My testimony

I feel the need today to write my testimony out; perhaps more for my own benefit and evidence of gratitude than anything, but perhaps it can benefit/uplift someone else in the process or down the road. So here goes:

THINGS I KNOW:

#1- I Know that God is Love (1 John 4)

#2- I Know that the way we show we are disciples of God is through our Love towards all around us and through our willingness to be obedient to the commands and counsels of God to both direct our own lives as well as to serve, uplift, bless, and help bring others unto salvation.

#3- I Know that God is in all and through all things. I Know that it is His Spirit that Gives Us Life, Light, Love, Joy- Health, Strength, Clarity of Mind, and Peace.

#4- I Know that our Greatest and most Painful Trials are specifically calculated to bring our souls to being able to receive forever our Greatest and most Significant Joys (aka- salvation!). They do not look like it or seem like it in the process, but they are God's Greatest Evidences of Love for us. I Know that without them we could not receive our salvation.

#5- I Know that there are 'many mansions' in the Kingdom of God, and I Know that there is one that has been prepared for me. I Know that the joy and peace and Love therein is beyond my greatest capacity to understand. And I Know that as I am obedient, as I repent for disobedience, and call out upon God and Christ for mercy, His Atoning Blood will come in and make it possible for me to get there.

#6- I Know that No One (..ah, tears)... NO ONE... is Fallen So Far or Rebelled Against God So much that they cannot call out to Him in Faith to be Redeemed. The road may not be easy and the price will not be cheap, but I Know that AS we turn from disobedience and unto obedience we will *immediately* feel God's hand Lifting us with His Grace. We will not deserve it; we will Know we do not deserve it. And we will be astounded at the manifestation of God's abundant mercy and Love towards us.

#7- I Know that while 'man looketh on the outward appearance, God looketh on the heart.' I Know that this life is the proving point to reveal to us what and where our hearts really are. Are they set upon selfishness and the 'lusts' of the world? Or are they set upon God- are they set upon Love?  When it really comes down to it, stock comes to barrell- Which do we choose?

#8- I Know that even if we have chosen wrong before, the choice is always ours to begin choosing God and Love over selfishness, pride, and lust. I Know that as we call out to God to change our hearts, to help us to choose 'the better part', His grace will cover us and lift us where we cannot manage on our own.

#9- I Know that "Perfect Love" "casteth out All fear;"  "He that feareth is not made perfect in Love."

#10- I Know that God allows us to make mistakes because He loves us. I Know that He gives to us our agency and while He may warn or indicate danger to us, the choice is ours whether we will act in line with what He wants or whether we will do what we want instead. I Know that Even the mistakes we make/ have made will be consecrated for our good and the good of others when we choose to  start making steps towards God instead.

#11- I Know that the Holy Ghost testifies of All Truth. It sees things 'as they were, as they are, and as they are to come'. I Know that as we continue in obedience and call upon Christ in faith we can receive personal witnesses and revelations from God through the Spiritual Power of The Holy Ghost as to these same things: 'things as they were, as they are, and as they are to come.' (Jacob 4:13, Mosiah 5:3-4).

#12- I Know that God is the force for All Good within this world. It is man that destroys, destructs, hinders, and hurts. It is God who heals, uplifts, forgives, redeems, sanctifies, and blesses. It is God who teaches us to do good. Who gives to us all gifts of intellect, spirit, or physical agility which we have. All talents, All languages, All capacity to understand and formulate them as well as other things that promote and uplift society and unite men together are Sourced from God.

#13 I Know that it is God who unites, and Satan who seperates.

#14. I Know that Jesus Christ Lives. I Know that HE IS The Way, The Truth, and The Life. HE IS our redemption. Without Him we are dead.

#15: I Know that The Restored Church of Jesus Christ is on the earth today. I Know That He stands at its head and directs its affairs, and that through Him the authority to bless and act in God's name has been given again to man. I Know that these powers can 'only be controlled and maintained upon the principles of righteousness: ....long-suffering, and love-unfeigned.' And I Know that as we consecrate ourselves to the Lord's work, call out upon His name in Faith that we 'might be saved, not through the righteousness of the law but through the righteousness that is of faith' that we will be able to perform miracles in His name and call down blessings(/cursings) from heaven.

#16- I Know that Faith is the first principle of the Gospel. That Repentance is the second. That Baptism by immersion for the remission of sins is the third and that then the laying on of hands by those who are in authority for the gift of the Holy Ghost is the fourth.

