by Janina Koch, nearby Cologne, Germany (English 2nd language)
I have been doing the workshops with Serge Benhayon now, since 5 years, being committed to go to the UK from Cologne three times a year in May, June and November.
There has been so much I have learned in this time about myself – becoming more and more aware and allowing myself to feel. Becoming aware how much I actually feel but rather choose not to, as I have felt easily overwhelmed by people, situations and expectations. So, I have very well-developed techniques not to feel me: for many years I used TV, alcohol and food. During a day of work or studying I looked forward to coming finally home to my evenings of TV, drinks, crisps and chocolate, or to meet a friend and to drink and eat together.
I didn’t really know to feel joyful and harmonious in my body, but somehow I preferred to rebel against it all than to do it the way everybody did it. I kept myself busy or numb, or was involved in emotional turmoil with my partner.
A few years ago Serge Benhayon said to me, “Beautiful Janina, be love”… I took it as a compliment of my looks; little did I know, at the time. I was so convinced that I was wrong, a failure, being unemployed a lot, not having a successful, happy life. I was so used to put myself down for anything.
The first two years of going to the courses in England, I tried very hard to be gentle and to behave in an ‘esoteric way’ – feeling that I won’t manage to ‘get it’ or to succeed. Even though, nobody asked me to be in a certain way.
Serge’s message was always clear – choose to be love and choose to be you. In the beginning I did not let in the message ‘choose to be you’ – as being me was certainly not something I wanted to be.
Over two and half years ago I went to my first seminar with Chris James, a 5-day retreat (singing). This was a revelation for me. I discovered that singing is natural for me. When I sing I allow myself to feel me. To express me in a loving and self-supportive way has showed me how beautiful I really am.
This has opened closed doors, a process to slowly open myself to discover more of my true essence. And to develop more trust in me and that I can go “with me” out into the world.
What is very inspiring all along the way are the beautiful and loving esoteric students I have met from all around the world.
And a big Thank you here to Serge Benhayon and Chris James.
I live in Germany, we have really great Esoteric practitioners and students here and their reflections are very inspiring – now including me!
The other day I started drawing a picture – a woman with a big heart, flying hair, going up some stairs – I wrote: stepping up to be me.
The Truth about Serge Benhayon 
When I was reading about the time you used to watch TV, late nights, eating and drinking, made me shudder as this was something I used to do. And I was recalled that period (which was many years), I could feel a sadness of where I was in my life, living day by day, hoping that I would feel some happiness or contentment through those activities. When I experienced anything, it was short lived, because the moment I woke up, I was back to square one again.
Like you Janina, after meeting Serge Benhayon, I started to discover more of me, and as I discovered more of me, the more of the other me started to drop away.
Would I go back to how I used to be and do? Absolutely not. Would I like to go back to who I used to be? Absolutely not! Life is very different when you are living the more of you…
To live expressing our true essence is one of the greatest gifts that we can offer ourselves and others, for it is our responsibility to be that reflection of beauty and divinity that we hold. When we hold back, everyone else misses out on what we have on offer and the world is that much less for our lack of true presence and expression. ‘Be Love’ – two words, so simple yet holding of the entire universe.
Henrietta spot on and agree two simple words, yet so powerful and correct. In that when we ‘Be Love’, the Universe expands and can only reciprocate.
“Be Love” – two simple words that mean only one thing, and yet we are so good at misunderstanding this, re-interpreting this and avoiding the true responsibility of what this would mean to live. And so we expose ourselves in the process of attempting to live the variations of ‘being love’ until such time that we know and live what it truly means. How else to be empowered than to work it out for ourselves?
Janina, thank you for your sharing…it has made me reflect on how simple and loving a comment from someone like Serge Benhayon may be, and we can re-interpret this or twist it around to mean something else. This is something I have done a lot of too in my life but in the process of re-interpretation, I walk down a path thinking that this is it when in fact it is not and sooner or later I do find out and then I know to return to the start where I strayed. Trial and error is sometimes a necessary path and hence one of the best teachers to help us learn to tune into the truth.
This is so heartfelt Janina and I can understand why, returning to living from our true essence is the greatest gift was can receive for ourselves and then share with others.
