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Jan. 29th, 2011
First... Love... Life
Jan. 29th, 2011 09:25 pmFrom The Book of Awakening: Having the Life You Want by Being Present to the Life You Have.
It seems there are two basic ways to feel the fullness of life, and both arise from the authenticity of our relationships. One is from our love of life, and the other is from our love of each other.
There is a picture…
I only have to look up to see it – a picture of the woman I love that smile down on me. It's not necessarily the picture itself that brings the feelings that go along with seeing it, rather the memories it evokes within me, of times shared, and the feelings of being filled with love for each other.
Surprisingly the memories are mixed ones, not /all/ of them the sort of sunny, romantic moments you'd expect when one is talking about this kind subject, but they are all first. Our first time together… the first time I took care of her when she was sick… and the first time I beheld her as my spouse.
We were in London staying in a hotel, and after a day of running around after the Nanites and it was good to spend some time alone. I remember talking with her and experiencing the feelings of love for her just growing and growing until they filled my heart. From that day to this… no matter the moment or the situation or the mood, that love is still there, as is the feeling of it.
Until you have taken care of the one you love when they are very sick, you have /not/ experienced life, nor a full connection to it. That might seem an odd thing to say, and maybe a very unromantic thing to be thinking about, but it is a truth of a relationship. You can't get more authentic. We were in NYC when she got sick, and just wanted to be home, so I drove her home, It took in excess of 13 hours because of getting stuck in traffic in DC and on I85. But she needed to be home, and so home was where I took her – and then I cared for her as best I could care for her. I can tell you, it's not something you /think/ about, you just do it. You do it because you want to bring comfort and healing to the one you love. I wanted that for her so badly, I poured out all the love in my heart to help her… and it still just filled back up.
When we decided where we were going to have our ceremony, I cried. It's such a beautiful place, overlooking a distant waterfall, where the peace of nature is just all around you. She teased me of course, but I had turned around and looked at her in the light of that day, in the atmosphere of that day and saw in her the true reflection of the love in my heart. Not that I hadn't seen it before that day, but in that setting, there in the peace and vastness of nature – standing as two beings committing to become one – it was overwhelming. When, those long months of waiting later, I walked up beside my mother, to see her standing there, in that space, surrounded by the friends that love us, that overwhelming feeling returned, and my heart overflowed with it. Each moment of the ceremony, each word, each action, each loving glance we cast at each other just whispered the presence and the sacredness of our love together beyond the mere confines of my heart, into the very essence of my soul.
Love is life, and life is love.
I am too alone in the world
and not alone enough
to make every moment holy.
-Rainer Maria Rilke
It seems there are two basic ways to feel the fullness of life, and both arise from the authenticity of our relationships. One is from our love of life, and the other is from our love of each other.
There is a picture…
I only have to look up to see it – a picture of the woman I love that smile down on me. It's not necessarily the picture itself that brings the feelings that go along with seeing it, rather the memories it evokes within me, of times shared, and the feelings of being filled with love for each other.
Surprisingly the memories are mixed ones, not /all/ of them the sort of sunny, romantic moments you'd expect when one is talking about this kind subject, but they are all first. Our first time together… the first time I took care of her when she was sick… and the first time I beheld her as my spouse.
We were in London staying in a hotel, and after a day of running around after the Nanites and it was good to spend some time alone. I remember talking with her and experiencing the feelings of love for her just growing and growing until they filled my heart. From that day to this… no matter the moment or the situation or the mood, that love is still there, as is the feeling of it.
Until you have taken care of the one you love when they are very sick, you have /not/ experienced life, nor a full connection to it. That might seem an odd thing to say, and maybe a very unromantic thing to be thinking about, but it is a truth of a relationship. You can't get more authentic. We were in NYC when she got sick, and just wanted to be home, so I drove her home, It took in excess of 13 hours because of getting stuck in traffic in DC and on I85. But she needed to be home, and so home was where I took her – and then I cared for her as best I could care for her. I can tell you, it's not something you /think/ about, you just do it. You do it because you want to bring comfort and healing to the one you love. I wanted that for her so badly, I poured out all the love in my heart to help her… and it still just filled back up.
When we decided where we were going to have our ceremony, I cried. It's such a beautiful place, overlooking a distant waterfall, where the peace of nature is just all around you. She teased me of course, but I had turned around and looked at her in the light of that day, in the atmosphere of that day and saw in her the true reflection of the love in my heart. Not that I hadn't seen it before that day, but in that setting, there in the peace and vastness of nature – standing as two beings committing to become one – it was overwhelming. When, those long months of waiting later, I walked up beside my mother, to see her standing there, in that space, surrounded by the friends that love us, that overwhelming feeling returned, and my heart overflowed with it. Each moment of the ceremony, each word, each action, each loving glance we cast at each other just whispered the presence and the sacredness of our love together beyond the mere confines of my heart, into the very essence of my soul.
Love is life, and life is love.