#17- I Know that as we act in obedience to the promptings of the Holy Ghost, to our baptismal covenants, and the commandments and counsels of God as communicated to us directly as well as through His words to others who have gone before us in the scriptures, that as we endure our trials well- That is, continue to be obedient, repent, and call upon God throughout them, through  the process of time we can experience a second baptism- The baptism of fire. This baptism not only washes away sin; it purifies it completely out of us. It sancitifies and seals us God's. And many more blessings pertain to it as well.

#18- I Know that God loves His children, 'nevertheless, i do not know the meaning of all things.' I Know that He hears and answers prayers of His obedient children who are striving to do all they Know is right. I Know that any question, any trial, any heartache, any ailment, sickness, disease, hurt, pain, can be answered by Him if we will put forth the spiritual work to be able to obtain it. I Know that the works of God are deep, and 'the depth thereof no man knows'. Each of us cannot here and now know All, But I Know that each of us can Know what we need to Know for ourselves, if we will call upon Him in Faith.

#19- I Know that Jesus Christ Loves Me. I Know that He has Redeemed Me; He has snatched (and continues to snatch) My soul from the bitterness of hell; He has released me from fear. And I Know, perhaps most importantly, That I Cannot Serve Him on my own; I Know that I am dependent upon Him. I am learning what is meant by 'the depths of humility'. I am praying for my soul to be fused into His and to have all evidence and will of 'me' taken and burned away. I am poison. I am destruction. Christ IS Life. To be sanctified, blessed, uplifted by the Fire of His Love and His Redeeming Grace is my daily goal towards which I hope to be inching closer in each moment.

#20- I Know that as a disciple of Christ it is up to me to share my testimony of Him and of the salvation we can gain from Him with the world. And I Know that as we serve and uplift and comfort those around us we open the doors to being able to ministers to them of that same joy and Love which we ourselves Know and Feel. :).

Let Go and Let God

LET GO AND LET GOD

As children bring their broken toys,
with tears for us to mend,
I brought my broken dreams to God,
because He was my friend.
But then instead of leaving Him in
peace to work alone,
I hung around and tried to help,
with ways that were my own.
At last, I snatched them back and cried,
"How can you be so slow?"
"My child" He said, "What could I do?
You never did let go."

                -Lauretta P. Burns

The part I love about this poem is the distinction of just what it is we need to let go of in order for God to help us in bringing about fulfillment of our deepest desires.. and that is, our own ways.

This is a very important distinction. The moment we "snatch [our own ways] back" is the moment we allow God to work within us and teach us and direct our steps as we move our feet.

Which brings to mind another poem:

"With thoughtless and impatient hands


We tangle up the plan


The Lord hath wrought.


And when we cry in pain He saith,


“Be quiet, man, while I untie the knot.”




How many times in our lives do we refuse to let go of our own ways so that God's ways can come in and heal us instead? And what's worse? We blame the brokenness on Him! When He is the one working constantly to undo the tangled knot we've tied by holding onto our own fallen ways over His omniscient, omnipotent ones to begin with.

We somehow think drawing out our own map from what we know and can see, and filling in the details with guesses on what we can't by stumbling along is better than tapping into the satellite of God and being guided by His GPS system! How foolish! Why are we holding onto "broken toys" and "our own ways" when God, the master physician can heal or soothe any pain and has technologies we've never even dreamed of and can teach us how to receive- and appreciate and Love the Greater things which He has for us by following His ways?

I Know that as we "Let Go" of our own ways and "Let God" 's ways in instead, we will find the Peace that He has promised us within the scriptures. A peace that surpasses all understanding;  and Grants unto us the Power to be able to patiently endure the process of time required for God to untie the knot we've all tangled one another up inside of by holding onto our own ways over His. 


"Faith is not the belief that God will do what you want. It is the belief that God will do what is right." - Max Lucado

"We must seek first to Know God's will, and then we can seek to do it." -Unknown


"Trust in the Lord with all thy heart and LEAN not unto thine own understanding; in all thy ways acknowledge Him and He Shall direct your paths." - Prov 3:5

"What you and I might rate as an absolute disaster, God may rate as a pimple-level problem that will pass. He views your life the way you view a movie after you've read the book. When something bad happens, you feel the air sucked out of the theater. Everyone else gasps at the crisis on the screen. Not you. -Why? You've read the book. You know how the good guy gets out of the tight spot. God views your life with the same confidence. He's not only read your story...he wrote it. " -Max Lucado

Peace I leave with you; my peace I give to you. Not as the world gives do I give to you. Let not your hearts be troubled, neither let them be afraid. -John 14: 27

Fret not about anything, but in everything, by prayer and supplication with thanksgiving, let your requests be made known unto God.
   