I love the simplicity and truth Serge Benhayon shares, ‘Serge’s message was always clear – choose to be love and choose to be you.’
Janina I feel that many of us got caught in trying to the ‘good’ esoteric student in the early years even though none of us were told or ever encouraged to be this. I have found that actually letting go and just being all of me was extremely hard. I was very judgmental of myself and so therefore judgmental of everyone else. We all come from such a grandness its quite hard to believe that we deserve to be all of this and more as we have for lifetimes crushed our belief that we could be anything other than human beings, rather than a being trapped in a dense physical body.
I can so relate to that trying very hard. But actually there is nowhere to go and nothing to become, we are already it.
There is no greater fulfilment in life that to be the love we are, just by being ourselves. The joy and power that comes from our innate lightness of being is our true normal.
We try to be so many things but being ourselves is the last that we choose.
I always enjoy reading this Janina. It’s such an odd society we live in because so many of us are not able to be our true selves, as we do not currently have a society that fosters the most basic human right to just be ourselves. It’s such a blessing to receive the support of Serge Benhayon’s work and make our return to living from our essence again.
The simple road for us to return to our essence is one of Love and starting with gentleness is setting a foundation that we can build on.
The Esoteric is simply an invitation to change your pattern of movements so you can finally start moving towards you.
Once we take that first step every thing else become a ‘step up’ to the deepening Love we all are. Then the ‘Walking With Your Heart’ by Chris James becomes a way of moving and thus walking that is incredibly simple.
Being ourselves is coming home, what we have an opportunity to look at here is how we have let ourselves get so far away from being ourselves in the first place.
Janina what a journey from feeling to be wrong and being a failure to a woman who is “stepping up to be me.”
That is indeed an inspiration for the ones who are feeling wrong or being a failure too . . . yes it is possible to change – it only needs different life choices.
It is so, so beautiful Janina to read about your journey of reconnection to the true you. Thank you for your lovely sharing.
It is so inspiring to read the stories of people and how they have changed through meeting Serge Benhayon and Universal Medicine. Thank you for sharing yours and so tenderly.
Over time, by living and walking in disconnection we develop several ways to avoid feeling us to the point that we do not feel that there is something to feel.
Thank you for sharing Janine, I loved your reading about your drawing – stepping up to be me, when we start changing our choices we start to let go of all the layers that we are not.
Janina thank you, you have described so well the process of living in disconnection to self and the gradual return to your true inner essence (the true you) that was buried beneath ways of coping so as not to feel. For women as we resurrect ourselves out of those behaviours it’s a common feeling to have very little self worth, to not be connected to our qualities, or believe we have much value apart from what we do or provide for others. Returning to a relationship with ourselves that is loving and that values who we are, and where we just enjoy being is priceless.
For so many people, discovering that they do have a beautiful voice, and that indeed everyone is actually born with a beautiful voice, is so deeply empowering, liberating and opens us up to the potential of so much more that is within us.
So true Chris, our voices have a true quality that we are ‘born’ with and to return to that ability we have, so we can truly express seeing expression is every-thing, true-expression is us returning to what truly expressing from our essences is all about. Then by expressing with a true voice via our re-connection to our essences or that which is-within-us, so our whole body starts to express the truth by all its movements.
‘Choose to be love and choose to be you’ are definitely wise words to base our everyday lives upon.
” . . . to develop more trust in me and that I can go “with me” out into the world.” I love this line as it is giving oneself permission to simply be.
I love this Janina. I’ve heard the words “Be Love” many times, either from Serge Benhayon himself or repeated. I even have sticky notes around the house that my son has written with the same message. But I now realise they have been just words to me and that I really don’t know what they mean. Something in reading your blog clicked and changed. Be love – that is the whole point of our existence!
Beautifully said Nikki – “Be love” is two simple words put together, and yet they hold layer upon layer of divine messages for us to peel off one at a time and understand the depth of what they actually mean.
Truly isn’t that what we all want for ourselves and each other, to just be and live who we truly are. This is a tenet of Universal Medicine and there is support for you for this. It’s like we are consistently living a lie, living a part of the truth and from there a lot is going wayward or ‘wrong’. When you choose to peel things back and bring dedication to what feels true to you and explore this consistently the world has a different view. It’s not my way or your way it’s our way and from there it’s all one and not a number of seperate parts.
