Making Room for Love

To truly allow yourself to love, you need to allow yourself the possibility at times, that you don’t.

That’s the irony with most of our relationships with
everyone and everything.
Why are we so afraid to admit that we may not love a person or love doing something or even love being a certain way, that we box ourselves into a place where freedom to choose no longer seems like a choice? For whatever the reason, under certain circumstances, we’ve deemed it socially unacceptable to admit to not loving someone or something. Maybe because we fear losing that someone or something forever,that we'll look bad, be judged or hurt someone… but whatever the reason, not letting ourselves feel something is the first step down a slippery slope, leading to depression and ultimately a life unfulfilled.
When we stop making room for these feelings we start resenting and withdrawing from people we care about because we feel trapped, trapped by feelings we're "not allowed" to have.
For love to be love, for love to thrive, it has to be freely given. You can’t free yourself up to truly love someone if you can’t even ponder the possibility that you don’t.
Where’s the freedom of choice and where are we to go
with our suppressed feelings?
It’s highly implausible that we can be feeling love for our partners, our children or our family 24/7. How many of us allow ourselves to admit that? For most people that have been in a long term relationship, the feeling that maybe they are not in love with their partner, is very frightening and so they conclude that it would be better left alone, unexamined. The problem; what we don’t claim dominates us. Ancient wisdom tells us that whatever is within us that is ignored or disowned rules over us. We must assume responsibility for it if we hope to gain freedom from it.
Here’s the real dope: if you allow yourself to feel it and maybe even say it occasionally, you have then freed up something inside yourself to experience real
love and joy.
I can’t tell you how many times I have done something out of obligation or not let myself acknowledge my true feelings for fear that I may have to then change
my life. Never has this avoidance of feelings ever evolved into something positive. Conversely, letting myself feel all my feelings, no matter how scary or life altering I believe they are, has freed me up to having a life worth living.

The Now

One of my favorite New Year's resolutions has always been to live more in the moment, the now, if you will. Admittedly one of the hardest things for me to do is to be wholly in the moment. There's always something for me to dwell on that either just happened or might happen any minute now that takes me out of the moment. I just read an article in the Huffington Post by Stacy Lawson entitled "Live In the Now" in it she has a quote that I love, by Montaigne translated from french "There were many terrible things in my life and most of them never happened." This about sums it up for me.
She goes on to write;
"Ultimately, this mischief of the mind limits your creative power - you cannot create from the past, nor can you create in the future. You can only create in present moment...in the Now.

The Now is eternal and unbounded. It is without content. It is free from any orientation or attachment. Some traditions describe the Now as the gap between two thoughts. By slipping into the gap of the Now you can structure an entirely new experience. When you are fully attentive to the moment, you can access the field of infinite potential...where past, present and future do not dictate your reality.

Every moment is truly new. Every moment is pregnant with possibility and imbued with vast creative intelligence. Your job is to constantly empty the mind, giving up old moments in favor of unlimited possibility. No matter what has come before, a new reality is possible this moment. No matter how "bad" your day has been, you have the power to create the best day of your life."

I know that these words are true, I know that when I have, on occasion, truly lived in the moment, they are the most gratifying moments of my life. One moment at a time.

For Want of Wanting

Want; it can be used as a verb (used with or without object) or a noun. One definition being; “to be deficient by the absence of some part or thing, or to feel or have a need”.