 And the peace of God, which passeth all understanding, shall keep your hearts and minds through Christ Jesus. -Phillipians 4: 6-7

 
 

The Miracle of Love

So, we have The Matrix of the Heart;

And we have the Law of Attraction which draws out the Realities of the heart, and brings us into contact within the context of that matrix with those who can help us identify the strengths and weaknesses and conditions of our heart, and then accept, reject, or appropriately adjust them from there.

And often times the circumstances brought about to help us do so are not entirely to our liking;

One of those experiences for me called out the dissonance I had created within my own heart to cage it up as tightly as I could, so as to prevent rejection and pain I had endured previously  in allowing it to be shared freely. For a long time (l.o.n.g.g.g.g.g.g.g.time) prior to this experience, this was the case with me; I had been conditioned by various things in my environment to believe that I would not be understood and that it was better to Keep back what was in my heart to protect myself from the pain of having it be rejected than to share it freely.

Each STEP I've taken out of this and with HOPE in the BELIEF (<--- which, btw, that is the formula of faith right there) that instead I might be loved for it has brought me a step closer into being able to secure relationships with those I've seen similarities of the heart in, but who could not recognize them within me because the cage I had built up so well would not even give them the opportunity.

This seems easy enough, but for me it was not (hell, even still it IS not) easy at all; I've kept back my heart for fear of feeling that crushingly painful blow of outright rejection of 'who you really are' by the people I wish to be accepted by most.

I used to look at the world in that state I was in and think everybody else was better than me Somehow because they knew how to get out of that fear and Just be open with people; (I'm finding more and more that that also is a generalization and more often than not a fallacy- but that's another post for another time). With me it didn't matter how hard I tried, or how badly I cared about someone or wanted something, time and time again I would revert back to that protective state. You talk about having built walls up; I'd built up a fortress.

In typing that now I realize Even more how much The Law of Attraction has been present in my life... You build up a fortress, and you attract and are attracted to others who have done the same. You wish to get out of it, but your own walls are holding you prisoner... Your army is turned inward on yourself: That is your protection... The threat is You reaching out to someone else, Anyone else who is new; who you might stand the same chance of experiencing that Same Pain all over again with;  You built the fortress so well that nobody from the outside could Ever manage to get in at all...UNLESS you for some reason unwittingly walked up and let them in.


So, here's the miracle of Love: Somehow that fortress which you have so painstakingly erected and dutifilly protected against all enemies- even against your own enemy of wanting to let somebody love you, and let yourself love them, Somehow, it turns into wax and Love's warmth melts it down. And you are convoluded; 'how did You get in?' And though you may resist and fight against it when you first recognize it- that desperate, futile last attempt to reassemble the now melted wax of your soul back up into your own Fort Knox-,  before you know it you are CONSCIOUSLY calling upon your personally-trained-and-tried-against-EVERYTHING-by-your-subconscious NAVY SEAL type army to stand down and Let You let this person in!

And somehow that is what you begin to Love about them; They had to have some kind of special key, or knowledge, or mystery of some sorts, hidden Even to you, to be able to accomplish such a remarkable thing(You find yourself WANTING- against all logic and past experience and anticipation of forthcoming pain- to trust them); Some kind of heaven-sent, touched-by-the-hand-of-God-Himself whateveritis... And you revere them;

...And I stare at this page with tears in my eyes because there is nothing more that I can say without diminishing it;


"The problem with building walls around your heart is that the higher you build them, the harder you fall when someone finally tears them down. "

The matrix of the heart

Lately I've had this idea kind of brewing, or kind of being brought up to me in different circumstances, and then settling into me of our world- everything we see, being nothing more than a matrix of what exists hiding in one way or another our true natures and understanding of Truth.

Robert Browning penned the following:


"Truth is within ourselves, it takes no rise
From outward things, whate’er you may believe.
There is an inner centre in us all
Where truth abides in fullness; and around
Wall upon wall the gross flesh hems it in
That perfect, clear perception which is Truth.
A baffling and perverting carnal mesh
Binds all and makes all error, but to know
Rather consists in finding out a way
For the imprisoned splendour to escape
Than in achieving entry for a light
Supposed to be without."


