Love vs Care

Love and caring for someone are often used synonymously, but I want to introduce a new definition in which they are actually opposites. Really, I'm just using these words to express ideas, but words are handy things given that's how we communicate.

Love is a pure, unconditional feeling. Love is the energetic expression of appreciation and wonder for the beauty of a person; for their personal Godliness. It is in the untwisted delight in the mannerisms and supposed imperfections that make Joe uniquely Joe and give Jill her Jill-ness. Love has no sense of time, no agenda, no momentum or inertia. It simply is: a flowing of energy from one person to another. Love allows us to fully and totally trust others to live their lives as they need to, for themselves and not for us.

Caring for someone is the root of care-taking. Caring is a perversion of love: caring comes with message, an agenda, something to accomplish. Caring is needing Holly to find a way out of her unstable relationship or wanting Dan to stop talking to himself when he walks outside. Out intentions may very well stem out of wanting what is best for someone, but in caring we forget that we don't know what is best for someone else. Caring leads to meddling and invasion and evasion. caring is the word we use to make it sound ok that we have agendas for people, and that we need for them to act and react in certain ways to gain our full approval.

Caring for someone and loving them are opposites. Love is genuine acceptance and appreciation, and having the complete trust in another person to know and do what is best for themselves. Caring for someone is having a need for them to change or have a particular experience and influencing them, however subtly, in that direction. Caring is harmful and can lead to the destruction of another's psyche if practiced too intensely, too often, or by too many people. While love is a wonderful thing, caring is to be avoided at all costs.

Power v/s Empowered

There's been days when I have been just an amazing person. I've been comfortable and loving and gone for my wants and been of service and just everything. And then the next day, or even that night, I freak out and do something that brings me down, like judge myself for an action or thought I usually wouldn't or something equally silly. And today I realized why I was so scared of being empowered.
I was confusing power with being empowered. Power means being able to change situations and people but maybe making mistakes and messing things up (see George W.). I've been really afraid of that, of power: of having influence and responsibility.
Empowered is a lot the same, in terms of having influence, but you get that influence through love; unconditional love. Love first means you can never screw up. So its awesome to feel good and be good when you are empowered because everything you do... everything I do... will be perfect. There is nothing to fear from being empowered, and everything to look forward to.

Yes! Thank you!

I've been looking backwards while moving forwards. Let's have an example, shall we...
I have a goal: becoming a certified child facilitator. I've been using worry and discomfort to move toward that goal. I make a mistake or do something not-so-effective in the playroom, and then I spend my energy looking back at that moment to motivate myself to go forward. And it does work. But... that means that as I move forward, I'm constantly looking back. Try that sometime... you stumble, you trip, you wander off the path. Its so much more effective to look forward; to be motivated by the gorgeous scenery of where I want to be. Once in a while it doesn't hurt to take a look back, but in general backwards is not an effective method of locomotion.
When someone gives me feedback, I have decided to see it as a hand reaching from the scenery of my goals and wants. Rather than getting feedback and thinking "oh damn, I messed up again" I will think of it as a gift and say "Yes! Thank you!" I will grab that hand of feedback and use it to pull myself forward instead of worrying about it to use it as a push from behind.
Forward!!!

oragami

We are all beautifully colored pieces of paper: we have infinite possibilities to become anything we want to be. Inherent in what we are is the ability to be anything at anytime. We are nothing and in being nothing, we are everything.
We like to trick ourselves though. We fold ourselves into a shape, maybe a crane. We think the shape of a crane will get us what we want: a job, a friend. But eventually we forget that we are nothing and everything and believe that we are a crane. We don't think we can become anything else.
The trick is to remember that whatever shape we take, its all a game. We are a piece of paper pretending to be a crane. We are a spiritual being pretending to be a physical one. We are a happy and joyful person pretending to be sad or angry or hurt, because we believe it will get us what we want. Which is fine and smart and good, as long as we remember what we really are.

