Sacred Journeys – May 2016

As my mom begins her journey of actively dying, I am honoured to share in this journey with her, inside the love that created both of us

As we move into the renewal that comes with spring, I am aware of the surge of optimism, abundance, and love that fills my veins as the birds return, the rivers flow, and the sun penetrates deeper into my winter-weary bones. The realization is always that this love I feel is not outside being handed to me, but inside me all along, and that spring’s promise inspires me to let love flow from within, once again.

I want that feeling all the time. So how do I continually cultivate being love, rather than the old way of seeking much of it outside myself, perpetuating feelings of not being love? I want to be the thing I seek, the alpha and the omega. I think it is about choosing it in each moment, and I’d like to use the inspiration of this spring’s energy to rewire myself permanently.

Rumi’s line, “Ours is not to seek love, but to seek the barriers we have built against it,” sits in a frame on my dresser, reminding me to put on fewer barriers each morning, until I am clothed only in the light that is love. I imagine many of us also are feeling this right now, the challenge and necessity of being present in the now, to be authentic and available to life.

There has been a great deal of loss, facing of fears of one kind or another, shifting out of old beliefs, that has been kneading us of late. I believe these events are compelling us to learn to shift into our place of love for ourselves, and others, where we find the strength to flow with what is presenting itself.

This spring, one of the most important people in my life, my mom, is very ill and I find myself spending my days connected to her state of wellness.

I sometimes become overwhelmed with grief at the thought of being separated from her in this life, and weep like a child, imagining the vast emptiness of her absence. But I am outside of love when that happens. Loss is real. Missing her will be real. But ‘poor me’ is outside love. Whether at her bedside, or a day’s drive away at my home, I feel her presence inside my field of being. The experience is a profound example of how truly indivisible we are from one another.

As my mom begins her journey of actively dying, I am honoured to share in this journey with her, inside the love that created both of us. Mom understands that we are individual creative expressions of that oneness, and we can sense the illusion of separation that life on earth affords us, whenever we let love reunite us with our larger Oneness.

In the midst of this intense experience, trucks have backed into my parked car, and simple communication with others has at times become bizarre and unkind. Each time it is a call back to center, a call back to love. When distress and stress of any kind make you react rather than respond, they show you how you are out of alignment with yourself. By being conscious of it, we can breathe deeply, and then re-focus.

All of us are learning to breathe in love. Each time we do it, we get better at it. Focusing on the illusion of separation between us, and staying connected to our feelings, to whether we are reacting out of fear or responding out of love, is vital for our well-being, and a part of our evolution.

If we are a part of all that is, then all that is unfolding is a co-creation, for our growth and enlightenment: ‘all is as it should be’ and ‘all is not as it seems.’ Ah, now that inspires loving acceptance of each moment. As a student of life, I choose to be inspired by the renewal and creative inspiration that is spring, to consciously choose love in each difficult moment, to make that my core resonance all the time. When I slip out I will hopefully catch myself and resolve to return to center.

As my mom actively dies I will be actively present, and both of us will deepen our experience from that truthful place. Then we can meet what appears on our path and make choices from that beautiful vibration that is love; knowing that life does not happen to us but through us.

One,
One,
One,
The lamps are different but the light is the same
So many garish lamps in the dying brain’s lamp shop – forget about them…
Concentrate on essence.
Concentrate on Light in lucid bliss
calmly smoking off its own holy fire
The light streams towards you from all things, all people, all possible permutations of good, evil, thought, passion.
The lamps are different but the Light is the same.
One matter, one energy, one light.
One light mind endlessly emanating all things, one turning and burning diamond.
One,
One,
One,
Ground yourself, strip yourself down to blind loving silence.
Stay there until you see you are gazing at the Light with its own ageless eyes.

(Jalaluddin Rumi 1207-1273)

Email Kim at: spirit@algonquintea.com