I think he said it there in those few lines better than I could in a few paragraphs. So, rather than trying to define what I mean by matrix, I will let that suffice and instead expand upon my thoughts on the reality of and the purpose of the matrix itself.

I suppose there are different religious reasons we could get into as answer to this question, and perhaps my answer is rooted somewhat in religious belief as well, but hopefully is one which can be generally accepted as a plausible possibility rather than a "Flying Spaghetti Monster" type of stamina.

As a scientific source of evidence of the matrix we live within I came upon this article in national geographic a few weeks ago:

http://news.nationalgeographic.com/news/2011/07/110711-invisibility-cloak-events-space-time-bank-robbery-science/

It's worth a read.

So, If we accept Robert Browning's description of the matrix of 'carnal flesh' in which we live, breathe, go about our day-to-day, and view and see everything else, then we must accept also the reality that Somewhere, there is something more. Perhaps it is because I have been raised with a belief in God, but I believe even atheists and agnostics must be brought to admission of the point that something more than what we can rudimentally see exists-

Surely we have all met a burley guy who we expect to be hard-hearted and curt who turns out to be the most loving guy you've ever met or perhaps, a small, 'docile' man who turns out to be entirely different than we expect. Or perhaps your perception is totally the opposite and you familiarize with the big burly men and are intimidated by the small ones. Or any and all the inbetween. Or surely, at the very least each of us has felt at some point misperceived or mislabeled or judged by another- 'who are you to say that? you don't know who/how I really am!'. They are judging upon what they see or perceive, we are judging upon what we know we ARE.

Which brings me to my point: We all have perceptions built up based upon our interactions with those around us who are each encoded within this same matrix. And We attempt to build up the way we act around these perceptions to prevent ourselves from experiencing pain; but as we do so we stumble along once again that Reality that we cannot judge the world around us by what we see. What we see is a mirage of Reality. Sometimes, even, the complete opposite of it altogether.

So, If we accpet the general premise that it exists, that Light and Truth stems from somewhere else inside us, then one must beg the question, Why even have this encoding and this deception of the depiction of reality at all?

I think perhaps it is to teach us better how to recognize the difference between Truth and the Matrix for ourselves. If what we see is merely a mirage, we must be brought instead to judge based not upon what we see, but rather to judge upon the that part that Always exists (what I call the HEART- the lifeblood and beating force and Reality of who and what we are);

It provides testing ground for the growth and the development of that inner-core that in Reality is us. A proving point. -Do we act in accordance with it? Or do we forsake it for things that are encoded differently? If we never had the opportunity to live within a matrix and to choose, how then would we know the stability and the integrity of our heart? If everything we always chose was plainly manifest to us for what it really was, without a second thought, -without being matrixonically encoded by our perception of light we would never Know ourselves.

Take Job in the Old Testament as an example- this guy had it rough! Loss of his home, his kids, his fortune, his health, support of his friends- and even support of his wife! This guy stood by God completely on his own- with nothing and no one else to support him in it- and in fact, with Everything and Everyone else giving him Every reason to deny God and give up! Can you imagine having only your spouse left and even having them say to you, Curse God and die! and through it all Job remarks,

"Til I die I will not remove my integrity from me! ...Who am I to counsel the Lord? ...Though he slay me, yet will I trust in Him!... Though I were perfect, yet would I not know my soul!"

JOB, imho, is THE MAN. He passed this matrix-where-and-what-your-heart-is test with flying, and yet with deeply ingrained colors!

If Job was made manifest for the 'perfect' man he was from the start, and was able to see through the matrix of, as one example, his friends hearts from the start- where would be the test?

Job remarks that if his friends were afflicted as he was he would offer them comfort and compassion, but that instead of them being like that towards him, they offer him false judgment;

Odds are that If each of them were manifested from the beginning as what they were, Job never would have associated with them, nor they with him, and then the evidencial point of his friends incorrectly judging him would never have been made at all. Instead, they were encoded within the matrix that brought them into association with one another and provided the necessary proving points.

The more I come to see and know and experience within my realtions with those around me, the more I realize this is true. I have begun looking at every interaction as an opportunity to discern the heart- either for me, or for the other person. And this has helped a lot with releasing guilt that is sometimes easy to unnecessarily hang onto, or pain that is as well.

