After finding out about Serge Benhayon and Universal Medicine, I read one of his books – The Way It Is – which made a lot of sense to me as I could feel the truth that was there.
As I started to attend presentations, so began the process of feeling how I was living and the truth of who I am.
Initially I felt so uncomfortable at being there; my unloving way of living was being exposed and it felt like everyone could see what I was experiencing. Really though, it was me that was feeling how I had been living – I was becoming acutely aware of the choices I had been making.
There wasn’t anyone telling me what to do, where I was going wrong or anything like that, it was all in my head… I was giving myself false reasons of why I should not be there. I was feeling how much disregard I had for myself – eating anything to fill up the void I felt inside, using alcohol, porn, watching hours and hours of TV – especially sport, sleeping in, etc… all the things I was doing to not feel this emptiness. I spent a lot of time hiding in my cave; the destructive thoughts I allowed kept me stuck in unloving choices.
Sometimes I would drive to the Universal Medicine events, sit in my car and just feel so anxious about going in that I couldn’t do it, so I would just go home again. Other times I didn’t even get out of my home, or if I did, I would just return home before I got to the event. Sometimes I would go inside, sit down, but before Serge got up to present, I would leave.
I’m not sure how long it took for me to be able to stay for the whole event, but I would then not really talk to anyone and leave as soon as it finished. There was always that feeling of discomfort in being there… I felt completely alone in the crowd; I didn’t fit in and I didn’t belong.
Although all I could feel at that time was the discomfort, I felt so out of place it eventually became clear that it was because of my own judgment on myself about how I was living.
Hearing the truth that Serge Benhayon presented connected with the deepest part of me and I knew I couldn’t stay away.
So gradually I started to attend more Universal Medicine presentations and workshops and throughout this time, Serge would always say “Hi Mark” if he saw me. I could feel that he saw all of me and accepted me as I am, almost certainly for the first time in my life. Serge was able to see the light in me, well before I could feel it within myself, because I was identifying with all the things I was doing that harmed others and myself.
I have no doubt that it was my first experience of being truly loved for who I am, before I was even able to begin loving myself.
What a healing that is.
I was being supported, being called to be more and I had no awareness of what lay ahead for me; understanding at last the truth of who we are, the truth about love and how that is what we are and feeling the absolute joy of just being me. For the first time in my life I felt that I belonged.
It was beautiful to feel the fullness of me at the event, but then to bring that way of being into my every day?. . . Well, that was another story. It became very clear that it wasn’t just about attending the events:
I had to develop how I lived every moment, caring for myself in every little choice I made.
For a long time I was always hard on myself and therefore, hard on others as well. Although this had dropped away before I became a Universal Medicine student, it remained in the form of not being able to appreciate others or how far I had come. Appreciation became a focus and as I deepened this awareness I was able to feel the beauty in others – they are just like me. This made it easier for me to see how I had been isolating myself, so choosing to connect with friends, going out more and socialising made a significant difference.
I have been able to let go of the behaviours that didn’t support me, mostly through the support of friends and practitioners. Being able to honestly talk about how I am feeling, the harming thoughts I am having etc., begins the process of deconstructing those old patterns. The perspective that is offered by others, the loving reflections of what they feel when I share, help me to gain perspective and understanding of how I am being.
I was searching for truth all my life. I now know that truth without love does not work very well because I was trying to be ‘right’ and this was just empty words that actually harm others… Truth has been central to my transformation over recent years. What is presented by Serge Benhayon resonates with the deepest part of me and it is through truth that I return to love.
by Mark Payne
Further Reading:
Universal Medicine Retreat….and Advance!
Sacred Esoteric Healing
My Life After Serge Benhayon’s Presentation Only Confirmed And Refined What I Had Connected To Before
The Truth about Universal Medicine 
Letting go of the judgements and hardness, returning to loving ourselves, ‘For a long time I was always hard on myself and therefore, hard on others as well.’
Mark I so appreciate what you are sharing with us because so many of us do not know what true love is or feels like. We have instead been brought up on a diet of emotional love, which is not the same thing at all.
I am still struggling with truly loving and appreciating myself and others as I have wrapped myself in seemingly endless layers of self protection against the ravages of the world. At least now I know that true love exists and that it is so worth connecting to, as I can appreciate others around me that have made that choice of connection and the love pours out of them.
Thank you Mark, great to read how honesty has shifted the feelings you have had and we can all learn to appreciate our essences as energetic appreciation deepens the understanding that we are more than this physicality.
Can truth without a foundation of love be true?
Can we have Love without Truth?
More and more I appreciate having an awareness to see the things that I do which are not loving. Yes, when I realise it I also can get into “damn, it Viktoria what are you doing/thinking?”, but when we begin to realise that only though awareness we can change unloving behaviours, only when we are willing to see them & acknowledge them as unloving can we make a difference to ourselves & others, we will begin to appreciate the magnitude of being able to see. Because otherwise, we remain stuck and contracted in our beliefs that how we are living is true, remaining completely oblivious to what we are actually doing.
Have you ever felt like a fraud? Like when you say one thing, but the way you actually live your life shows differently? The only way to feel steady on our own two feet is to actually live what we preach, go through it all & experience it through our own bodies – then the words that come out of our mouths have a weight of tangible, lived experience.
Who is there to tell us discomfort is a healthy place to be? It signals something we need to look at and suggests there is more to life, even if we can’t feel it fully yet. The moment all seems lost and hopeless is often the threshold that leads to more honesty and openness. Impossible to move on without this stage.
Thanks Mark for sharing your story, I noted in particular your words about appreciation and how this changed how you were with people and you stopped isolating yourself. Appreciation is very powerful, practised on ourselves it highlights our own inner beauty which I have found automatically opens my awareness to others’ inner qualities. Appreciation is very supportive for how we feel about ourselves, and for our relationships.
Appreciation is super important, starting to appreciate and love ourselves builds a great foundation.
I agree Lorraine, and it is an important foundation as there is much in life that is designed to make us question ourselves, not feel good enough, feel less, or compare ourselves, when we can feel held by our own self love via our appreciation of what qualities we bring to others.
It can be uncomfortable to get really honest about how we are living but boy oh boy it is worth doing.