INTRODUCTION
Each of us has a wellspring within, a font of wisdom that we can tap. But most of us don't trust ourselves enough to look inward for answers. We learn at an early age that all knowledge comes from external sources -- schools, churches, doctors, newspapers, government officials and our parents. We are taught to revere and respect these external sources and accept their authority unquestioningly. When these sources seem wrong to us, what choice do we have but to fault ourselves for misperception, confirming our distrust and total disregard of any inner wisdom.

It is only natural that we want to feel a sense of connection, a belonging to something greater than ourselves. Without that connection, we feel unbearably isolated. We are taught that we can only find a sense of belonging through adherence to the rules established by the authority currently in power. This authority is not just political leadership but the longheld beliefs of our culture so deeply imbedded in us by lifelong reliance on external sources, that we accept them as our own, even as they rub us raw. We submit to this authority in order to belong. And yet, because that belonging is conditional on our having altered our natural selves, we feel we don't really belong just as we are. We compare the ideal person put forth by the authority to the person we know we are inside, and fault ourselves for the difference.

Here's something the authority in power won't tell us: We can feel completely connected without altering ourselves to suit anyone else. Instead of suppressing our own natural wisdom and bowing to external judgments, we can tap that inner wisdom, that deep wellspring within us, and through it sense our own belonging, not just to this culture but to all of nature, to the universe, to all that is.

This book was initially written in meditation, tapping my own wise inner voice. Upon sharing the writing with others, I discovered it has value for them as well. One friend says she uses the book like the I Ching: whatever page she opens to addresses her concern for the day. When requested, I have asked my inner voice questions for friends, and the answers, they tell me, have been very helpful. Some of these answers, when appropriate, are included in this book. However, I am not a counselor and do not pretend to be one. If some of the topics included in this book are concerns of yours and you benefit from the words, that is fine, but the real purpose of the book is to reawaken your own inner wisdom, so long denied.

This is not a book about how to become a better person. There has never been a you in this form before, so there is no standard by which to measure you. This is not a book about self-improvement but a book about self-discovery and enjoying the process of living.

NOTE: This book is not intended to replace any form of psychotherapy or counseling. If you feel you need help, do not hesitate to reach out for it. People helping people is a vital part of life. But instead of seeking an authority figure to give you all the answers, consider finding one who helps you get in touch with your own inner wisdom.

TAPPING MY INNER WELLSPRING

Disconnection
Once while meditating I saw myself in white Chinese-style pajamas grinning from ear to ear in a gravity-free sphere of white light. This 'me' seemed joyous, wise and carefree, not worn down by daily responsibilities and concerns.

She was not at all like the me I was used to, the me who was hanging on tight to my job as an ad agency vice president even though I was unhappy about many aspects of my situation.

I didn't think I could afford to leave my job. Besides, I had been promised a partnership. How could I throw away such a golden opportunity? I did not stop to think that a partnership would merely commit me to more of the same unhappy experience. I chided myself that I was just afraid of success and plodded on, plastering a smile on my face with clients, dealing efficiently with problems about advertising, ignoring the very existence of my own problems.

My role as an executive in many ways seemed alien to the person I am deep down. Just as I put on high heels and tailored suits to fit in to the business world, I also dressed myself in certain attitudes and behaviors to make myself more acceptable to the people I came in contact with as a representative of my company. The biggest part of my days was spent playing a role. I was afraid to be myself because it might not be acceptable, so I stuffed down my true feelings and my real opinions. Looking back it is easy to see I was wrong to think I had to pretend to be other than I am, but I was totally convinced of it at the time. I remember at one point confiding to a co-worker that I felt "totally separate from myself". I laughed it off at the time. Today it seems an ominous statement. Why wasn't I listening to myself? Why didn't I see the danger?

My Body Sends A Message
Eventually, I suppose out of sheer frustration with my foolheadedness in the face of such severe emotional disconnection, my body literally shut down. I was diagnosed with severe chronic immune dysfunction syndrome and was put on an intensive course of treatment. The doctor told me to take a leave of absence from work, but I didn't feel I could totally abandon my responsibilities. Since there were about three hours of the day when I had some energy, I spent those hours in the office. The rest of the time I slept, struggled to keep my home in order and my family fed, clothed and loved. My husband and two teenage children offered emotional support and were very concerned about my health.

Learning to Ask In and Listen
The most important thing I did for myself during this period was to begin to meditate again. I hadn't made time for this simple but vital practice in my overly busy life, but now I had plenty of time. I took a class at my local community college and meditated regularly at home as well. It was in one of these meditations that I met that joyous inner self, bouncing around doing somersaults in her white sphere of light.

Instructed by my meditation teacher to ask questions of any inner guides met in meditation, I began asking her questions and her answers seemed so clear and sound, I felt strongly that I could trust her advice. Other inner voices clamored and demanded, but this one made no demands. She spoke lovingly and deeply. A few meditations later, I asked this newly discovered self the question I had been stewing over for months: Should I leave my job all together? Instantly the answer rose up from inside me "Oh, yes, yes, yes, yes, yes!" and "Trust me, absolutely". There was much ecstatic dancing around in there, joyous and liberated. The voice was so strong and so clear that I felt absolutely confident in accepting its wisdom and acting upon it.

After months of worry and struggle over this question, I resigned from my job without any doubt in my mind that it was the right course of action. I have never once regretted that decision. Immediately I started feeling better. Those few hours per day when I had some energy were now devoted to getting myself well.

Over the months that followed I continued to do the simple relaxation techniques I had learned. Increasingly my home meditations became question and answer sessions with my newly discovered wise inner voice. At first I would stop the meditation in order to write down what she had told me. Then I found that I could write down these dialogues as I meditated. I filled many steno pads with this writing.