I believe the choices we make define us. And I believe that includes our choice to remain within the manifestation of the weakness or folly or strength of our heart the matrix manifests to us, or to overcome or abandon it as well. And I believe that every experience, interaction we have here is one more opportunity for us to either move in accordance with the heart, or else to move closer to the mesh of matter that is Everything we see.

Job's friends misjudged him, but I like to give at least one of them the benefit of the doubt that after the record of the book of Job we have today one came back repentant, using that experience as an indicator that he needed to MAKE THE CHOICE to correct his heart, and come more in line with Job's reality and heart rather than just looking outwardly upon the matrix of perception that God had abandoned and was punsihing him and thus he deserved judgment over compassion.

There is ALWAYS a choice. No matter how bad we have messed up from the start. No matter how deep our betrayal, Peter denied Christ thrice, and wept bitterly upon realization of what he had done. (Christ knew and revealed his heart, even when Peter was persuaded by the matrix of his outward allegiance to Christ up to that point). But Peter also went on to become the ROCK of the church, BECAUSE he CHOSE to recognize the opportunity to use the manifestation of the condition of his heart at that time that had been brought to his attention through the matrixciity of things as a building block (rather than a stumbling one) and correct it.

God turns Saul to Paul; a completely changed man, and the other apostles at the time are not so sure about God's decision; This fellow that is notorious for harshly persecuting Christains, Lord? You must be crazy! But God knew Paul's change was genuine and sincere. He responds that 'Paul is a chosen vessel unto Him' and I trust that if He were responding to them within the context of this post he would say something like,

You are judging by the content of the matrix which I have placed Saul in up to this point; but I have done this for a wise purpose. He has been persecuting Christians without knowledge of the Truth, and now, I have dissembled the matrix a bit, and allowed him to see his error. Armed with this new Knowledge and repentant he will minister with compassion, empathy, and understanding towards the world who will do the same to him as he has done to others. Let go of what you perceive, and accept him for what, with Knowledge of me, he has become.

I hope I am not seen to be contradicting my own words; the matrix allows us to manifest the condition of the heart, but it also allows us opportunity to adjust it, and then to prove that adjustment's efficacy. It is not contradictory, it is complementary. And the best part of it all is that The choice is Always Ours :).

Love to all,

Trish

Alright... what to post about next? A few ideas have been ruminating within my mind the past few days..

The first is taking off on the last blogpost with a new one about how it is a choice we make whether to allow the experience of Love to take us into that experience where we not only see it, but see everything else by it, or whether to allow separation from it in whatever way it is we're separated, to take us in the opposite direction, where we instead must close our eyes to it altogether.

The second is to write a post about the Law of Attraction, that is- my understanding of it, and how it leads us into and out of All our relationships and eventually is designed to lead us into that final relationship where we can remain WITHIN Love in ALL our relationships. Think about that; just in writing that sentence the idea of it is beautiful to me.

I really like the distinction of Being IN Love and Living WITHIN Love that I accidentally happened upon in my writing last time. We can be IN Love, (in certain pieces) without being able to live WITHIN Love (as a whole). This results in messy relationships. One moment is bliss and the other is hell. It doesn't (necessarily) mean Love doesn't exist, Sometimes it means that it just needs perfecting- and Sometimes that perfecting can only happen in being apart from each other because it is so volatile emotionally otherwise.

This is what leads me into the law of attraction post. I think of a certain pair of friends I've had for years, and others who I've known who are now happily married with whom they would tell you without hesitation is their best friend and their soul-mate, and I think of the last post I made in hitting on the point "If two people love each other, what?" and as an example of both people being at that attraction level where they are able to live WITHIN Love with each other, I think of them.

I think, how can you write a post like that saying Love is messy, when Love is beautiful? Just look at them; That's beauty.

And what I get at, is that maybe those people are on a different level than me in that aspect. (I don't doubt it.. they've always been spiritual models of a type to me).. they are willing to do what it takes to reach that level of love; I am not.

Now, though it's seemingly now this way, and in some cases seemingly always has been with them- I also don't doubt that they've each had their share of messiness to get them to that more perfect place.

I look back on past instances in my life and I see that within them I was fine; it was the other person that was the cause of all the messiness; and I realize now, that that was exactly the issue right there. That was my heart- and therefore, that is the heart which I attracted to me... And we all know a relationship with ANYBODY where "I'm fine and it's you who needs to change" is a volcanic eruption just waiting to happen.

