I’m in London at the moment, as I’ve really enjoyed my time in England these past several weeks. I seem to have connected with a really good group of people, people who are fairly conscious, and who are either creating art, trying to make the world a better place or trying to make themselves a better place. I’m sad in a way to go, but it does feel like it’s time to move on. I’ll be here for another full day and then on to Paris for a day or two, then Metz, France where I’ll be dealing with some of my mothers ashes, then onwards towards the Eastern Bloc and eventually to the Ukraine where I plan to join the Rainbow Gathering now happening there.
There is something I want to perhaps write about but I’m a little hesitant and also I’m not sure exactly what the angle is going to be. It, as seems to often be the case with this blog, has to do with Love. I met a woman recently while traveling here and for the past week we had the most wonderful Love thing. I don’t want to go into the details of it all, but something wants to be uncovered here so I’ll keep typing………….. There isn’t anything dramatic in a way, nothing nagging, nothing tweaking me internally wanting to be sorted out. The wonderful thing about it is that is was simple, pure, true and somehow inspired. Our situations are such that we knew getting into it that we would be parting in a short period of time. What is great though is how we were able to constantly push our own limits and allow something very dear to develop. Our communication throughout was near flawless which enabled us to dive deeper together within the protection of honesty and truth. I think we had more really honest conversations in that week than many couples have in decades of marriage. We started out the whole thing with a “repeating question” where I’d ask her “What are you afraid of?” and she’d tell me something she’s afraid of and then she’d ask me the same question “What are you afraid of?” and I’d answer. I would then ask her again, and she’d answer and then she’d ask me and I’d answer, over and over and over again for maybe 15 minutes until we exhausted whatever fears we might be harboring. That simple exercise I think set a tone and created a lot of awareness between us, and space as well. The reality, I hope, is that we are going to remain friends. Our life situations may not really allow much beyond that, but one never knows.
What it really felt like, in retrospect, is that we did the world a favor by being together. That may sound silly, but it’s true. I do believe that the consciousness of the planet is raised one moment, one person, one relationship at a time.
She had her own learnings from this whole thing which I believe were quite powerful and even life transforming, and for me, what was so beneficial was to feel again what it can be like to have a relationship work on several critical levels: emotional, communication and physical. Always seems like one or two of those are there for me, but not necessarily all three. It’s been a long, long time since I’ve had that, and I think I was in somewhat grave danger of forgetting, which could lead to potentially disastrous consequences. This was a wake up call in a sense, to remember and to not forget. To remember what it can and I believe should be like, when relationship is supported by very solid, forthright and truthful communication.
Although this was only for a short period of time, in some way that brevity helped to distill things down to a very pure form, which then make the lessons learned and feelings felt more clear and precise. I guess mostly what comes of this writing here for me is that I see that I was changed on a deeper level. Lessons learned about trust, honesty, compromise, support, care, communication, lovingness, appreciation, presence, and liberation.
If you’ll remember from my most recent post, there was a learning that happened for me about “learning to do by doing.” The last line of the St. Francis de Sales quote from that post is: “We learn to love by loving.” That is clearly the most important line in the entire poem. I am touched now as I write this how quickly the universe provided the opportunity to extend the wisdom to encompass learning to love by loving. What better practice in the world could there be?