Today I had a realization that changes the way I look at my life. I got up this morning and found my mate in the living room writing in his journal, I sat down and we immediately got into deep conversation about life, our lives. One of the things he touched on was the feeling that his grandfather and father were considered icons or “great” men and that all his life he wanted to be great. My response, was that he was already that great person, even back then as a boy, and that he just didn’t see it, which I know to be true, but almost sounds pat in today’s world of self introspection and positive affirmations, etc.
As we got deeper into the conversation I shared that it reminded me of MY childhood only I always wanted to have the perfect body, I always fantasized that if I had the perfect body (and overall look) I would be beyond happy, my life would be filled with wonders beyond my wildest imagination blah, blah, blah… I guess this was my version of “being great”.
We went on to talk about the times in our lives when we actually achieved “greatness” (at least in our own mind) or came as close to it as possible, for example; a time when he was playing piano so beautifully he made his instructor cry at a recital, or a time I was in great shape and very happy with my body and the overall way I looked.
Why then did we not maintain these statuses? Why were these fleeting moments? Why did we need to sabotage ourselves? Is it because once we were getting close to great, and our lives were not exactly meeting our wildest fantasies, it was too disappointing to face?
What about this state of WANTING, “the state of being without something desired or needed, of being without the necessaries of life.”?
Now this, the state of wanting, this is where we grew up. It was something we could handle, this feeling was so familiar, so comfortable, it seemed to fit us perfectly. Wanting wasn’t a launching point to get you to the next place in life but rather was a perpetual state of being, a mood or way of life, if you will. This is how we were recognized, how we learned to relate to others. It was like belonging to this club, those of us who knew about wanting. I started to think back to the 60’s when I was growing up, what was I hearing about- wanting peace, wanting to change the world, wanting to be somebody, wanting to stop the war…it was cool to want. Now wanting…that’s something I could sink my teeth into, wanting is where it was at.
When I think about the last conversation I had with an old friend of mine, (about a week ago) what did we talk about? We talked about wanting to lose weight, hmm… let’s see…how long have I been wanting that… Oh yeah only about 40 years now - 40 YEARS!!!! What the hell! Let’s at least consider changing the subject!!! There should be a statute of limitations on it for Christ sake, come on already! How long should we be allowing ourselves to want something??? (I’m starting to feel like Lewis Black all of a sudden).
Here’s the rub; it can’t possibly be about losing the weight or whatever that thing is that you say you “want” it must somehow be the wanting that is the goal here . Imagine having a contest for people who have been wanting something the longest in life? You wouldn’t actually get the Gold Medal, your prize would be to get to keep wanting it!
What I’m saying is, that wanting, the state of wanting, is the what we end up becoming attached to, as painful as it is.
Now it’s not as if we all haven’t achieved many goals along the way, it’s just that I can finally see clearly how this state of wanting is so ingrained in me that I don’t even notice I’m in it. To see past wanting and accept HAVING is really to accept a totally new way of understanding and living life. I think I’m ready for a change.

Gratitude

It’s been a while since I thought about him, “The Smiler” The man with the beautiful smile and glistening eyes that always seemed eager for a pleasant conversation and always had time for a friendly “Hello, how are you?”... Mr. Martinez. He lives on the block that I once lived on, the block that my children still live on half the time with their father and his girlfriend.
The block that houses people of my recent past, my ex in-laws and their long time neighbors, the block that holds my children’s father’s childhood memories.
I lived on that block for 5 years, a mere fraction of the time the Smiler has, during that time I must have walked down it thousands of times, through all four seasons, carrying bundles, pushing a stroller, rushing off to work or to pick up the kids. Often I would see him outside his house puttering around, he would always look up, always with that same friendly smile. He reminded me of my father in his later years, there was something distinctly sentimental about his look, something shy but open at the same time,his energy seemed unrelentingly kind and loving. I never really knew him. I almost never stopped to talk, except when my kids were dawdling or learning how to walk, the pace was much too slow to avoid his welcoming glance and it seemed futile not to strike up a conversation. We mostly talked about the kids, he knew my ex’s family for many years and would always ask about them, eager to hear, as though their lives were a vital part of his.
When I moved out of that house I never saw him, it’s been 3 years.
Today I was walking down the street with my 6 year old daughter and when I looked up there he was… a petite old man wearing glasses and bundled up in a wool winter coat and cap, slowing walking down seventh avenue. I wasn’t sure he would remember me at first, as I gradually started to walk past him I saw him slow down to look at my daughter and then at me and then back to my daughter while slowing to a stop. I stopped and smiled at him and he asked me while pointing to my daughter “Rrrrrossman?” I responded “Yes that’s her, I’m her mother" (so as not to be confused with a babysitter). He turned towards me with wide eyes and the most beautiful smile and said in a thick Spanish accent “You! Yes You! I didn’t recognize you, your hair looks different, how are you? You look good, you moved away so quickly, only after a few years, I have been on that block 40 years, and I know everybody. How are you? How are you? Are you Ok? Are you married?” he was so eager to hear about my life and me, he glowed and so did I. He said I looked happy. As we talked I looked down at my daughter who was smiling up at us, she too was swept up in the infectious energy of the moment.
As we parted I felt compelled to give him a hug, as I released him I saw his eyes get watery, and in that moment I felt loving gratitude for being remembered and seen through the eyes of The Smiler.