Letting love lead is the formula for finding a joy so resilient that the light of it will shine the way through any dark night of the soul.
I found joy, after I thought that I’d not only lost it, that perhaps, I’d never known it. Never letting love lead, but rather the comments and feedback from the primary relationships in my life, from society, from any direction, because I was a people pleaser.
I wasn’t happy with this role. It’s likely why I live as a hermit today. If your company requires me to do what you want, I’m happy over here. I’m certain there are people who share, negotiate, and otherwise make room for someone else, but it wasn’t my early experience.
Today, I am loving God and white space as I heal and prepare to create a family and community of my own choosing, consciously choosing and building stronger relationships.
A Joyful Life
A year ago, I wrote about finding a joyful life. My stepmother once told me that life isn’t something you find; it’s something you create. She told me this as I was preparing to start over on the West Coast, thinking I’d begin by consciously choosing my new hometown.
With her comment, I rethought my plan. In the end, it didn’t matter; circumstances conspired to keep me put until the spring.
Instead, I met a guy I thought was charming, capable, and funny. Of course, previously, a friend had asked me if I’d ever date him, and I’d said, “No way! That is a scary man.”
The scary man explained that he was upset at working for free. I countered and said, “No, I was the one providing the cash.”
That’s when I realized that the money never went all the way through to the destination, and I’d been dating a scammer. I regret enabling his contact with innocent victims. Never loan money, but when you do, and you justify it because of the cause, maybe think about paying directly to the source.
A joyful life has nothing to do with the external circumstances, but rather with the speed at which your decision can become your reality. The opposite of joy is a block in between the deciding and the living.
Some blocks are internal. You make the decision, but then you hesitate for reasons that might sound reasonable, and because they sound reasonable, you stop.
Some are external. You make it through the internal hoops, red tape and barriers, get up to make it happen, and someone says something. “That’s not how you do it.”
Looking for Harmony
Just like my stepmother did to me. As soon as they could, she and my dad hightailed it to a new hometown of their choosing. It was okay for them, but not for me.
Different rules for different people don’t fly in my world. I know it’s a reality in the 3D world, but I don’t condone it and would define progress as the direction away from this source of unfairness.
In a year, I went from offering to be the heavy in our relationship to realizing that he is fully capable, yet only uses this persona of his towards me. Me and anyone else who has wronged him.
I’d seen instances when this side of him should have come out and didn’t. I was perplexed as to why. I offered to sub in until he grew the legs himself, only to realize it was a sucker’s plan. There are certain people he wants to think of him in a certain way, so he outsources the tasks that he doesn’t want attributed to him.
I know the difference between charity and a scam. I’m sorry I fell for it, but now I am letting love lead me back into the light.
Truth requires much less explanation. The simplest things explain the most, so when you are searching, groping for a way to excuse things that you don’t like or don’t think should be true, they likely aren’t. He’s lazy. He’s using you. Move on.
It might have taken me a while, but at least I got there. Self-love. I never did like feeling used.
When people say one thing and do another, they may be mid-transformation or lost in wishful thinking. The only difference between the two is the quality of the action they take. They aren’t action-oriented? Well, then…
Listening for Light
How can you listen for light? It’s in the language, the intention, and the energy being expressed.
It means that I am no longer tuning into my old favorite channels of Canadian Politics, like Moose on the Loose, and Northern Perspective. There is no light in politics right now. It’s a steady stream of hearing about things that make my inner light fade.
Listening to the news, I can feel myself shift from happy, hopeful, powerful energy into doom and gloom and powerless to do anything about it. When an election comes near, I will update my knowledge on the subject, but until then there is little I can do. I will vote. I maybe even volunteer, but today, there’s no point getting riled up.
People who speak negative things invite negativity into their lives. I don’t want to be near them when the thundercloud they are inviting arrives, so I quietly back away and go on my way. It’s important to me to maintain the positive, faithful conversation with the universe that I am having, and I don’t want to be pulled into a pit of grossness because someone wants to share it with me.
If it’s gross, keep it to yourself and learn how to transmute it. I can’t do it for you, but I can tell you that it can be done. If your challenges haven’t become the greatest gifts on your hero’s journey, then keep going. One day, your two worlds will merge, and you will be the master of both.
Go out only with a full cup that spilleth over, and a full heart that radiates kindness, and a soft gaze that says, “I see you and accept you, fully as you are.”
Living for Love
I accept your rage, your negativity, your need to criticize and condone. I’ve been there. All the pain in my soul could not be contained. It oozed out, it came out like firecrackers. I wish there were no casualties, but that’s not the case.
In my case, rage was unprocessed sadness, negativity was unchallenged beliefs, and my need to criticize and condone came from an ego under threat. All rooted in fear. Financial fears, relationship fears – all gone with an independent, happy retirement. Solo, and able to be that way.
Letting love lead, because nothing else is a competing priority. A luxury? An absolute gratitude.
The opposite of love isn’t hate, for being consumed by intense emotion is a quality they share, making them more alike than opposites. The opposite of love is fear. Fear causes you to freeze, take flight, take up fists, or take a partner to bed. That last one can be an intense trip if you are not aware of how easily you can be confused.
If you experienced corporal punishment, you can easily confuse love and fear. You are supposed to love your parents. You are afraid of this large adult who is going to intentionally inflict pain on you. What?
When you are letting love lead, you feel joy and move toward it. You notice that you are pushing yourself to eat your vegetables because they are good for you, and self-love reminds you to relax; you are eating your vegetables because your body will thank you for it, and you are inseparable from your body – while you are alive.
In short, living for love is living to feel good. Not indulged, but for the experience of being in your body and optimizing to feel as comfortable and healthy as possible.
Bouncing Forward with Joy
I recently read Google AI’s description of this site. The word “grief” jumped out at me. I used to identify this emotion solely with death, and the event of someone important in your life passing away.
While my mother did pass right after the start of this blog, I was so estranged from her that I didn’t know she was sick. I’m not bouncing forward from that grief.
Grief, I’ve learned, is something we must go through whenever there is a loss that is not coming back. It’s a complex process involving at least five distinct modes of behaviour, and that’s what makes it a process – doing the behaviours.
As a child, when we moved, I grieved leaving behind friends, because there was no Facebook and long-distance calling was expensive. We grieve people, but we also grieve ideas.
As an adult, I grieved meritocracy, the idea that opportunity goes to the most deserving, and realized that it’s all about who you know. When I was told this as a child, it made me angry, eager to prove them wrong, only to find myself on LinkedIn.
Through grief, peace, and the quiet knowingness that humanity is still progressing, there is still forward motion; the species is not done learning, adapting, and evolving. You’ve had the honour of witnessing this window in time, and there is vastness before it, and there will be vastness after it. It’s a mere spec, so what significance does that issue hold now?
Joy is the energy of creation; rage is the force of destruction. When rage is targeted at the institutions and ideas that no longer serve, both energies serve to create a better path forward, a better world for everyone.
Let love lead you into the joy of creation. Create anything. Just create.
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