Thank you Janina, I have found that when I sing I also seem to let all of me out, I feel very connected to me and so joyful to simply express from my heart. Singing is such a simple yet powerful thing to do!
Serge Benhayon inspires us to become aware of the true love that we naturally are if we choose to be who we truly are.
A beautiful and tender sharing of you returning to be you in full.
In future ages, there will be recordings of this extraordinary man who walked the planet and talked with such wisdom grace and love, one of the things that he told so many people were so simple… Just to be love… One day this will change the axis of awareness of humanity, and the bearer of this message will be truly appreciated.
Trying to be something or someone to ‘fit in’, look good, behave in a certain way or to even find ourselves never works ‘I tried very hard to be gentle and to behave in an ‘esoteric way’ – feeling that I won’t manage to ‘get it’ or to succeed. Even though, nobody asked me to be in a certain way.’ Being true and honest with ourselves regardless of how others are and letting ourselves be is the only way and it feels really good to hear how this happened for you 💕
A gorgeous story Janina of self-love, self appreciation and self responsibility; a beautiful gift for us all, thank you.
I love this Janina ‘stepping up to be me’ – the greatest gift we can ever give ourselves and others.
I can feel the appreciation you have for yourself Janina and the choice you are now making for yourself. A very beautiful celebration of yourself.
Beautiful to hear Janina. When you are met in love for who you are you realise just how far you have been living away from it. Serge Benhayon forever meets you for who you are.
If the world only valued the truth of our hearts, over our outer achievements, looks and the rest… it would be a very different place, and none would be able to lose sight of their own inherent beauty as easily as can be done today.
Thank God for Serge Benhayon, yourself Janina, and all those who are willing to see past the veneer to the truth of who we are – no matter the layers it may be covered in, or the denial of our innate beauty we’ve allowed ourselves to believe…
Love what you have shared Victoria as it is giving back responsibility too each of us to reconnect to our essences.
“Stepping up to be Me”. I love that.
There is nothing more beautiful that being able to take yourself out into the world and to express all you are after hiding behind self created doors for so long. Stepping up is indeed something to share so that others can realize they can choose that for themselves too.
Beautiful Janina indeed, whose voice, when she claims it, is so beautiful and delicate and strong that it is a reflection of the deepest tenderness and beauty
I love what you share here Janina and as a fellow singer can really relate to what you say about singing allowing you to discover more of your true essence. It is a wonderful way to explore our expression and feel the fullness of who we are.
Janina I have watched you change in the past years and boy oh boy have you changed. You are now a role model for all that it is possible to turn a life around.
I related very much with acting this out myself – “The first two years of going to the courses in England, I tried very hard to be gentle and to behave in an ‘esoteric way’ – feeling that I won’t manage to ‘get it’ or to succeed. Even though, nobody asked me to be in a certain way.” I took the amazing truths that reverberated through my whole being back to my life and tried to bend and pigeonhole them into my made up way of living. I’ve since realised that it’s not about behaving in a way that ticks boxes and says you’re this or that, it’s about living from who you are and that is then reflected to others.
Janina, I love your “stepping up to be me” picture of a woman with a big heart, flying hair, going up some stairs. Absolutely Gorgeous and so are you! Great blog, very inspiring!
Janina I can completely understand how singing brought you back into connection with yourself. I find that when I am truly connected to me and loving myself I naturally sing, and when the singing stops it’s a signal I am not being myself. Even my dogs start dancing around me again when the singing returns because they feel my joy to simply be and express me again.
Janina, you describe the ways you used to numb yourself not to feel yourself. I think sometimes we numb ourselves not to feel all that is NOT us – all the stuff we have absorbed and how much we are actually missing ourselves and our connection to others.
When we are not choosing to be ourselves or are not connected to ourselves we can absorb all sorts of energies that are not us. For example, if someone expresses anger towards you, you can feel that go into the body like an assault. Then all this poison builds up and feels horrible in our body and we get exhausted so it is not surprising we want to check out from feeling that or eat too much because we are exhausted. Coming back to love and our true connection is the only way to get out of this cycle for when we are full of ourselves we do not fill up with what is not us, and who we truly are is indeed very joyous.
