Wednesday, February 18, 2009

A BLOG FOR LAUREN

It is February 18, 2009, and it is indeed a very special day. This is the day that my only living biological niece “comes of age.” That tiny baby I held just yesterday is now eighteen years of age, and will shortly graduate from high school, and enter into college. It seems impossible and incredible, and yet it is so. I have been breathing very deeply into this awareness since arising early this morning. So many feelings and images have been flooding my heart and mind, almost to the point of overload. I am sitting here at my computer, attempting to allow some of this emotional data to dance its way into this blog.

I will not know the profound gift of parenthood in the duration of this lifetime. I have come to peace with this fact, knowing that my procreations are of a different nature than flesh and blood and soul. The closest that I will come to know of this relationship is through my brothers only off-spring, Lauren. I recall so clearly looking into her infant eyes, and feeling a love beyond anything I had known. I knew instantly that there was something old-soul about her, and very, very special. That isn’t just the view of a proud uncle, though indeed I am. I could and still feel a vastness within her that transcends her current human story. I love this child…err….young woman with a love that is nearly painful. It is from that enormous love that an even deeper call has come forth from my own Soulful emergence.

I have a profound need to express my love for my niece in expanded ways of givingness. I am not necessarily speaking of material giving, though that impulse is certainly there as well. I purchased a life insurance policy some years ago so that I would be able to leave something to Lauren as my body left this world. I had never considered that before. I recently saw an ad for a different policy with a bigger pay-out, and I made a note to check that out. Even as I witness this unfolding within me, I also know that beyond leaving a life insurance policy, I want to insure that I leave her the legacy of a life fully lived. I want to demonstrate by example that so many of the limitations set by tribal thought have no basis in Truth. Since I turned fifty, I have been keenly aware of what I am called to leave for future generations, and this is personalized as I think directly of Lauren. I see how many of the challenges that she is facing today are challenges that I too have been called to transcend. I feel this passionate wanting to spare her the pain of loss, of limiting self-esteem, of the strangle hold of a world of no. And yet those are some of the very things that have contributed to the expansion of my own consciousness. I watch today as she endures the fading away of a father in the very way that I lost mine; and me at an even younger age. As painful as that was, it has been a profound portal to a life of greater service for me, and for many around me. I want to know at depth that as much as I want to protect her, I can’t rob her of her entry points into a life of greater depth, more profound meaning, and purposeful authentic expression.

As I watch Lauren growing into a wonderful young woman, I also celebrate her gifts, and pray that she will do the same. I quite honestly shed some tears this morning as I pondered some of my own gifts; gifts that I feel in many ways have not been fully given. I want more for her. I want her to realize earlier than I that we are gifted in order to be given. I want her to know deeply that she is indeed worthy to be given, an acknowledgment that has taken many years her uncle to know. It renews my commitment to expressing my Self freely every day, in new and meaningful ways. I want to give her that example. I am willing to step through the fears that blocked my way in the past. I want to show her that a painful childhood is not a limited future. In fact, it fuels our contributions even more. As I continue to expand in my own Self-love, I celebrate the love I have for her, a love that calls me to live more fully, love more freely, and give more completely.

So you see it is indeed a very special day. It is the day one of the great loves of my lifetime was born. And now she is coming into her own as an adult with infinite possibilities before her. My love for her inspires me to expand my own probablities, and to relentlessly pursue the possibilities before me. That is the greatest gift I can give to her. To not only say but to embody that we are each Sourced in and by the One Source which is ever seeking to live, to love, and to give Itself fully through Its creation. Any dogma that denies that is just fearful commentary.

So Lauren, honor what the past has shown you, but never be limited by it. Listen to the mind, and always lead with the heart. And never, ever let the world or its fearfulness define you. You are infinitely, all ways more. And never forget you live within the adoring gaze of an uncle who loves you beyond condition. That requires me to love myself more fully, in order that I have what I am wanting to extend to you. And even after I am gone, look for me in the every twinkling of a star. In the winking of a squirrel. Smell me in the fragrance of the lilacs, and the sweetness of a peach. I will be there even as I am here. In the love. The ultimate lesson of life, my dear, is that it is always about the love.
Happy Birthday.

SEE TAYLOR LIVE ON SITE FOR CALENDAR OF CURRENT EVENTS

Tuesday, February 3, 2009

FEBRUARY RADICAL EXPRESSION



I have had a particular song looping through my awareness as of late, creating a kind of subtle backdrop as I move about in the activities of my day. It is a song recorded by the singer Whitney Houston a number of years ago now, and has subsequently been preformed and recorded by countless artists. It contains a phrase that seems to me to be at the very heart of the spiritual journey of unfoldment: LEARNING TO LOVE YOURSELF, IT IS THE GREATEST LOVE OF ALL.



As simple and as Hallmark as that may sound, I have come to see that process as the very quest of humankind. In the early lyric of that song, it speaks of showing children “all the beauty they possess inside.” I personally know very few people who were parented in that way. There is no fault to be found. It reflects the dominant teaching style of most of our modern day cultures; children need to be shown what is wrong with them, so that they will adapt to the tribal mold in which they are expected to fit and function. What arises easily and spontaneously in children is only acceptable in small and early doses. The free and unconditional spirits that are so enchanting early on are soon figuratively and sometimes literally beaten into submission, so that there is a conforming to the world at large. Those who escape or rebel against this programming are ostracized and outcast, and this rejection is woven into the fabric of the unconscious, just as any type of rejection is for all of us. Science tells us that by the time we are four years of age, we have taken in the message that there is something inherently wrong with us. This is the root cause of the pervasive low self esteem that plaques especially western cultures. Then we are told that God is love, and that we are of God, and the paradox of our programming and the theories of the Theo send us into what often is a life time quest to reconcile what ultimately is irreconcilable.



And so learning to love ourselves is indeed the greatest love of all, for without that, we cannot truly experience the loving Essence in which we live. It is not ultimately a love that is experienced as subject to object. That is the great misnomer of religious images. The Universal Source doesn’t love us per se; we are that Love. It is One Love that is containing all. It is the same with self love. As we access the depths of Sourced Love within our sacred hearts, we then may come to contain all of the supposed parts of ourselves in a love that has no need to fix or to correct. The unconditional love that we are here to embody is in and of Itself transformative. That is why it is the greatest love of all. In fact, as rare as it is in human experience, unconditional Love is the only love there really is.



As this is the month that is not only designated as Heart Awareness month, but also contains Valentines Day, perhaps you will join me in allowing the faint strains of that beautiful song to flow through you as you heartfully move through these twenty-eight days; LEARNING TO LOVE YOUR SELF, IT IS THE GREATEST LOVE OF ALL. Unconditional self love will be the transformation of our world. When you truly dwell in love, love will be all you live and give. It is the vibration of Source, and it is the destiny of the sourced. Love whatever arises, and feel your self being lifted to a whole and Holy level of living.

SEE TAYLOR LIVE CALENDAR ON SITE FOR CURRENT EVENTS