“A thousand candles can be lit by a single candle and yet not diminish the first candle’s light.

Happiness is never diminished by being shared.”

-Buddha

REFLECTIONS

Unbuttoning the Virgo this past week, has been exhilarating! On several occasions I abandoned my need for purposeful encounters and just had fun…I spent time with others accomplishing nothing, just being! I went out to dance with no expectation other than the sensation of dancing. Yes, it’s true…I left the couch this past Saturday night! I drove myself, in the dark, to a bar with a band, and danced with wild abandon…with women…no men were asking and I didn’t care! I just wanted to dance! I also went on a date with a good looking man and had a mindless time. This is Virgo Unbuttoned!

 I am bubbling with enthusiasm, like a child who comes rushing in from playing, panting, tripping over words, describing the wonderment of an innocuous event. I feel as excited as I did when I was 6 and discovered an ant carrying a cake crumb I had dropped, that was bigger than its own body.

Amazing Ant!

My first conscious experience of exuberance happened while doing a 10 day hike to Takakkaw Falls in the Canadian Rockies. It was unusual for me to do such an arduous hike, let alone carry most of my own things.(note in photo that the guys packs are ‘slightly’ bulkier than mine) But it was not unusual for me to be with 2 men, neither of whom I was involved with, but each wishing they could be that special guy! My Mother always reminded me that my favourite pastime as a child was playing house…problem being that I never stopped…I have felt like a doll being placed in various positions and situations…with no apparent will of my own.

But I had one moment on this hike that was different. Early one morning, in an unexpected act of independence, I walked to the edge of a waterfall, and showered under it. The exuberance I experienced from the extremely cold water and the opulence of my view, created a spiritual awakening. I was jolted into the present moment, no longer observing my life from a safe distance. Although unable to describe why this moment was so monumental, I knew I had experienced something new. 

Spiritual Awakening at Takakkaw Falls

Me, with David and Bob

2 decades later, when I began Jungian analysis, this experience was my reference point for what I wanted to achieve. I had clung to this intense and thrilling moment knowing that if it could happen once, it could happen twice. I begged my analyst to help me. I was exhausted from years of playing house, living with muted emotion…being remote, removed and repressed. I told her that my only palpable emotion came from a daily re-creation of the waterfall, where I would be jolted alive,  into exuberance, under a 3 minute blast of cold water in the shower. Self induced shock therapy! The title of my Week 4 of 52, post(July 30 2012) was Changing My Fun Factor. Interesting to note that the ‘intention’ to have fun took 4 months to become integrated.

Exuberance, that’s what I’m looking for in a cold shower!

During the past 2 weeks I have been doing Deepak Chopra’s 21 Day Meditation Challenge, Creating Abundance. I was particularly drawn to the message of day 9, Abundance and the Law of Giving, because it resembled my efforts to be altruistic in Week 3 of 52, Changing My Expectations of Love. Back in the summer, I realized that I was attached to the outcome of my generosity. I expected what I received to balance what I gave…specific to each person and situation. If I brought wine for dinner, I expected reciprocity. Constant monitoring took time, created resentment and in fact MISSED THE POINT of the Law of Giving. The natural world is sustained in a flow of abundance, a perpetual process of giving and receiving. An apple tree absorbs sunlight, nutrients and water and in response produces delicious fruit. The point that I missed was that neither the sun, nor the soil, nor the cloud that willingly gave up what they held in abundance, ate the apple they helped produce. They did not look at the tree and say, “Hey, I gave to you, what are you giving me?” There are no hoarders in the natural world. The sun, cloud and soil were not diminished by giving to the tree, and were restored by other natural processes in our abundant world.

Bountiful Universe, a continual flow of giving and receiving!

So I have been experimenting this past week. I want to be loved for the woman that I am, so I will offer love to each and every person I encounter for the person that they are…right then. I intentionally did not hoard my love. So back to my date with Mr Handsome. It was readily apparent to me that he and I had very differing views on everything from personal transformation to compassion to the sharing of one’s wealth. In the past I would have felt spiritually superior, which would have expressed itself in obsequious flattery, or subtle derision and denigration. To my surprise and delight I had 5 hours of simple fun. I shared my perspective without judgment of his, which allowed me to be a loving presence. I did not worry if I received love back, believing that in adding love to the Unified Field, I was creating an undulating flow in my environment, that would sooner or later grace me with love.

ASPIRATIONS FOR WEEK 20 of 52

CHANGING FROM SCARCITY TO ABUNDANCE

I have had the best week ever! Is this because I have tapped into the Unified Field of Abundance? From this vantage point, I believe that giving joy, does not deplete me of my joy, giving a gift does not deplete me of my material resources, giving love does not deplete me of love…in being free to give while remaining open to receive,  I join the undulating flow that is our Universe.

So for Week 20 of 52, I will continue to to offer that which I want to receive.

Offering the love I want to receive

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