What would it be like to feel love in every moment, to live your life from that place? Is it possible? I believe it is. In this week’s video blog, I talk about how a new dimension can open up to us when we center our hearts and minds in loving the people and the world around us. When you see possibilities instead of problems, everything begins to unfold in expansive and magical ways.
Tag: love
Your Compassionate Heart
That thread is compassion. We were born with a compassionate heart, and it is repeatedly awakened whenever we experience someone else’s pain or joy as our own. Today, on this planet, there is a quiet but universal awakening occurring in which we are finding the compassion deep in our hearts. At times of crisis or catastrophe, the shell of self-protection breaks open, and we feel deeply for our fellow human beings, often giving money, food, clothing, or whatever is needed to help. We feel that way too when we share in someone else’s happiness or good fortune. Our compassionate heart is always ready to shine its light of love outward. It’s a natural part of being a human soul in physical form. That’s why we are here, really: to become aware of our individual separateness as an illusion, and oneness as the greater truth.
Selfishness and lack of compassion are habits. Ones we learn from a very early age in this culture. We are frequently taught that when someone else wins, we lose, and that “on top” is the best place to be. In spite of countless spiritual or religious teachings about love and sharing with others, the overriding voice of this society insists “look out for yourself” and “don’t let anyone else take advantage of you.” It becomes a habitual trigger response to the world, and you lose your connection to that thread of compassion that ties you to other beings on this planet. And to your self as well. Because if you don’t love and have compassion for yourself, you are incapable of having it for others.
The key to stepping out of your conditioning and awakening compassion is patience, with others and with yourself: patience as a daily practice that is cultivated with each conscious breath you take. This opens the door to peaceful loving relationships in all parts of your life. It may take time to reverse the collective trend toward mistrust and separation, but it is possible if we are patient and committed. The kind and gentle child who lives within us is just waiting for acknowledgment and encouragement. Each time one of us is generous or caring in word or deed to another on this planet, we are shifting the energy for all of us. In that shift, the silent message is: “You are not alone.”
Compassion is the reason you were born: love creates life. Divine love and compassion created the universe and lives in your very cells. When we open to the compassion within us, we find the true meaning of life. It’s not about money or fame or accumulating possessions, as we are so often told. It’s about sharing love with others. It’s about generosity of spirit. Caring for self and others with equal gentleness and understanding. Compassion is a circle really. And we are all part of it, at the deepest level. The love you give returns to you and fills your compassionate heart with joy, overflowing into greater and greater expressions of love in the world.
You Are Perfect Now
This morning before dawn, I sat on the sofa of our new home in Florida and cried as I remembered my garden in Massachusetts. I ached inside at the memory of my colorful flowers and the butterflies and bees who visited them. There, I was part of the seasonal flow of nature. The robins called to me if I didn’t fill the birdbath early enough each summer morning. The squirrels and rabbits occasionally sat near me as I worked quietly in the yard. The hummingbirds darted rapidly from the bright-red cardinal flowers to the native honeysuckle. The goldfinches balanced atop the purple coneflowers as they ate the seeds in autumn. I missed them all.
Yet I knew it had been time to leave. The house was sold, neighbors were moving, and Florida was calling. It was all perfect. Today, that perfection met me when I went for a walk after my predawn cry. The immense stunningly white clouds against the intensely blue sky stopped me in my tracks. The skies are always breathtaking in Florida. At all times of the day I am in awe at the color and light. And then there are the tropical flowers and birds right outside my door: hibiscus, plumeria; ibis, egret, heron. I love my new home, even when I miss my Massachusetts garden.
At times I think I should always be upbeat and smiling. Centered in my inner God wisdom and flowing along life’s path in complete synchronicity with every experience. The crazy truth is that I am synchronized, whether I’m crying or laughing. Perfection is not the exclusion of certain feelings; it’s the inclusion of all of them. There is absolutely nothing that is not the way it should be in my life, and yours. Our human design is so tightly constructed that every part is essential. If any of it was missing, we would not be who we were created to be, and there would be a hole in the fabric of the universe. Everything is unfolding as it’s meant to, for the greater evolution of life.
In essence, none of us is flawed and nothing is wrong with us; we are perfect just the way we are, here on this planet to live an experience that is uniquely ours. God experiences life on Earth through us, and the universe expands through God’s own loving expansion (and ours). The entire cosmos is a finely tuned and orchestrated symphonic work of genius in which nothing is off-key or discordant. This is the “music of the spheres,” which spiritual seekers have sometimes heard on their journeys beyond the individual egoic self.
From this perspective, all is well, and if I accept whatever presents itself in my life moment to moment, with love in my heart, I tap into a deeper awareness and clearer vision which guides me through my life without suffering or judgment (of self or others). No mistakes have been made. The Divine is an all-encompassing energy that moves the universe beyond time and space or human questioning. What exists in your life and mine, and in the world’s, exists for a reason that is not necessarily logical or even intuitive. It just is. This is absolute Being, of which we are an inseparable part. Thus, everything we do arises from the evolutionary potential of the universe. We live and die, we grow and evolve, because we are Being itself, eternally expanding into new levels of beingness.