So, how do we get past that point and get to a point where we attract the kind of Love we want? What DOES it take? I hear it all the time "Be the person you want someone to be to you" blah blah blah.. But the thing of it is this: At whatever your stage of Being happens to be at that time and point of life, that is what you WILL attract to you, regardless of what it is you WANT to be or TRY to pretend to be otherwise.

Because, you see, the thing of it is this: Love manifests the heart. And that is the gorgeousness of It. But it isn't a matter of what you DO, so much as it is an underlying matter of what you ARE.

So, the real effort is that of changing the self- and I'm talking Complete overhaul here. "Be the person you want someone to be to you" means just that: you have to BE it; heart and soul.. Love sees through all masks and façades; Love not only mainfests the heart, Love manifests the Truth. And at times, the Truth just so happens to be Quite the Ugly Creature.

So, if we're fed up with our relationship situation, we have to take a Truthful inventory of what we are- we have to face that Ugly creature Truth front-on, directly in the face.

And you can see right there why this point of The Height of Love is one which many never reach; Our Pride is too Great. We do not want to take that inventory- because as soon as we do, it means we have no longer any one else to blame- we see that it is ME who has been standing in MY way all along; and thus we arrive at the Pinnacle of Love: Placing upon the altar that Ugly Version of ME; raising the knife to slaughter it, not being able to see how anything Greater than it could even exist; when suddenly, (And this is where it becomes beautiful, friends;) the moment we are no longer afraid of what we cannot see, and Put our Trust instead in what we HOPE to BE, is the very moment where we become changed; Our actions align with this new wave of being... of becoming, and the Universe brings to us, as well as INto us, all the manifestations of that now redeemed state.

We can now Grow in Love with our new self (and invite others to do the same), THROUGH the process of crucifying the old. -And never in ANY other way (Just trust me, I've learned this the hard way!)

The question to our many, many heartbreaks in this world very often needs to be switched around- from THEY to ME. I trust there is a point in each aspect of Love where one reaches something of perfection in it, and at that point he suffers more at the hands of the imperfections of others than he does his own, but even then, the solution to it is to realign ourselves with changing ME; my outlook, my perspective, my patience, my parameters, my state of BEING.

If we are constantly focused on renewing our hearts; constantly eyed on that target of what we hope to be, then our actions will align with it- even if we throw a dart the first few times (or even the first few hundred times) and we end up entirely off the board, at least we have the right board in sight; and as such we are throwing darts that will actually fit the board when we either A) get lucky enough to hit it, or B) Develop sufficient skill necessary, through repeated trial, to hit bullseye time and time again.


"Love can never express itself by imposing sufferings on others. It can only express itself by self-suffering, by self-purification. The law of love knows no bounds of space or time. Where love is, there God is also." -Gandhi

“Joselyn, How may I prove my love to you?”
“If you would prove your love, you should do worst.”
“My worst, what do you mean?”
“Instead of winning to honor me with your high reputation, I want you to act against your normal character and do badly.”
“Do badly?”
“Lose.”
“Losing proves nothing, except that I am a Loser.”
“Wrong!, Losing is a much keener test of your love. Losing would contradict your self-love and Losing would show your obedience to your lover and not to yourself!”
"I will not lose!"
"Then you do not love me."
(A Knight's Tale)

When love beckons to you, follow him,
Though his ways are hard and steep.
And when his wings enfold you yield to him,
Though the sword hidden among his pinions
May wound you.
And when he speaks to you believe in him,
Though his voice may shatter your dreams
As the north wind lays waste the garden.
For even as love crowns you
So shall he crucify you.
Even as he is for your growth
So is he for your pruning.
Even as he ascends to your height and caresses
Your tenderest branches that quiver in the sun,
So shall he descend to your roots and
Shake them in their clinging to the earth.
Kahlil Gibran, The Prophet

So let's talk about Love.

(As a zillion different emotions associated with even the Idea of it fly into me just in typing that)

Who can contain it?

Or, for that matter, explain it?

The book of John says to us “GOD Is Love”

In Les Miserable, Victor Hugo writes, “Whoever has loved knows all the radiant meanings contained
in those three letters of that word: She.” [Ladies, believe me, it works with 'He' as well :D]

And that just about encompasses it all.

I am skeptical of anyone who claims to have actually experienced What Love Is who is quick to quantify it or explain it,

Because it cannot be. It is a reverence which surpasses the power of Anything but the language of the soul to communicate it. Music gets close- Silence, perhaps closer; it is one of those things we've talked about previous to this- That Remains in its element of Spiritual Purity; transcending-this-worldness.

