Choosing to Live in Love

I'm a very strong-willed woman. I like a good challenge and appreciate efforts being given or shared between individuals. I've lived my fair share of struggles and have learned that not everything in life is "fair" - however now with this new outlook on life, I'm also seeing that some of these struggles were needed to make me who I am today. Also looking back, I might have even incurred some of my "situations" due to where my focus was at that time in my life.

Focus on debt. Result: Get more debt. Lack of finances. Situations where I'm left without money.
Focus on lack of trust. Result: Get lied to. Situations arise where I find my disappointed in someone / something. Frustration and angry towards 'everyone' else cause in my mind, they're all incompetent. 
Focus on struggles. Result: Be exposed to more struggles; bring on drama; get magnetized to troublesome situations (wrong place, wrong time).

Shifting Perspectives

So my new way of 'being' is to shift my focus on what I want vs. what I don't want.
This isn't easy. I know I shouldn't say 'that' since my focus then makes 'this' hard.
This new way of "being" is, just that - it's a new way of being.

What is this way? What am I wanting to be? ...I am looking at living life with 'Love'.
?? What are you talking about, you ask? 
Why, thank you for asking...


I write this blog out of nothing. I have no guideline. Nothing to base myself on - just simply letting my mind be free and allowing this flow of writing come through me. I'm accepting my inner-self to just listen and 'go with it'. So what if it doesn't make sense, if it's really bad - well I just won't post it. ...but what happens if this inner-self actually brings out a message that makes sense? If I choose to never listen, to never allow it to come out - I'm disconnecting myself from 'me'.

When I decided to sit down today, to start writing this blog, this isn't at all the topic I had chosen. I had just had a break-down with my teenagers about putting-in their share of team work / effort for the house duties. I had just finished venting a little too loud and a little too much and was coming in with a focus of writing about the "Boat" story I always tell them. I'll have to leave that one for another time. But once I sat down and refocused, a different message came about and just started flowing through me.

Some people joke around and say that I've completely lost it and there are times where my fear-based mind believes them. This is when I have to stop and refocus. This is what I meant earlier about "this isn't easy". My internal spiritual struggles are just that - internal. At times, I just want to forget this sense of self and just go on my way and live humanly, ignoring my spiritual-connection and pursue life in ignorance. ...but having done this already, repeatedly,  I know that "Love" keeps coming back calling me to stop living this way. As much as I try to pretend its not there - this connection - is there and keeps appearing at various stages of my life making it harder and harder for me to ignore it.

Our world has a tendency to embellish itself with it's human-ways, convincing us that what it has determined as being beautiful, is beautiful; what it has set as "smart" standards is what we all need to evaluate ourselves on; what it views as acceptance, we accept and what it tells us to reject, we push away.Where do these standards come from and why are they the only ones we set to achieve? According to these human-rules if I'm born uncommon and fall under their 'ugly' category and don't meet their educational standards; I'm pretty much doomed to fail. Why would we simply accept that?

For those who don't - I continuously applaud you because you are the strength, the courage, the vision, the truth this world needs. Don't hide behind close doors just because people don't understand or fear you - come out and let them see that "Love" is perfect and that each one of us is just that... "Love". Let those who live in fear... let them run and hide behind close doors.

Let Go and Believe

For me, this new way of being continuously tugs at me and fill-me up with fear-based programming.
Why are you doing this anyways? What are you trying to prove? You're no better than anyone else - who do you think you are? What makes you think you're special? Why even bother with all this, you know it's not going to get you anywhere...

So why do I bother? Because I sincerely believe I'm worth it. I sincerely believe that God (Love) is real and that letting go of control, power, fears, etc - is truly the way of life. It is the journey; that thing that everyone keeps looking for; that feeling we're all wanting; that void we're looking at filling - all of it, it's Love.

Love

Love is acceptance, trust, appreciation, permission, kindness, confidence, honesty, forgiveness, gratefulness, the ability to give, is faith, is to believe... Love is endless.

Everywhere I turn to, when looking for support, to gain better understanding, to collect knowledge - every one at the end of these support lines of communication (counsellors, social workers, physicians, scientists, researchers, etc.) have all turned to "Love".

Numerous authors, speakers, spiritualists, countless others have all documented their experiences and formulations on how living in 'Love' can change your life, ...so what's the worst that could happen? I become a person living life with a spiritual connection, gaining inner-happiness by choosing to see things with a lens of 'Love'? Could it be any worst? ;-)



What does this really mean? What does it mean to my life? Do I have to change? Do I have rules to abide? My answer to myself is: no.

