Are You Letting Love In?

We cannot move through this life unscathed. At one point or another, we will be hurt by a lover that we trusted, which can leave us leery about trying at love again. It can drive us to do things that will keep our hearts hidden, protected, and buried somewhere where no one can find it.

Many would argue what love actually is: Emotion, feeling, a state of mind, a state of being, an action, or, as Allanah Myles sings, 'love is what you want it to be'.  

Here is my take on it: Love, unconditional love, is seeing the other person for who they really are—as pure love themselves, and loving that person because they are already love. There is no ego involved. There is no 'you scratch my back and I scratch yours.' It's an energy exchange that easily flows between two people.

The only time that it doesn't flow easily is when there is resistance by one or both parties. Typically this means that the heart is still being protected and hidden.

Eckhart Tolle says, "What is commonly called "falling in love" is in most cases an intensification of egoic wanting and needing. You become addicted to another person, or rather to your image of that person. It has nothing to do with true love, which contains no wanting whatsoever." 

Dear Lovely Souls, Loving another requires unlocking the door to your heart so love can flow in. How beautiful it is to be able to experience what it's like to love and be loved. Life is meant to be lived with love. Don't squander it.


PS:
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Letting the Past Go

Things that we did or didn't do, how we acted or reacted, or who we have hurt--we all tend to get stuck in this place of 'what-ifs' or 'shouldn't haves', wondering what could have been different. We hold onto past situations and behaviours with the belief that this is who we are, and if only we could change it.

Eckhart Tolle says that we should deeply realize that the present moment is all we have and that our primary focus in life is NOW. Not what happened yesterday or 10 years ago, and not what might happen tomorrow or 10 years from now...right now, this moment is all we have. 

Any past situations that you experienced, whether good or bad, happened because you were a energetic match to them. What happened in that moment occurred because you were ready to expand for more, and any contrasting experience was put in front of you so you could choose something different....something lovelier, nicer, kinder.

It can be difficult to understand that any perceived negative experience might actually work to our advantage. We view negative situations as something undesirable, and they certainly are in that moment. But, it's these experiences that wake us up, that make us choose differently in each moment. It's these experiences that make us pay attention to what we are doing and how we are feeling. 

Anything that you have been holding onto from the past that might be keeping you stuck, it's time to let it go. It has served it's purpose: it has shaken you awake. That old stuff can't be changed, no matter how hard you try. 

So, dear Beautiful Friends, take those things from the past and stand on top of them. Then, reach out your hand and grasp something better.

Namaste.  

Standing at the Threshold

As the holiday season approaches, most of us become more reflective about our lives, taking the time to slow down and determine what we truly want.

The other night while watching Charles Dickens' A Christmas Carol, I realized something with regards to what the ghost Jacob Marley said to Ebeneezer Scrooge: "I wear the chain I forged in life. I made it link by link, and yard by yard; I girded it on of my own free will, and of my own free will I wore it.”

Now, I don't believe we carry these things into the afterlife only because we return to pure positive energy when we do croak; however, I believe we carry these chains right now, and we add to the link the more we carry anger, resentment, regret, fear, and unhappiness. And it's always our choice to carry it or not. 
The good news is we are not alone. Most of us carry these chains because we have lost touch with who we truly are. We choose to bind ourselves with negativity, making it a form of protection, and not realizing that this is what is strangling us. The sad thing is, we are doing it to ourselves.  
Eckhart Tolle would say that these chains are ego-based. We hold onto these negative emotions for numerous reasons, including to feel in control, or feel we need to struggle or suffer to get to the good stuff. Maybe we feel holding onto these things will make us more aware. It won't hurt as much if we are already prepared, right? 

How can we let go when someone has hurt us, especially since we are angry with ourselves for allowing it? We can't move on because we are so busy looking back at what happened. We become paralyzed in our own negative emotion. 

Firstly, it's time to be honest with yourself: Are these negative emotions serving you? Maybe in the beginning you felt that they offered something to you for a short period of time. But, right now, in this moment, do you feel they serve you? No. They aren't. They are binding you, just like they did to Jacob Marley. You can't control other's actions, you can only control your own actions and reactions. 

When you come to this realization, that's when you start to feel the chains dropping away. 

The second thing to do is, when you feel like you are ready to react to a situation, which is all ego, send love to that person. Immaculee Ilibagiza, author of Left to Tell: Discovering God Amidst the Rwandan Holocaust, said that when she came face to face with Hutu tribe members who were killing all Tutsi tribe members, she envisioned sending love to them, and discovered that they backed down, letting her pass to safety. If Immaculee can send love to people who had killed the majority of her family and friends, you can send love to someone you feel has wronged you. 