So how can I write a blog about Something which cannot be written?

You can write all around it. You can write almost to it, but as soon as you hit Exactly it- you cannot write anymore.

But we can try, and see just how close it is I'm able to get to it today, before that moment hits me.

And that's the other thing- you never really know the effect it's going to have upon you- you can't predict it. One moment will be the Most Blissful, unquantifiable Joyous experience of your soul Reaching up to Heaven because of it- and the next will be Simultaneously Collapsing in Realizing Just how much of a dilemma you seem to have gotten yourself into in allowing It to get inside of you.

Because, you see, the dilemma is this- When you Love something- or someone- at such a level, you start living on that level, and in that level, and that level becomes your world. That level of incommunicable happiness and joy; that level of Speaking with your heart what your toungue cannot; and that level of Receiving the same type of communication back.

So the dilemma about it is this: What of your world when that world goes away? how do you adjust back to a world where that Love-world-level's non-existant? To a world where I send out a message to you from my heart, and the understanding doesn't come back; the other person isn't on the same plane as me: a separate ray which happens into me, and Just as Beautifully happens into becoming a line with me as well. Rather, their understanding in this world is a similar line (going both directions) but on a skewed plane- and no matter how much you yearn for that same-plane understanding to come back to you again, -Even if it doesn't form a line... Even if it just collides and stops, or runs parallel or ANYTHING- you can't find it.

Now, I know in reading this you're thinking, well, the dilemma is never a dilemma at all, because ::when two people love each other::...

Please! Tell me! Because I want to know! "When two people love each other", what????

And that's just it. You can't quantify it. The very dilemma of Truly Loving Somebody is just That; "When two people love each other, what?"

It is one thing to be snaked-along by some guy (or gal) who Never Really had an inkling of Love for you at all; but it is Quite another to be Separated, for whatever reason, from One who Somewhere, at Some point, Really Loved you in some way.

That is the stuff heartache's really made of.

SoOoOOo, "When two people love each other, what?"

Well, I'll tell you what;

Love demands the best of us. The Highest of us. And we live in a fallen world, with versions of ourselves which are far below the version of ourself we ought to be.

And we coinhabit that fallen world with fallen beings who are in just that same dilemma with themselves.

And we can't for the life of us seem to work it out ourselves, so we fall into this place where we realize maybe we need someone else to help us go along. And so we take our fallen self and mix it up together with some other fallen self of our choosing, and we hope together somehow we can muster up Something together that can help to save us.

And in doing so, we come up now and then with heartbreak, and now and then with beauty, and now and then with this Shakespearean-type-tragedy that seems to be Some kind of cruel concoction of the two.

I believe in the beauty/breaking of a one-sided love; and I Know it, intimately. But I also Know the BreakingBeauty of a Love that DOES exist on both sides, but needed to Know of its existence first in order to have and find the Strength to weed out the Separating Fallenness which exists within each other now, and Bring each person to being able to reach that pinnacle of the Best of Us(Which, I've come to believe, for this earth-life, at least, is 'simply' the ability to recognize and Reach for the Best in both ourselves and others, but Still being willing to accept us at our Worst when we fall short of it) that Being WITHIN (-note the distinction) Love requires of us.

And I've thought now and then (you know, here and there- in a passing thought, and hardly more than that!), that I'd much rather have never experienced either. But you know what? I don't think that's true, anymore. You couldn't pry these experiences away from me anymore, let alone Just have me Give them up to you without even so much as a Request.

C.S. Lewis says he believes in Christianity as he believes that the sun has risen: not only because he sees it, but because by it he sees everything else.

So it is with Love;


(^Ah, and there it is, that 'can no longer write' moment):

you familiarize yourself with that world of the soul, and even if it's heartbreak that brings you to it, you then see Everything in your world from that soul-perspective. You've communed with it now, be it briefly, or lengthily, or intermittently, or whatever the situation may be; and being apart from it then, in some paradoxical kind of way, Only enables you to be brought further into it because you Know now that something more than Just what you can rudimentally see exists; you can now find and draw out the heart of other things- other people- That matter that is too pure for us to see, or to discern otherwise, and That matter which, by Whatever Grace it is we are even permitted to encouter it at all, Once it is encountered, is Too Real to ever be denied.

A blog about......

