Falling into Love; Falling into Self

At the time of this writing I am currently leading a book study on the book True Love by Thich Nhat Hanh. It's a great book. A lot of the book deals with the importance of, and cultivating the ability to, be completely present for the one you love. A very brief synopsis of the book would be to say that the basis of true love is deep understanding. The basis of deep understanding is deep looking or listening. The basis of deep listening is to be present for the one you love. The basis of being present for another is to be present within yourself.

Being present for another sounds so simple. You can say to the one you love, "I'm right here." That in itself is a wonderful thing, but it may or may not help cultivate true love. I may be present but I may not have cultivated the ability to look or listen deeply in order to fully understand who this person is that I feel so much for. I need to not only have the desire, but also the ability to really 'get' this beautiful soul before me. To hear her, to understand her, deeply.

For true love to develop between us I need to be able to support her in bringing forth her authentic self and, equally important, be able to receive her authentic self as it is. This is not to say that there are not challenges or times when her authentic self won't conflict with my authentic self, however that may be showing up at the time. The book gives insight and specific practices to help hold sacred space for each other, towards each other, and together as one, functioning towards a unified goal. Conflict can thereby deepen the connection between us and help facilitate the unfoldment of our authentic selves as individuals.

The authentic self. What exactly is the authentic self? Is there a relative authentic self and an absolute authentic Self? I personally believe that there is. What then is the relative authentic self? This is our self that is shows up authentically but can also show just as authentically, yet completely different, another time. Haven't you felt strongly about something and then some time later felt equally strongly, and completely differently, about the same situation. Unless you are still madly in love with the very first person you ever fell in love with I would say that you have probably had this experience. The relative authentic self. It changes. That is its nature.

I have come to perceive that the relative authentic self is present when one 's thoughts, speech, emotions and actions are all in alignment. In other words you are not feeling one thing and saying and doing something different. Now there are levels of awareness within this authentic self. For instance, you may have had plans to go out when you get a call from a dear friend who is struggling with something and asks that you come over to be with them. You now feel conflicted between really wanting to tend to your own needs and also wanting to respond to a cry for help from a friend.

To access your authentic self you might say to yourself, "Which course of action is the highest expression of myself in this moment?" It very well might be that you know you can go out another night and you choose to be present for your friend. It could equally be that you say to your friend, "I really hear that you are in pain; I get that. Unfortunately I am unable to come by right now. I trust that while you may not be experiencing it at this moment, you do have great inner wisdom and strength that is available to you. I will call you later tonight or tomorrow to check in with you." So if you can be with your friend and not feel resentful, or go out and not feel guilty you probably are being pretty authentic.

When we are being authentic, in our own power, we can really inspire others to rise to that same degree of self truth. I believe it is also a wonderful time of being in deep connection to our soul and our soul's path, the play and display of our unique expression of Spirit.

So what then is the absolute authentic Self and how does true love come into play? It's a great question. One I think we can spend our lifetime opening to. I will be authentic with you now by saying that is one reason I am facilitating this class. So that I may open to a deeper experience and understanding of it myself.

But I will tell you my thoughts of it at this moment. And I will use an analogy to help illustrate it. Lets say that I am a nice little island surrounded by a wonderful, clear, vibrate ocean. I am also surrounded by other small islands all around me. Some of them I really enjoy interacting with, some perhaps not so much, and others I have very neutral interactions with. And lets say that I become aware of one island that really thrills my heart, inspires my mind and moves my soul. Fortunately for me, I have the same affect on her. We are, in fact, deeply in love.

So we become an 'island couple'. We consciously choose to share our 'islandness' with each. To open to each other. To share the journey together. And part of the journey is going beneath the surface of the ocean. As we go deeper we experience each other's depths; that part of our 'islandness' that continues beneath the surface of the ocean. As we go deeper we also experience our own depths. So picture these two islands with their underwater land masses going all the way down to the ocean floor.

As I go deeper, wanting to fully understand and experience this love, I experience deeper and deeper expressions of her underwater 'islandness' and she mine. Sometimes we each get sacred as we may not have ever gone so deep before. Sometimes we come across some scary things. But as we open more deeply to each other we also experience deeper and deeper levels of our own selves.

And what happens when we both get to the bottom of these columns of land mass that we first perceived were just islands? We experience the bedrock, the ocean floor. What happens to all the islands if the ocean were suddenly taken away? The islands open to the absolute authentic Self. There only is one land mass.

The ocean only gave the illusion that there were separate land masses, separate islands, when in fact there was only one. So when my beloved and I come to the bedrock we open, and surrender into, the experience that we are in fact, and had always been, the same absolute, authentic Self, experiencing Itself. We experience each other as ourselves, but this 'self' is that Self that has always been One, whole, complete.

Of course, this analogy, like all analogies, has its limitations and breaks down at some point. In this analogy the island land mass (the relative authentic self) and the bedrock (the absolute authentic Self) are the same. When we open to our true nature we discover that we are not our thoughts, our emotions, our self-concepts, etc. In other words, those are the tools of the relative authentic self, ones that we easily identify ourselves with, yet are completely different than the absolute authentic Self. When we open fully to the absolute authentic Self duality does not exist.

It also is important to note that one does not need to find a true love to make this journey. The journey of remembering can happen completely independently of joining with another. Just as an island can move it's awareness down from the surface to the bedrock without needing another island. The main reason for this is because, I believe, there really is only one 'land mass' here. The experience of this 'Oneness' is the same, regardless of the unfolding.

It becomes then a personal choice, this journey of remembering. To make this journey alone or with another. But either way the journey is the same for the awakening of Love within one's self happens as we make the journey, even though there really is no journey. Whether another is involved or not, Love awakens and it experiences self and others as the same. And what a delightful, sweet, sacred, non-journey journey it is. This journey of falling into love and falling into Self.

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