Dear friends, we are standing at the threshold of a new year. It's time to let go of the chains that bind you. 

Namaste.

Your Inner Being

Your inner being always knows.

It knows when something isn't right. It knows when a change needs to be made. It knows when you are longing for more, and it knows that you deserve more.

It knows your deepest wishes and it knows you can have them if you are willing to receive them.

Your inner being can always be trusted because it is certain. You can feel it. It feels like knowing. It feels unwavering. If feels stable and secure.

The only time it wavers is when you doubt the feeling; when you doubt that knowing.

"Inner silence promotes clarity of mind. It makes us value the inner world; It trains us to go inside to the source of peace and inspiration when we are faced with problems and challenges."

~ Deepak Chopra

Get in touch with your inner being by getting quiet. Meditate. Get rid of the excess noise and chit-chat in your mind, and get to the place where you can ignore ego.
If you aren't quiet within, if you cannot find peace, you are still in a place of ego.  You want to go to that place where peace, love and knowingness reside. That is the place of your inner being.

Listen to the deep inner awareness of yourself, Beautiful Souls. That is where the good stuff is.

Namaste!

Your Enoughness

It's interesting what we will believe about ourselves when someone plants a seed in our brain. For instance, the feeling of not being enough for your significant other is a heartbreaking realization. Have you ever felt that nothing you say, do, or become will ever be enough for them?

We spend so much time trying to show this person how 'enough' we are, how worthy we are, hoping to satisfy them. We show them that we can do all of these things for them, and maybe, just maybe, we will be awarded with some modicum of gratitude and appreciation. But it's never enough. 

It's truly sad and disappointing. 

The fact is, it wouldn't matter how much effort you put into being 'enough', it would never be 'enough'. 

So, what do you do? 

1) First, realize that this is all ego. Eckhart Tolle says, "Whenever you feel superior or inferior to anyone, that is the ego in you." Ego will have you believe anything that it wants you to. It will have you believe that you are everything in one breath and nothing in the next. Take a step outside of this judgement and be the observer of this thought. The thought is just that--a thought, and it holds no weight.

2) Understand that the person you are trying to impress will never be satisfied because they are always looking for something outside themselves to make them happy. It is not your job to make them happy. It's theirs. 

3) Understand that the way you feel about yourself, your enoughness or not enoughness, is compounded by continuing to feel the way you do. If you felt 'enough', you would have that reflected back onto you. No one can tell you that you are enough or not. You are the only one that can deem yourself 'enough', and you need to connect with that knowing from deep inside. It's the only way. 

4) Their acknowledgement of your enoughness isn't going to make you feel like you are enough. Knowing that you are is all you need.(see #2)

5) There are loads of people in this world who will celebrate your enoughness. Find them. Those are the people you want in your life. 

6) If someone doesn't see your enoughness, then this is a person you do not want in your life. They are detrimental to you living a happy and fulfilled life.

You are more than enough. 

Our Greatest Teachers

Who are your greatest spiritual teachers? 

They don’t have to be the typical ones that we commonly think of like, Buddha, Gandhi, or Jesus.

Actually, they can be those who have brought you the most pain.

I know this seems a little ‘out there’, but we can gain a lot of knowledge from those people who have treated us not so kindly and with derision.

Last week, I watched an interview with Shirley MacLaine and she was asked this very question. Who were her spiritual teachers? She said that her greatest spiritual teachers were those who have caused her the most pain.

Taking a step back from this, you’d think that the woman enjoyed being mistreated. However, this wasn't the case. What she was saying was that those who have caused her the most pain were giving her more clarity of what she didn't want to bring into her life.

Being mistreated, disrespected, not getting the love that you want, or being treated unkindly by these people can help us to grow and evolve into the human being that we want to be.

There have been many times where I have been mistreated or that I hear of others showing disrespect and I think, ‘I don’t want to be like that. Be a better person. Always strive to be a better person.’

But, it also comes back to how we treat ourselves. If another person is mistreating us and we are putting up with it, and have been for quite some time, this is an opportunity for us to look inward and understand what we are bringing to the situation. It's time to ask those hard questions of why are we choosing to stay when the relationship does not serve us for our highest good.

However, if you have gotten out of a relationship, and still harbour resentment or bad feelings, take a look at how the relationship has served you. What new knowledge have you garnered from that relationship?

Take that experience, take that new understanding, and realize that something even better will come along. It always does.