Lack of self-worth is really like the plague, but virus that spreads throughout generations, with the resultant dysfunctional relationships and societies that we see all around us… For if we truly loved ourselves, this would be manifested in a very different evolution of humanity.
I agree Chris, when we appreciate that we come from love and we are love then all that is not love is not who we are. Absolutely something to sing about and celebrate.
Beautiful Janina – so open and honest. “Serge’s message was always clear – choose to be love and choose to be you. In the beginning I did not let in the message ‘choose to be you’.” We are all so different – so unique – yet we are all love – if we choose it so.
Wonderful Janina, I love to feel the commitment you have towards yourself and your humbleness and openness. Very inspiring.
It is very beautiful to read the development of people developing more love in their lives. Gorgeous.
Allowing ourselves to connect with the deeper and truer part of us forms the foundation of self love from which we can experience the beauty of US in our everyday lives, and then, of course, everyone benefits.
Chris just felt to appreciate how fortunate we all are to have you with us inspiring people to find their true voice and their inner heart through singing.
I love the picture with the flying hair. There is something innocent and light about it that shows: the business of being me can be light and playful.
Beautiful blog Janina, and I can relate to not fully getting what Serge meant until much later. In fact, the ‘being me’ part was foreign to me until recently as I too have now begun to live with a felt connection to and honouring of me!
Hi Janina, you are certainly an inspiration and the inspiring words spoken by Serge Benhayon to you I too will cherish “Beautiful Janina, be love”… absolutely gorgeous thank you Janina for sharing .
Janina, your blog took me back to when I first started with Universal Medicine and the many things I heard presented but have taken me a year or two to truly hear. I now have many moments when I go “oh that’s what he has been saying for the last two years”. Thanks for your sharing, I’m always inspired by the commitment of people who travel far and wide to follow truth.
When I read those words, ‘Beautiful Janina, be love’, I could not only feel how truly beautiful you are but also the incredible love that you are. So lovely to know you and to have felt that love you have now chosen to live.
Beautifully expressed Janina and how we inspire and support others when we choose to be all of who we are.
Janina, this is another great example of being inspired by Serge Benhayon to be love and to ‘be you’.
You are certainly flying Janina!
Absolutely gorgeous, Janina. Reading your blog I realise how I am still putting lot of pressure onto myself by holding expectations, and being hard on myself for not meeting them, and that I allow myself to not appreciate and be who I truly am – especially when I see that my circumstance is not reflecting what I started to feel and recognise inside myself. Your sharing reminds me that it is precisely those moments that I have to choose love more than anything else. It was really beautiful reading about your unfoldment. Thank you, Janina.
‘Choose to be love and choose to be you’ wise words indeed. Beautiful blog Janina, thankyou for sharing.
A Beautiful and honest sharing of the returning to who you truly are. So Tender and Loving. It feels like an ‘explosion’ happened which blew everything apart and then coming back together, it was completely different, it was still you but as you truly are. I loved the symbology of your picture – ‘a woman with a big heart, flying hair, going up some stairs – I wrote: stepping up to be me’. Says it all, thank you Janina.
Beautiful Janina that you found a way to be more and more yourself! I found it funny and quite remarkable what you wrote about your failure at behaving like an esoteric student and the fact that you allowed yourself to feel you while singing. It is totally about allowing oneself to feel oneself and share this with the world.
Yes and how weird it is to behave like an esoteric student! When we behave like anything it is going to stand out as odd because it is not our natural way, it feels alien. The re-connecting with the body and feeling what is being impulsed from the body is a far more true way than trying to be a picture that may well not be true for you.
So True life has never been about trying, behaving or acting to fit in-to-that-picture, life becomes simple by reconnecting to our essence and feeling the impulse so we move in a whole different way.
The power in our choices is immense, as such I feel inspired from having read this. Thank you Janina for this beautiful blog.