Through the meditations I learned how I had set the stage for illness. I saw that I had led a totally unbalanced life, devoid of the types of experiences that replenish me, such as nature walks, or doing art, or singing and dancing. There was no place in my life for the spiritual or the artistic aspects of myself. For years I had mistaken the externally driven creativity I used on the job to benefit my clients' bottom lines for the vital artistic expression that rises from within.

I began to see more clearly the stresses I had experienced during the previous two years -- the loss of my mother who had been my closest friend, the subsequent physical decline of my mourning father, and the ongoing challenges involved in raising adolescents, even ones as delightful as mine. Now I could see where I had gone wrong in handling these stresses. For example, I barely took time off from work to mourn my mother's passing. I just kept making stupid mistakes on the job and crying myself to sleep at night. I foolishly honored my client's needs above my own.

The way I 'handled' stress was to ignore its existence. After a day at the office kowtowing to clients and watching creative ideas disintegrate before my eyes, I would come home to my husband and children with only enough energy to throw together the simplest meal and climb wearily into bed, escaping into novels, television sit-coms, and sleep. I felt the double-edged sword of mother-guilt so common to my generation. I felt that my working took time and energy away from my children, but that quitting would deprive them of what my salary could buy. Something had to give. What gave was my health.

During the healing process, I discovered how my illness benefited me. Being sick allowed me, without reprise or recrimination, to leave an impossible situation. I came to understand that I could not get past the illness until I was done needing it as an excuse to do what I wanted and be who I am. I had been working away at a job that made me unhappy, secretly hoping that some external force would come along to pry me out of my situation. Finally one did: my doctor. But that was not enough. The true martyr, I kept on working those few hours I could totally against his advice. Who was I waiting to praise me for my self-sacrifice? No one did. And no one insisted I quit either. No one except my wise inner voice.

Quitting the job was just the first step. Clearly I had to learn to be more inner directed. I had to learn to let go of my fear of speaking my mind and displeasing others. I had to love and trust myself enough to ask what I wanted, to honor my own ideas and opinions. I knew if I couldn't do that, I wouldn't get well because I would continue to need illness as an excuse to do what I wanted to do.

Acknowledging my need for creative self-expression, I began painting and drawing as therapy. I had dropped out of art school twenty years before, not for lack of interest but for lack of confidence. Now I was learning to enjoy the process and not focus on the end product, not worrying if it would be any good. I stopped beating myself over the head and comparing myself with others.

Through my meditation practices I have learned to live in the moment as much as possible, enjoying the beauty and wonder of the world around me. I experience many blissful moments in which I am completely aware that all is one, and I completely belong. Gradually I have become the subject of my own life, allowing that what I have to say is valid, no matter how anyone else might respond to it.

Replenishing the Wellspring
Because of my own experience, I find myself noticing when my friends are dangerously disregarding their own inner needs. I see them doing as I had done, always putting the needs of others first, forgetting to make time to tend their own inner needs, reaching perilously close to a point of total disconnection.

We are taught at a young age to put others first and feel guilty if we even consider our own needs. But what we fail to realize is that by always putting others first we rob them as well as ourselves. Without replenishing our own inner wellspring, what we give depletes our finite resources. When we allow ourselves to tend that wellspring, it becomes a boundless source from which giving springs naturally.

It is a lesson that many people, like myself, have had to learn the hard way. Naturally we want protect others from the pain of crisis learning. Heed the warning! My experience is not unique, but universal.

Who is This Wise Inner Voice?
Though the crisis that drove me to concentrate so intensely on the meditative path has passed, I continue to meditate to maintain the health I have found. My inner voice has spoken to me about all manner of things. But who really is this inner voice I refer to? I think of her as an aspect of me, but in truth, I am an aspect of her. She is my greater expanded or vaster self who is completely conscious of her connection with all that is. My meditation takes on the form of an inner dialogue between the 'me' who inhabits a body with the label of Stephanie Noble and that vaster self who needs no label nor physical body.

In a recent meditation, my inner voice explained that, just as we enter the duality of the earth plane for growth and learning, I entered the duality of this wise inner voice dialogue to grow and learn during a time of crisis. I was accepting advice only from external sources, so in a way I had to externalize that wise aspect of myself in order to listen and accept my own inner wisdom. She went on to say, "Now, however, is a time for integration. To retain this separate-seeming relationship would be like keeping training wheels on your bike after you have already learned to balance. You still have a lifetime of learning and growing and exploring to do, but you can do it more efficiently now without training wheels, without seeing me, your 'wise inner voice' as a separate person."

At first I struggled not to see this integration as a loss, because I so enjoyed these dialogues. I said that I would miss her. She said "Where would I go?" I said I will miss her smiling face. She said, "Have you looked in the mirror lately?" Lo and behold, I am now the person of my original meditation, dancing about in the white light, joyous and carefree, grinning from ear to ear. All I need are the white Chinese-style pajamas!

A GUIDE TO JOYOUS LIVING
Upon sharing an excerpt from these inner dialogues with my meditation class and friends, many of them asked for copies to keep. They encouraged me to transcribe and share more of the dialogues, and to consider turning them into a book. During my next meditation, I asked my wise inner voice if she would like to do so and she said yes and that it should be 'a guide to joyous living.'

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The book that came from this experience, Tapping the Wisdom Within, A Guide to Joyous Living, is organized by topic, so that you can easily access words that are pertinent to whatever is your current experience or emotional state. The words resonate with your own wise inner voice, allowing it to be heard.