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.
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