Written by: Vicki Ravangard, Executive Contributor
Executive Contributors at Brainz Magazine are handpicked and invited to contribute because of their knowledge and valuable insight within their area of expertise.
I was always fascinated by the Wizard of Oz as a child and through my teenage years. I often clicked my heels and chanted the mantra "There's no place like home", hoping to be instantly transported somewhere my heart desired. As we grow up, we are conditioned by society and our parents about what is right and wrong. As children, we have very few privileges, and there is an expectation that we do what we are told if we don't, there are usually consequences.
Subconsciously, we start to create our comfort zone and we associate this with our safety. We fill this zone with the rules and logic we are taught by society and the people around us who influence our lives.
For a lot of us, there comes to a point in our adult life where we start to question the reality around us, and we begin challenging the societal norms that we have grown up with. We begin to create our own terms and conditions around what is acceptable and what isn't. What we once considered to be our comfort zone no longer feels very comfortable.
For some, this is an Awakening to a very new way of living and it can play a significant role on your soul-journey, leading you down your very own Yellow Brick Road to discover your true purpose. It can also mark the death of a life that no longer serves us.
"I don't think we're in Kansas anymore Toto"
Dorothy finds herself in a strange new land, that we learn to be Oz. She mistakes this for being lost. However, this could be perceived as feeling lost in a new place, a place that is moving her closer to her soul purpose.
From the minute Dorothy realized she was lost, she had set herself a clear goal to find her way back home. She was determined, and there was no question of it. Yet, she was also able to embrace the magic of this new place she was in.
Making friendships and inviting them on her journey so they too could ask the Wizard for something they truly desired. A heart, a brain, courage. Dorothy and her friends are essentially on a quest for external validation from the Wizard. She believes that he will hold all of her answers as that is what she had been told, much like we were told as children.
Along the way, she encounters the Wicked Witch, who I like to think of as our Ego, trying to sabotage our every move. The Ego is trying to dominate our thoughts and dim the light that shines inside of us. As this plays out in our own lives we can often feel the divide between the Angel and the Devil trying to influence us, or in Dorothy's case, the Good Witch & the Wicked Witch.
There comes a point where the desire to succeed is greater than the desire to feed our Ego with fear. When the Wizard sent Dorothy to face the Wicked Witch and return with her broom, this is symbolic of facing our Ego head-on, at any cost because the reward is greater than the risk.
Ironically Dorothy throws a bucket of water over Scarecrow to keep him from burning and incidentally kills the Witch. The irony is that Dorothy never intended for that to happen, she was simply trying to save her friend.
"Nobody's ever seen the Great Oz! Even I've never seen him!"
"Well, then how do you know there is one?"
As they return to the Wizard victoriously, with the Wicked Witches broom, you can imagine the disappointment they faced when it became apparent that the Wizard of Oz was nothing more than a man behind a curtain with a speakerphone. It was all an illusion.
Or was it?
The Wizard in this story can represent our unwavering faith in what we can't see. We don't always understand why we are put on the path we are on, we often question why, why did I have to learn this way?
In my experience, this is a teaching from The Universe, perhaps one that we have ignored one too many times. When we ignore the signs we are given, they keep coming back to us in many different forms. There is always a higher purpose and a lesson to be learned.
" You've always had the power, my dear. You've had it all along. "
Throughout their travels, Dorothy & her friends demonstrated that they already had the things they were so desperate for the Wizard to give them. They simply never believed in themselves. Dorothy carried the answer inside her all along, but she had to journey through Oz to discover this for herself, or she would never have believed that she had the power to return home.
You are the only person who can walk your path in your red slippers, and sometimes you will have to travel miles in the wrong direction to find something that was inside you all along.
When you are in pursuit of your goals, don’t forget the lessons you are learning each day on your journey. There is an undiscovered magic that already exists inside of you and you do not need validation from anybody else to make you feel good enough to walk your path.
Follow your Yellow Brick Road, but don’t get so focused on the end result that you lose sight of how far you’ve come.
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Vicki Ravangard, Executive Contributor Brainz Magazine
After 10 years of working my way up in my corporate career, I am a Part Qualified accountant who works as a Finance Analyst for a UK Airline. I am also a Spiritual Mindset Coach. So how did I go from corporate to coaching? My coaching business 'Take Her To The Moon' was born after embarking on my own spiritual mindset journey where I discovered the art of creating a life with intention and the power of conscious thinking, which positively influenced all areas of my life, including my corporate career. My Business focus is helping women who have lost their direction in life, to master their mindset & discover their soul purpose. I put my own unique spin on some of the greatest spiritual teachings and use these to help my clients experience greater success. I have a huge passion for Music & Travel, which is where I draw a lot of my inspiration from - and I am also a Disney lover!