Sound wacky? Abstract? A little frightening? Only on the surface. At the deepest level, beyond whatever you or I may feel/think individually, this is our collective global direction now at this key time. In the midst of all the extremes of our lives, we are coming into full conscious awareness of exactly who we are and why we are here. We are God, living out infinite variations of the love that created the universe. The more clearly I see that, the more I can relax and just live my life, one perfect moment at a time. So can you.
Finding Home
When I moved to Florida from Massachusetts last month, I could feel my consciousness loosening and opening up as we drove south, state by state. By the time we reached Florida, I felt completely detached from any one place. It was almost as if my awareness was free-floating over the entire eastern seaboard, perhaps even beyond that. In moving, I had been letting go of former selves as well as physical objects and familiar places. Even time. As I traveled from New England through the southern states, time and place became almost meaningless. There was nothing but the present moment, in a very intense way. Nothing was familiar, everything new—something I’ve experienced in every major move I’ve made in my life. Yet, this time it’s a little different.
In this key transitional move, the letting go is deeper, the awareness more expansive. I am older than the 20-year-year-old self who left the Midwest to be a California flower child so many years ago. The past and the future seem equidistant in my mind. Soul guidance is at the forefront of my life now, and that shifts every perspective, inner and outer. Even that distinction loses its meaning because everything is within me. The external is just a reflection of my infinite soul’s progression through time and space.
My soul is non-localized: unattached to Massachusetts, Florida, Illinois, California, or any of the other places I’ve lived in or traveled through over the years. I am experiencing myself as Being, without location or identity. Almost as if I am a visitor from another planet or galaxy. Actually, aren’t we all that? Dropped down from some other dimension onto this blue planet floating in a sea of stars called the Milky Way. We are stardust ourselves, shining light on the world around us as we move through our lives. When we meet as our separate paths merge, there is recognition, an awakening realization that we are here together to embody connection and love, to transform our lives and everything around us with that love.
As I passed through Connecticut, New York, New Jersey, Pennsylvania, Maryland, Virginia, the Carolinas, Georgia, and finally reached Florida, I watched the skies themselves transform, the heavenly towering white clouds dramatically darkening with daily thunderstorms and lightning flashes in the humid heat. Palm trees lined the road; tropical bushes and flowers proliferated. Observing it all, I was neither here nor there, but everywhere. I was part of the eternal movement into the unknown. Yes, this is why I moved, not knowing anything except that I was to go. To let go and go. Spirit is moving me, all of us, on our soul journeys.
Spirit survives the packing and unpacking, living and dying. It is within us and all around us and has no beginning or end. It moves to its own cadence, beyond human events and activities. When we step into this perceptual field—this greater awareness of the source of all life—beginnings, endings, arrivals, and departures fall away, and we are Home. No need to hang on or resist; the entire journey exists in this very moment. Breathe deeply and see the far horizon that lives within you. This is infinity; this is God. This is who you are.
The Temple Is You
Life can be challenging, no doubt about it. Physical pain, emotional distress, loss, grief. Yet there is also joy, love, self-expression, and celebration. These are the extremes of being human on a planet of polarities. This is why we came here, to experience everything (and for God to experience it through us) and to come to the ultimate awareness that it is all a blessing, not a curse. In that realization lies freedom from suffering. It opens the door to being immersed in divine connection 24/7, within which we are fully conscious of our own divinity. We understand that all of what we experience on Earth is for our evolution and expansion, not our destruction, and our bodies are the vehicle for this human/divine process within universal consciousness.
So your body is a temple where you can meet God directly and be held in that transcendent embrace of unconditional love. You don’t need the external physical manifestation of a building or shrine, although sometimes those can be powerful reminders. The greatest reminder, though, is your own heart, your own soul, which are ever-present in your physical form. With one deep spirit-infused breath, you can access the divine Presence that is always with you. In many languages, the word for breath and the word for spirit are the same, and this tells you something about the ancient wisdom that surrounds us at all times. When the mystics and masters said that “God is within,” it wasn’t a metaphor. It is a physical as well as metaphysical reality.
We meet God/dess everywhere all the time. It infuses life on Earth; it infuses our own lives. There is nothing you can see or touch or hear or imagine that isn’t sacred Source energy, which created this extraordinary universe to begin with. Actually, it wasn’t so much a beginning as an expansion within timelessness: Being exploring itself beyond beginnings and endings. That may sound strange or esoteric, but the day-to-day reality is this: When you look at the sky, you are seeing God. When you look in the eyes of a loved one or a stranger, you are seeing God. When you look in a mirror, you are seeing God. That’s all there is. In realizing that at the deepest level, you begin to walk upon the Earth with wonder and gratitude for the preciousness of every experience, every second we are gifted with here.
Yes, you are the temple. And so is everything else. No separation. The human mind sees separation, otherness, but that is an illusion. The heart knows the ultimate truth that there is no them, no it, no inanimate objects that are disconnected from us and can be used or abused. Everything you do or say to another, you are doing or saying to yourself, to God. When you hold that awareness in your consciousness continuously, your life becomes a prayer and a living meditation. And isn’t that the greatest gift you could possibly give and receive in your lifetime?
Spiritflower 
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