Truly beautiful Janina, stepping up to be me. I too have hidden myself away most of my life, not wanting there to be a me, but thanks to Serge Benhayon I am too am stepping up to claim me and actually enjoy being me.
Truly beautiful Janina, inspires me to step up and claim the amazing woman I am!
It was inspiring to read about the changes in your life as a result of your connection with Universal Medicine. Thanks Janina.
This was really beautiful to read Janina and your openness to be and express the love you are, inspiring.
Janina what an inspiring blog. Your joy and beauty is deeply felt through your expression, as is the fullness of your big heart, as you claim yourself as the gorgeous woman you are.
Thank you for sharing your commitment to stepping up to be you.
A beautiful blog… you’ve described your blossoming so simply, and the picture at the end is a perfect image to describe these next ‘steps’.
Great blog Janina. I can relate to that dilemma of not wanting to be myself believing that myself is not good enough but at the same time missing myself deeply. It is so cool how you have described a possible way out of that trap by expressing yourself through music and singing with Chris James. I too have experienced this with his workshops.
Janina this is a gorgeous blog. I related to your honesty and I appreciated the gentleness with which you share and write. I have had very similar experiences concerning Serge Benhayon and Chris James. They have both been so supportive concerning my experience in learning to express myself. Thank you for sharing.
The Love of your expression steadily grows, beautiful Janina, like an ever opening flower. It’s such a blessing to be around you. There’s a joyous humming or singing wherever you are! This again is not (only) a compliment for your voice, which is a reflection of your tender and precious power, it’s a testimonial of what you are emanating – as if sweet humming bees would all the time be around the heavenly blossom, that you carry into the world by being you.
How simple and playful this can be – you are showing me!
This is also a testimonial of how the love of God works through Serge Benhayon and Chris James. They are living this example for such a long time already and ever expanding their incredibly loving expression. When I am around them, I get a very real feeling, that eternal love does exist. Not only in them – since this is easy to feel and to see in their eyes – but also inside of all of us, equally so!
Such beautiful words that build everyone Felix – and yes such a blessing to feel and realise that there is true love in this world, that it is not something we need to look for on the outside but that it lies within. And yet how confirming to feel it in someone like Serge Benhayon so that this then ignites it in us from within…So many blessings to count.
Janina,beautiful to see the change in you as a result of your connection with Universal Medicine. It is always a joy to spend time with you, when you visit the UK.
I liked this very much, I could feel how you have embraced yourself and given yourself permission to go out into the world and fly. The picture was perfect…
I love that you drew the picture Janina! Wonderful words too, thank you.
Thank you Janina, and like Karoline I too was touched by the ending ‘stepping up to be me’. So deeply touching.
So gorgeous Janina, thank you for your loving words.
Gee this gave me such a heartfelt smile thank you for sharing.
Thank you Janina.
I too have found the work of Chris James most supportive in the claiming of my voice, Janina. It sure is a fun way to open up and discover more of our true essence.
Your words ‘to develop more trust in me and that I can go “with me” out into the world’ say it perfectly!
This is a beautiful account Janina, thank you for stepping up and sharing you.
Janina, it´s lovely to see you blossoming. Keep going to be you – you ARE BEAUTIFUL 🙂
I had to smile when I read “I tried very hard to be gentle”… Sometimes it seems too easy to just BE so our mind prefers to make it complicated or hard. But when we let go of this belief it IS simple and lovely.
Absolutely beautiful.
Hi Beautiful Janina – thank you for sharing your re-discovery of your ‘voice’ and the loveliness of you.
I love reading about the development and changes in people as a result of their connection to Universal Medicine. Thanks Janina for your lovely story.
I loved the way you ended the post, the beauty touched me.
Dear Janina, this is so tender – thank you very much for sharing. And the drawing you describe brought a big smile to my face. Another beautiful testimony that we do not have to be living next door to Serge Benhayon and Universal Medicine, or to even have English as our first language to use the tools we all have inside ourselves to, as you say: ‘stepping up to be me’. Awesome.
Janina, I have witnessed the changes in you, from being withdrawn and invisible to blossoming into the beautiful woman you truly are, full of grace. What an amazing journey you embarked on and long may you continue to grace the world with the love that you are.