If I have faith and just believe that "Love" will take care of me - that means I have no rules. Remember rules are man-made guidelines to structure a group of people so that control and power can be maintained.

To believe in God, to believe in Love, can't and shouldn't be strenuous.

If my focus is to "serve" and I believe that "serving" is what gets me to God (Love) then my beliefs are what are guiding me and the Universe (God; Love; Karma; Source; whatever you call it) in return responds. As long as I am doing what I want out of the goodness of my heart, and don't expect anything back in return - this is living in "Love".

If making food at a restaurant fills you up with joy and you'd do it for nothing, just simply cause it brings you peace, then this is living in "Love".
If taking photos is your passion, and you'll do whatever it takes to live this life - then this is living in "Love".
If sharing with the world, on a blog, your journey to "Love", and expecting nothing in return - then this is a way of living in "Love".

Whatever it is that brings you that peace, that joy - that's your inner-self calling out to you and saying: "Just go with it and everything will fall into place. Love will take care of you."

Living in Love

Again: Love will take care of you. Wow!

...Are you crazy, Love can't pay the bills. I've got a house, two vehicles, two pre-adults graduating high school in June and another that's just starting a growth spurt (mid-teens). Are you crazy - show me the money!

This is the hard part. This is a prime example of not having that faith. And so I'm telling the Universe - You can't take care of me, I need to do this myself [my focus]. So what am I going to get in return...

Pretty deep, eh?

So that's where I'm at. I'm not saying that having faith means sitting on your favourite chair watching TV waiting for the phone to ring. I'm also not saying that you'll magically walk to the store and find a winning lottery ticket... no what I'm saying (for me) is that having faith means that opportunities will come up allowing changes to occur in your life. You must be open to these changes AND you have to be conscious enough to notice these opportunities and ... to just have faith that it'll all work out.

If your sitting down whining about how everyone else is getting everything and nothing happens to you... then what is it you are focusing on? You're focusing on lack; on greed; on wanting others to suffer because you suffer; whatever the case... just remember that focus (even if you don't want to be focusing on this) is what's going to come back to you (Karma).

It's the Law; New Thought Movement; Law of Attraction, Law of Success, the Universal Law. For years, decades, centuries, ...forever - this has been documented.

You can't change others, you can only change yourself.
You can't change anything, you can only change you - your perspective on things.
Believe that you can change whatever you want - but in the end, if you take a deeper look - you'll notice that you're the one that changed. Your views. Your beliefs. Your perspective. Your feelings.

"When the student is ready, the teach arrives"

We're so caught up in "our" own little worlds that we disconnect from our spirit, choosing to not want to be students anymore. We figure we know everything. We're smart people and we don't need to connect to wishy-washy spiritual-connection stuff.


That fluff is for those yahoos who've gone overboard. And besides if it ends-up being true then I'll just deal with it when I retire. Right now I have to take care of myself and everyone else who needs me. 

...so what happens if you don't make it to retirement? Why choose to live a life of internal misery, worries, fears, and whatnot - who are right now creating cancers, anxieties; diseases inside you.

"For people who are more concerned about being able to pay their next bill than they are with the law of attraction, it's hard to think that keeping a positive attitude will change anything. Louise says that just hearing the ideas behind the law of attraction can help a person begin to make small changes in her life. "When the student is ready, the teacher appears," she says.

Martha says she noticed the law of attraction at work in an unlikely situation—while coaching homeless heroin addicts in Phoenix. Martha says they lived on the street because they couldn't afford apartments. "Then, I found out they were spending an average of $180,000 a year on heroin," she says. When Martha asked how they got the money for their addiction, she saw a change. "They would become completely different when they were talking about the one thing they believed was necessary. And as I've worked with them, I've seen that what they believe and expect is what they get.""
The Oprah Winfrey Show - June 27, 2008: Living the Law of Attraction

Lifetime Commitment 

This is where my choice resides. I don't want to live with what ifs. I'd rather live and learn; take chances; break 'rules' living outside the norm; challenge myself with breaking habits; challenge my beliefs; and choosing to continuously be a student - a student of life. The world is ours to learn and explore. And limiting ourselves to our little safe circle of security and comfort is what's going to get you no where. This is because you choose to live in fear and you allow that fear to consume your every thought. I no longer want to live in fear - I want to live in Love.

I read the following in the book Chicken Soup for the Soul.

This life is a test.
It is only a test.
Had it been an actual life
You would have received
Further instructions on
Where to go and what to do!
[Found on a bulletin board]