led by the late Della Reese, star of the TV show, Touched By An Angel. I was a devoted student to Science of Mind, one of the birth origins of Law of Attraction. Over several courses, I became a licensed Religious Science Practitioner. I spent many years as a theology and philosophy student studying world religions and spiritual practices, which included quantum physics, law of attraction, becoming a master reiki practitioner, and more.
During one of the classes, a woman who gave birth to a child with severe birth defects stood up and openly rejected the accusation that her baby chose this fate. Someone from the crowd blamed the mother for the infant’s fate, as she shouted from one side of her mouth, “Your fears manifested your child’s disability,” while shouting from the other side of her mouth, “We’re 100% responsible for everything that happens to us.” Which is it? Do other people’s fears manifest our realities, or do we?
Are statements like these helpful, hurtful, or both? The same goes for the sayings, “God works in mysterious ways,” and “Everything happens for a reason.” If God gives us free will, than not everything we do is God’s will, or plan; and not everything that happens has a reason for happening although if it makes us feel better we can create one. Looking back at our life we can see how if this thing hadn’t happened at that time then what we are happy for wouldn’t exist; but that’s still not an example of everything happening for a reason, more-so it’s an example of the zen parable of The Farmer, AKA Well Maybe.
Even Esther Hicks, while channeling “Abraham,” explained that what we experience is not always our creation. She/He/They shared a story of a woman who was having panic attacks each time she went on a bridge in San Francisco that were not coming from the woman herself. Abraham went on to explain that San Francisco was in the aftermath weeks and months of a major earthquake and there was a mass consciousness of fear resonating on that bridge, palpable to nearly anyone on it—regardless of personal vibration. Sometimes, we pickup on things in our environment, not because we are tuned into a frequency of fear or lack ourselves, but because the frequency that’s vibrating is being held by so many people at once that it can create static in our own vibration station. We can conclude from this that we are not sole creators, but co-creators.
My child was born with our genetic condition, just as I was. There was no placebo effect, because we had no name for it but perhaps there was a frequency resonating through our epigenetics as there were likely several generations who had been inflicted with this before us. Nevertheless, knowing the past doesn’t always change the experience of the now. I suffered for years while the medical community told me it was all in my head and the spiritual community blamed me for manifesting my illness through my head (my thoughts, feelings, and beliefs). They accused me of being attached to my pain, so I studied with Buddhist monks to learn nonattachment techniques. There was me and there were my symptoms, unattached and yet still living as one, only now in silence and with little support, because talking about the pain only created more social judgment, rejection and isolation. Finally, a diagnostic criterion was created, and genome testing became possible; and low and behold, it turned out I was not the creator of that which already existed. Just as anyone with brown eyes cannot use their mind to turn them blue, or anyone who was fully grown at 5 feet tall can use their thoughts to become 6 feet tall. Our minds are miraculous; and yet within the human experience, they are still limited…for now.
When these “spiritual” people meet someone with Down Syndrome they don’t say to them, “Have you considered that your thoughts created your chromosomal condition?” Yet when they meet someone with a “dynamic disability,” an “invisible illness” who doesn’t “look” like they have a disorder, they have no problem throwing salt into the wound by blaming our soul’s choice for our physical reality. This doesn’t make us feel empowered, it adds an undue burden to the pain and loss we already carry. Please take note, dear spiritual community, that it’s really not a helpful, compassionate, or caring approach to healing. In fact, it can feel quite cruel, insensitive and downright abusive. We already feel victimized by having our lives taken from us; suggesting that it’s because of some subconscious thoughts we have is like blaming a woman who was raped for what she as wearing when it happened. I know your intent is to empower, but this is not the kindest way to go about it.
Like someone with Down Syndrome, I also have a genetic marker for my medical condition; but apparently, according to the above comment, I’m still responsible for creating it myself as a fetus in the womb, or in a past life, because suffering from this condition is “serving me” in some way. This prevalent belief in the spiritual community is that we are 100% responsible for choosing all our experiences. This belief is an absolute. Yet, the only true absolute in universal law is that there are no absolutes. The only constant thing in life is change; this we know to be true. This is why I hold those in the spiritual community who profess these beliefs the way I’d hold someone with a contagious disease: with compassion and at a distance.
