Spiritual practice is about entering into love – not personal love or meeting the one, but being love. Our relationships play a powerful part in our spiritual awakening. They show us the unhealed aspects of the personality and motivate us in our search for joy.
Karmic agreements are typically set up as opposing forces – the outgoing personality with an introvert, fiscally responsible with a shopaholic, promiscuous with sexually repressed, etc. This Yin and Yang duality allows us to learn from one another, to expand points of view and try new experiences until we find balance or run in the other direction.
We are each responsible for our own joy. Relationships are not about raking away someone else\’s unhappiness or expecting another to fill some void within us. Rather, they allow us to see our fears, expectations and judgments more clearly. Should a challenge arise within any relationship – family, friends, lovers, co-workers, even a brief interlude with a stranger – see how quickly you can find the lesson or the gift within it. Silently bless the person for bringing unhealed pain to the surface and then consciously enter into the realm of spiritual practice. Everything is an opportunity to awaken.
Live in love. Do your work. Make an end of your sorrows. ~ Buddha ~
What we seek most from others is the very thing they find hardest to give. Acceptance creates a space in which transformation can occur and in order to move into acceptance, we must first love and accept ourselves. Then it becomes easy to allow those we love the space in experience their own awakening.
Today my intention is to bless those who have graced my life with their presence. I am honored to receive the gifts of love and awakening that have unfolded each step of the way.