by Katrina on March 5, 2010
I’ve caught myself thinking the last few days about how differently I would interact with my loved ones now if I hadn’t been through the challenges in my past. If I’d never been hurt, would I be better than I am? If I’d never been disappointed, could I speak my mind more? If I’d never cried, maybe I wouldn’t worry about getting hurt?
We can wish to change the past, but I think deep down we know that we are who we are because of it. If I hadn’t had my heart broken, I wouldn’t have the strength that I feel quickening my blood, strength that comes from having had to rebuild when my world fell apart. I wouldn’t trust myself to rise to the challenges my path leads me down. I know, through the dark and confusing times, that I have a fire inside me that believes fiercely in love and that even if I don’t know what will happen, that I have to do what I can.
When I talk about love, the first thing that enters into people’s minds is romantic love. But I’ll say it again and again – love is more universal than that. Romance is an expression of love, but it isn’t what love is. It has infinite ways of expressing itself. The love I feel for my friends is no less than the love I feel for lovers or family. The love I feel for someone will change and evolve through knowing them and the changes happening in our lives. One expression of love (romantic) is not better or worse than another (familial). We simply express love in whatever channel is appropriate at the time. Love can be like fire, desire and passion driving us to action or intimacy… but love can also be like water, filling us and flowing through us. There is the spark of new love and discovery of a kindred spirit, as well as the deep love built from time, understanding, and trust. Love is a mystery. We are awed by it. We search for it, even though it’s all around us. Love is a primal force.
Love doesn’t ask us to be perfect or pure. It asks us to allow it into our lives. We all have something to offer, whatever phase of our journey we’re in. There is beauty in the love of an innocent heart that has never known pain, but there is equal beauty and worth in love that comes from a heart that we have pieced back together. There is hope and strength in a heart that chooses to ignite itself in the dark. Making the decision to love despite confusion and fear and past pain is a powerful thing. That decision invites love in and shows that we want something stronger, better, more aligned with who we are. It’s in that desire to be more than we have been before that we find power, truth, and nobility in love.
{ “The true nobility is in being superior to your previous self.” ~ Hindu Proverb }
by Katrina on March 5, 2010
The last few nights I’ve been feeling really restless. My dreams have been smoky and symbolic, women in threes, old overgrown gardens, strange ancient houses, voices speaking the names of old gods long sleeping. There have been so many messages and I feel like I can’t hold them all. They fade with the dawn and under the concerns of living in the physical world.
When I agreed to act as a servant of love, I didn’t believe I had anything to offer and though I put myself in her hands, I thought Aphrodite a frivolous goddess. When I thought of love, I often thought of a group of attributes, or qualities that I wanted in a partner, or a warm safe feeling that would soothe my fears and nurture me. I thought I knew what love was, and the more I follow this path, the more I realize how much I have to learn.
Love is all around us. It connects us to people, places, and objects. It’s the force that moves the universe, the life blood of creation. Every action we take, we take for love, for desire of a feeling, an experience, a person. And yet, to love is one of the scariest, hardest things we can do. I’ve often been caught up in thinking of love as quantifiable… that I have a limited source that I give to a specific someone in exchange for equal value of service, caring, etc. That if I run out, I need someone else to fill up that space for me. Sometimes I wonder if it was a cosmic joke for Aphrodite to take a lonely, dreamy little moon child and walk her down the trials of love, to see what she could become.
The funny thing about love is the more I give, the more I have. Not because one person or another gives it to me, but because the act of loving aligns me with a greater source of universal love. When I act out of love, I invite it into my life and carve a greater space within myself for love to flow through my being. I step deeper into love’s realm and that is my reward, more than any act of affection or caring than anyone can show me.
When we search for “love”, we are searching for many things that we associate with that label. The desire for love can be a mask for the desire for attention, sexual pleasure, sensual pleasure, care giving, protecting, teaching, sharing. We establish patterns early on that we continue to act out of, thinking if we can find the perfect person or the perfect way of explaining ourselves we will have those needs met and be happy.
Love is so much more than that. Love asks that we be gentle but strong, open and changing but centered in who we are, vulnerable and courageous. Love asks us to take chances again and again, even when we are tired and weathered. Love asks for us for our nobility, for us strive to be more than we have been. Love can bring us what we ask for, but the greater mystery is when love brings us what we didn’t know we needed.