Friendship 

(If I can begin it before tearing up) 

When I think friendship I think Winnie the Pooh and Piglet and Christopher Robin

I think of C.S. Lewis' book "The Four Loves" (amazing, btw [and a quick read]- read it if you haven't!), and how he postulates within it that Friendship is the Highest Form of Love. 

I think of Woody and Buzz, 

I think of my 7 year old nephew walking alongside my 2.5 year old nephew by the hand (Why? -I'm not even sure, really; just because he can?); 

I think of LDS scripture, when it states that once we reach a certain degree of faithfulness, God no longer calls us His servants, but rather considers us His friends. 

I think of the instances of friendship in my life and of how Deeply they have touched my life, and continue to touch my life, and I think of all those examples stated previously in conjunction with them, and I find that Truly, Friendship is the basis of So much good that is in life. 


I've often found it interesting in my own life, how different friends seem to fill up different areas and soul-needs, and all work together to bring in a bigger and better and more fulfilled me. There is the friend that you can talk to about Anything, and then there is the friend you Know you can talk to about Nothing; And the friend with whom you need no longer talk about things at all (or perhaps, never needed to from the start); 

If you think about shows which have been successful in portraying the idea of friendship, you realize their success has been in creating characters whose personalities are each very distinct, but yet work together anyway. 

You have Joey and Chandler and Ross and Monica and Phoebe and Rachael.

You have Cory and Topanga and Shawn and Eric 

You have M'Lynn, Shelby, Ousier, Truvy, Claire, and Annell

C.C. and Hillary... 


Just to name a few off the top of my head. 

Each of these examples is a testament to the completing pieces of ourselves we find in those who are not only different from us, but different from each other. 

I venture to say one measure of a man's greatness is made evident within the range of the kaleidoscope of the friends he chooses. 

Without you, I am just me. Linked in friendship with you, however, you have a little bit of me, and I then have a little bit of you, and so we become connected in that soul-way (sole-way as well) of which I was talking about wanting to achieve within my writing; 

I know nothing of physics, but in my own theory, I maintain that certain matter existed and was used to put together the matter of the soul; and that this matter that was used was unique matter, unlike any other matter anywhere else... something of the same- as in all the matter we make things out of here comes from earth, even though we end up after mixing it with unique things such as plastics and textiles, -or more naturally, woods and metals. 

Such is the same with God's creation of our Spirits, we all come from the same type of spiritual matter- but in making unique Spirits we end up with woods and metals and fabrics and plastics, each different from the other. So when we interact with people we sometimes counteract each other because we are more distinctly metal and they are more distinctly plastic, so to speak; 

There are always those people who are plastic and so they hang out with all the others who are plastic, too, but then what is the product that results? Simply more of the same- no growth or evolution or Creation of anything Greater.

What I am talking about- is the "FRIENDS" type of friends- who see that they can each be themselves- their own element, while Still at the same time having each of their unique aspects work together to create something like... (**looks around**) a smart phone, for instance- which could never have been created with merely that one thing, or even all the same type of elements.

Now, sometimes you meet that same-exact type as you, and you click instanteously, because you needed more 'you'ness in your life; Sometimes, we get so alone in our uniqueness that we need that same uniqueness in which we feel alone in, brought into us from outside of us. 

Then, there is the same-as-you in Just the right ways, and the different than you in Just the right ways person that kinda takes you by surprise and is a little bit difficult for you to comprehend. You have within your mind this compendium of sorts- You just fit together Too perfectly and interlockingly. You can comprehend and appreciate their similarities (perfectly, in fact), but what you Cannot comprehend is how it is those specific similarities can co-exist with those specific differences;-

This is the kind of friendship that is more than just enriching you each separately into a smart phone- this is the kind of friendship that blends you up together mixing you up into a smoothie instead. And almost without thinking about it, (but at the same time doing so completely purposely) you each drink it in, and you absorb into you all the good nurtients from it you can, and very seamlessly and just as naturally as your body does with its waste do away with the bad. You then come to find that the effect this concoction has upon you is So beneficial, in fact, that you simply must continue drinking it. This is the kind of friendship which very naturally leads into a soul-enriching, and sometimes, even, a soul-wrenching, experience. 

This is the kind of friendship which is the basis of- or perhaps the center of- or maybe even, Love itself. 

And when you Even so much as touch on this accidental and yet also freely and independently chosen type of connection with another it encompasses the renderings of All kinds- Nay,- of Every Kind, of Awe;