Love And The Fragility Of Relationships
Lyratah Barrett
When I was younger, I had an idealistic view of love, relationships, and life. I thought love was constant, unconditional, no matter what. I still believe this is true on some dimension or frequency.
I believed that once united, through friendship or family, the bonds of that unit, that love remains. Needless to say, one can imagine my disappointment when life’s experiences showed me how untrue my beliefs were, especially when responsible for causing the distress that others experience through careless actions or thoughtless words. I’ve come to wonder just what is it that lingers, if anything, in relationships among us?
Our lives are filled with those whom we have known, loved, and appreciated for periods of time, whose disappearance is caused by a move, a change of activity, a different mental focus, a breakup, or death.
As life happens, so do those with whom we interact. Some have left an impact on me that will last forever.
The deeper connections are with those from our tribe or ashramic group. An ashram, being a group of souls who come into this world to work on a particular focus. We connect with those who are a part of an ashramic externalization for a particular mission. The ashramic connection spans lifetimes. Through our ashram, we connect with our own inner note, our purpose for being, and the work we are here to do in a lifetime. I am sensing, in the light of recent events, that one of the larger issues that humanity is here to work on is racism and human equity in many ways.
We Are One
My sense of connection has expanded in this life to include humanity. I know our true brotherhood; we are all kindred spirits; one soul in diverse forms. I feel our inner need for love, respect, compassion, understanding, appreciation, and sharing. I know we are forged from love and exist through and by love. Those basics define us all on this planet.
It is my life’s goal to eradicate the feeling of difference, alienation, the illusion that separates and imprisons us in fear. Every day, energetically and demonstrably, I reach out to others to say I see you, recognize you, and know you as me. We are comrades in this place we call home. If I can make others know how important they are, I feel I have done some aspect of the work.
As we relate, our egos bump up against each other, creating joy, laughter, fun and also creating misunderstandings, disconnections, emotional shutting down, polarity, distancing, and separation. To maintain openness, stay with love and respect, harmony, appreciation, and understanding; still working things out is the goal.
We’ve heard that famous saying by Geoffrey Chaucer, “Familiarity breeds contempt.” It’s true. Think about it. In most cases, we exhibit our best behavior when we first meet. Through experience, do we not learn to live above the fray? Do we not learn to resist being pulled down into the quagmire of the astral/emotional, or get lost in the illusion of fighting against otherness? Don’t we realize that when we disagree, see someone as an opponent or other, we are fighting an aspect of ourselves?
We are at a point in history where dark forces attempt to separate and divide us. This force, presently working through the political arena, is trying to fool us into antagonism with those who don’t believe as we do. It is attempting to have us take sides. This force, representing the end of the Kali Yuga**, is worldwide. This is why there is no place not in some aspect of turmoil. It seeks to weaken in order to control. Bob Marley said; “united we stand, divided we fall, one and all.” It seeks to divide and conquer.
This emotional goop in which we are living is falsely created to present as real. It is a programing we cannot allow. We are in a war for Truth. This Programmation has to be prevented in every way we can with everything that we have. Our world depends on it.
Find the Middle Way
The Truth is, separation is a false construct. Separation only lives in the minds of those not knowing that we are love and that we are one.
Separation lives in the minds of those who want to have power over others. It is part of an old system still struggling to survive. Through it, we find opposition seeping into everything we try to create. Our job is to transmute and overcome the opposition as it manifests itself. We find the middle way or point: a smile, a hello, through service to those in need, by using your expertise to tutor, through sitting with the elderly, rocking a newborn in a hospital, serving in food kitchens, using your artistry, telling a story if you are a storyteller. Using your gift of gab, comedy, or writing, you name it, and find a vehicle to share with others. Your talent, your gift is needed by others.
Humanity is slowly learning to love. We inherently love; we are love and live and exist in love. Though invisible, it is all around us, and more importantly, within us. We live and breathe it all the time. It is in nature. Each of the three lower kingdoms (mineral, plant, and animal) symbolize and manifest the love energy to us when we take time to look.
Allow love to be in sole control of you and your environment. It is a galvanizing, transformative force. Radiate it out to our world, even to those who seek to limit and control us. Allow it to echo from you. Let’s work together on becoming catalysts of love for our environment. It will work out exponentially from wherever we are. The more who join in, the more who are affected will result in a tipping point. Realize that as we work to be love, to represent love in everything we do, we do not do so alone. We are supported by the unseen worlds and energies.
Let’s take note of what we allow to enter into our being. Who are you listening to; what are you seeing and hearing? That includes your own thoughts.
Love transforms everything. Love is not pushy, braggadocious nor unkind. Real love expects nothing in return. When and if your love reservoir appears to dry and you need nurturing, here are a few ways to do that:
- Walks in nature, brooks, streams, trees, gardens and plants, canoeing, oceans, seas and lakes, the heavens itself
- Listening to birds, walking a nature path
- Meditation, meditation, meditation
- For some, their happy place may be painting or re-decorating a room.
You get it. Find what nourishes you.
Lessons come in many forms, from the work environment, our partners, our children, our neighbors, our siblings, each showing us an aspect of our shadow that we don’t see but need to work with. Lessons can happen anywhere: while sitting on the bus, while navigating in your car, it can be your best friend or an abuser, anywhere we live and exist. If we can begin to see these events like the teaching moments from the Soul, something to deepen growth, help us to evolve, then every moment takes on greater meaning. Ask yourself what is the lesson here and how best to handle it?
Growth happens through the crucible of daily experiences. It is a luxury to miss the patterns of life’s events, to think they are disjointed moments, having no relationship to each other, or that events simply come by chance. When we awaken to realize that we are here to fulfill a purpose, we are then beginning to connect the dots.
A well-known sage once said, “The goal of all development is integration – integration as a personality, integration with the soul, integration into the Hierarchy, integration with the Whole, until complete unity and identification has been achieved.”**
Our planet is conscious, integrated, and whole. Humanity, and all the kingdoms, are a part of our planet’s consciousness. Everything is seamless. Unfortunately, our vantage point is limited. We are unable to see the whole.
As once was said, we need only to shift our perspective, change the aperture of our lens in order to see life more clearly. That is our work.
End Notes
**Kali Yuga: In Hinduism, Kali Yuga (Sanskrit: कलियुग, romanized: kaliyuga, lit. ‘age of Kali’) is the last of the four stages (or ages or yugas) the world goes through as part of a ‘cycle of yugas’ (i.e. mahayuga) described in the Sanskrit scriptures. The other ages are called Satya Yuga, Treta Yuga, and Dvapara Yuga.
**Esoteric Healing by Alice Bailey