Unity

Wow, what a really amazing day. Know that for this post, I use the words God and Universe to mean the same thing.
I had a talk with Fritz on Sunday night, a dialogue with Julie today at lunch, and a yoga class this evening. They all conspired so that I had a huge realization.
The realization is that I understand unity. See, we really are all just one big creature. Like lots of little cells, called people, with semi-permeable membranes so we only let in what we want to. Connected by this plasma/blood stuff called air. What that means is that when good happens for one of us, good happens for all of us. You can't improve the health of your heart without improving the health of your liver and lungs and kidneys as well. So as long as I am doing what is truly an authentically good for me, I am helping everyone around me and everyone around them, and around them... by helping myself I am helping the entire organism called Earth. Sometimes it looks like hurt or sadness or anger, but the Universe has a huge unimaginably complex plan that is so far beyond me all I can do is trust it. Whatever happens for anyone is what is meant to happen for everyone because really we are all just one big Universe, all of us together.
And as cells in the Universe, we are also completely self-reliant. We have everything we need inside of ourselves, just as cells have their independent nuclei and cytoplasm and other things I can't remember from fifth grade science. It is good and fun and amazing to be a part of the beautiful whole, but it is also good and fun and amazing to supply all of our own needs. Whichever method of fulfillment suits us best at the time is the best for everyone at that time.
God is truly Most Glorious!

I also used to have a belief that I wasn't able to figure out what is good for me. But I now have solid evidence that I can. There was a volunteer at Option who I felt uncomfortable around, and so I made a conscious decision not to become close to him, although he was pushing for that and in the past I would have ignored my discomfort and felt that I "should" be his friend. Today I found out that the reason he left Option suddenly was because he had been seriously inappropriate with a female staff member. I had an intuition, followed it, and totally took care of myself! This evidence that I can and will take care of myself is huge for me! Its further proof that as a cell in the Universe I really do have all that I need.

I love you all, my fellow cells!

New Assignments

First new assignment: where I live. This gorgeous place on the river has been so very perfect for my first year here, but it's time for me to move on. It's too expensive, too far from work, and too isolated from my friends and coworkers (most of which, ironically, is why it was so perfect for the beginning of my time here). I'm moving to a not-nearly-so-cool apartment in Great Barrington. It still has amazing views, just not involving the river. There's a cool spot of river that's nearby though. It's also about 20 minutes from work, versus a 40 minute drive from where I am now. It's very near town and a grocery store too. Its a one bedroom instead of a studio, and I am looking forward to having separate sleeping and living areas. It's also significantly cheaper than where I am now. Fritz will be my roommate at the new place, but we have it worked out so we have almost completely separate space: we will even have our own entrances.

Second new assignment: I am doing a minimum of 5 dialogues per week for 8 weeks. I just completed week 2. Its an amazing assignment! I sent an email to everyone I could think of who does dialogues. I am getting some from some pretty big-time mentors and teachers around Option, and it's been amazing. My beginning topic is always to be something around expressing emotion, but dialogues go to a lot of unexpected places. The teacher who assigned it to me said to think of it as a blast off: it takes a lot of energy to get out of the atmosphere (like 5 dialogues a week) but once you are there you only need to make course adjustments, you don't need a huge thrust again.

In unassigned news, my new way of eating is really good for me. I tried to eat a lovely chocolate cake the other day and.... I didn't like it. I was momentarily depressed, but then realized how wonderful it is. I still crave the feeling I used to get from eating things like chocolate cake, but I've created a new belief that melon is my treat. So I don't buy melon regularly; I treat it as an occasional special treat food. That's been working really well for me, though I will admit to a certain yearning in my salivary glands when I see a chocolate filled croissant.
I'm loving spring here: everything is all shiny and green and new. It inspires me to be shiny and green and new as well.

It's a really exciting time to be me!

Something

Something, something, something, but I don't know what, feels like its missing. When I'm productive and doing things I feel good. When I don't have something I'm working on, like on weekends when nothing is planned and no projects need doing, I don't feel good. I know, I have to relax and stuff to have energy or whatever. But I feel restless and unsatisfied. Like right now, I'm only posting to have something to do that has some kind of result. Some time soon I think I'm going to have to look at this.