by Kate Joyner
Today is the day we celebrate love with our intimate partners. I love it.
I’m a mystic. All of my poems are about the heartbreaking encounter with love. I love any excuse to celebrate love. I fall in love so easily, I’ve been known to fall for a lamp post.
Even though I’m not in relationship, I still love this day. It’s a beautiful, sacred tradition.
But, people, here is the thing, Valentine’s Day is too small…..
and here’s why….
First of all,
one day out of 365 to celebrate love? Really, is that it?
I don’t know about you, but my mystic self would be very unhappy if she had to spend the other 364 days waiting to celebrate love.
We need to celebrate love every-single-day. Love is the force that moves the planet.
And when we look around in our world, it’s in the absence of love, that we see so much unconscious hatred, scapegoating, war and violence…..
We need to wake up every single morning, cultivate the love within and then celebrate….
(And when I talk about love, I’m not talking about the pretty pink fluffy love. I’m talking about beyond duality love. About taking in the light and the dark and loving it all, kind of love. That each person is a mirror to your own soul and when we drop the defenses, there is just love, kind of love.)
We need to tend our wounds so deeply, until we realize that in our own brokenness, is the door way back to our own love….
This is the kind of love we need to celebrate, every-single-day.
Second,
another way to small point about Valentine’s day is that you need to be in relationship to celebrate Valentine’s day. (And if you’re not you get down in the dumps about not having a partner)…
Way to small……why?
Because the love that you are looking for is inside of you.
No one can give you the love that you don’t already know in your own soul.
There is nothing more painful than the journey back to love.
That’s why most people don’t even go there. They wait for some prince charming or princess perfect to come along to give them what they don’t have inside….
Big mistake….
This is where it all goes wrong!
The journey back to love start’s on the inside of every single one of us. And when we come back, when we find that place within our souls, that’s when we can truly love another.
The journey back to love is the most painful one that exists. Why? Because you have to meet every single place where you’ve erred from love.
The demons inside that have kept you away from love are dark and hairy and scary.
Your heart will crack into a million pieces, over and over again.
Who in their right mind would want to embark on such a journey?
Maybe you feel the emptiness of not embarking on the journey? I know I did.
I got to my late 20’s and I was so unsatisfied with the outworn models of male and female relating. I hit an existential crisis wall and I went searching.
My focus turned from the external need for love and approval to the internal sourcing of my own love.
Each time I broke an internal wall, I reclaimed something that was mine all along.
I became more whole. I realized that I was the one responsible for creating my own reality, not anyone else.
When you reclaim your own love, there is no limits to this love.
It’s as big as the universe. It cannot be contained. It can’t be held back. You can move mountains with this love.
So, is this painstaking journey worth it?
Hell yes. It’s worth every moment in the inferno. You even begin to love hell.
Which takes me to my third point:
When you know a love like this, loving another is only one expression.
The magnitude of your love can be poured into an intimate relationship with a partner, but it doesn’t stop there. This kind of love is so deep and so vast – it’s all-encompassing and even reaches for the stars.
Share it with the birds and the trees. Share it with a homeless person and with people who have never known love before.
Become the love that you have sought.
Radiate it from your being so that those who pass you by become intoxicated at just the sight of you. Love so freely, that you forget where you end and the other begins.
When you love like this you dissolve the walls of separation and the whole world becomes your lover.
(To be clear, I’m not talking about a co-dependent, boundary-less kind of love, because that isn’t really love, it’s unmet need. I’m taking about being so full with your own love, that just by being, you’re sharing it).
So, today, let’s celebrate love, in it’s fullest degree.
Even if you have a partner, go buy yourself some roses today. Don’t wait for others to pamper you. If they do, bonus, you’ve got two bunches.
If you don’t have a partner, after having roses, go put on your finest dress and take yourself out for dinner.
Don’t wait to feel love from another. Evoke it every single day of your existence, through the cells of your body and your bursting open heart.
Go into nature and give your love to the wild.
Sing to a tree, make offerings to the flowers, dance with the birds.
Even if you’re shy, especially if you’re shy, do it anyway.
And most of all, even if you’re heartbroken, even if you’ve suppressed your capacity to love again, find a way to break open, just a little, and never stop loving, yourself first.
Know that your heartbreak is the source of your deepest love.
Feel it in its most tender and sore spot. Meet it with care and compassion. Give it time and space to heal. Pain can be alchmized into love, beauty and strength.
Give it a go.
About the Author:
featured image – source
Merken