We Can Do Better
In conclusion, my suggestion to the nonbeliever is to not throw the baby out with the bathwater. Exploring our beliefs is a useful tool. Sometimes life actually is a self-fulfilling prophesy and minding our thoughts can lead to less pain; and sometimes life is a reflection of chaos theory, better explained as “sh*t happens,” and no matter what we do, the pain persists until it passes, or we do. My advice for the spiritual community is to stop adding insult to injury in the name of being “helpful,” by blaming people for their pain. If you truly want to help, lead with the fact that the mind can help ease suffering and accelerate healing; instead of the banal platitudes that speak in absolutes, and victim blame with statements that we are “100% responsible for everything that happens to us.” Universal laws of quantum entanglement have proven that just isn’t true: unless you consider “us” as “one,” as in “oneness,” and that we are all equally responsible for the good and bad (and judgement of “good” and “bad”) in each other’s lives, which also, is only as true as Schrödinger's Cat, because well…just because you untangle one necklace from the heap doesn’t mean the others become untangled too. In other words, think before you speak, speak with more humility and kindness, and leave your certainty to addiction at the door; thank you very much.
Regardless of whether or not our souls choose our life paths before we are born, once we are born, we get to choose again. So, in case anyone is checking my work, and to all those who believe that I and others like me, who are suffering from medical conditions we were born with, have chosen them for a subconscious reason that is serving us, the following letter is carbon copied to you. Universe, and universal minions alike, hear my choices, for they have changed.
Letter to the Universe
Dear Universe,
If my soul truly chose the life I have now, I’m ready to choose again. Let me be clear, I want to keep living in this life, at this time, but not under these conditions. I’m holding on to the love and discarding the rest.
This is an official notice that any contract made prior to my current state of consciousness is now null and void. If my soul, as a fetus, truly chose a life of trauma, chronic pain and poverty for the purposes of evolution, please note that evolution has occurred. Your job here is done. There is no severance package. This plan is terminated immediately.
I do not need any more painful human experiences that my soul chose before I arrived to teach me how to be a good person. I believe I have reached the top of the goodness meter that I am capable of and become who I’ve always known myself to be. I’m an empathic, compassionate, loving, patient, kind, playful, creative, and forgiving person who also knows how to boldly set boundaries and stand up for herself and others with courage. Therefore, my soul choices surrounding suffering are no longer serving me (if ever they did); and I am now actively rejecting them and making new choices.
From here on out, please note that my soul and body choose unconditional love, health, wealth, wisdom, happiness, and joy. I choose an abundance of love, freedom, ease, creative expression, and fun. I choose financial security, effortless movement, blissful travels, talent, intelligence, authenticity, integrity, and respectful relationships of reciprocity. I choose peace, contentment and success. I choose bold strength, gentle kindness, sensitive power, brave courage, charitable generosity, empathetic caring, tender compassion, playful connection, love, life, and living. I choose laughing with my loved ones, Pulitzer Prize winning, EGOT career success status. Suffering is no longer needed, wanted, or welcome. Thank you for your services (attempted or realized); but please cease and desist and note that they are no longer requested, and in fact, are openly rejected.
In the immortal words of NSYNC, “Bye bye bye, buh-bye.”
Description for the visually impaired-Photo of Sage Justice, wearing poet’s black, holding eye glasses with her right hand, while her left hand puts her long chocolate brown waves of hair behind her ear, as she looks off pensively in the distance at a church whose bells are ringing, soulfully. Sage sits in a wooden folding chair, outdoors, in front of a red brick stone castle home near a patch of fragrant lavender, in France, at the Writers and Artists-in-Residence at Chateau d’Orquevaux.
If you appreciate this publication, Sage Words, but are unable to afford a subscription, please consider choosing the “Buy Me a Coffee” button when you can. Every little bit helps. Thanks!
If you know anyone suffering from long covid or a chronic illness please check out “How To Heal Almost Anything” (April 2024) or if you’re interested in creating a life you don’t need a vacation from and the topic of loving with a boundless heart while maintaining boundaries so as to not be a doormat, please consider purchasing a copy of Sage Words FREEDOM Book One.
Thanks for reading Sage Words! This post is public so feel free to share it.
