Unconditional love and the practicalities of life

[Gem]

Originally Posted by Meadows

It appears though that your whole reply was based on assuming and judgement. I wish I hadn't bothered asking you to expand.

Sometimes people do parade their 'enlightenment' this is the internet and its nature is to provide a virtual world for people to 'be' someone they can't be in off-screen life.

I come here to work through some very real issues that effect how I interact, my relationships, my career etc.

I can't begin to relate to what on earth you're seeing to reply as you have. I just don't need it though.

I can feel it like I can feel the wind blow, and I don't actually feel loving kindness in most of these 'we are love' styled things, they usually go South and get closed anyway, then I was only remarking how being raised in a violent environment is like a warped kind of normal, but there's no way to know any better. That has a lot of effect on how I interact, relationships and the whole society I adjust to, we're talking about the same subject, though maybe I responded a bit abstractly.

I don't assume what your issues are or have ideas about what you need, make judgements on it, have solutions, know the answers ... nothing like that, so it's true absolutely, I have nothing you need.

[Gem]

Originally Posted by sound

Your comments were not wasted on me ... and thanks for your raw honesty there Gem with what you shared re: your upbringing ... I missed out on that by a whisker ... and to think i lamented, and to a certain degree, resented my parents for not taking the plunge all those years ago ... but ... times change ... people move on ... other opportunities present ... the passion dies out lol ...

It's no big secret, the details are secret just because it's beyond the scope of acceptable conversation, and it was a while ago, things are much more peaceful here, but sometimes I'm in a group conversation and they talk of everyday things, like where they stick their photographs or something, and it strikes me that I have never done anything like that, small normal things like that can stand out sometimes.

As I said to Tobi, I don't use the word love for the deep connection to universal energy that he described.

I use the word love in relation to the connection to physical things/people etc. But I recognise that on places like SF people use the word love. I used to feel irritated by the lack of love from self-professed love experts...but somewhere along the way, I changed and no longer feel bothered by it. Now, I discuss with my own interpretation in view, and I use my own words to reflect upon whatever it is in me, that I'm working on.

It wasn't so much that you responded abstractly (although it didn't help with my interpretation) - it was that you responded with the irritation that you feel about the subject.

I don't understand why you responded that way to my post.

[Gem]

Originally Posted by Meadows

As I said to Tobi, I don't use the word love for the deep connection to universal energy that he described.

I use the word love in relation to the connection to physical things/people etc. But I recognise that on places like SF people use the word love. I used to feel irritated by the lack of love from self-professed love experts...but somewhere along the way, I changed and no longer feel bothered by it. Now, I discuss with my own interpretation in view, and I use my own words to reflect upon whatever it is in me, that I'm working on.

It wasn't so much that you responded abstractly (although it didn't help with my interpretation) - it was that you responded with the irritation that you feel about the subject.

I don't understand why you responded that way to my post.

People love just fine as it is, the self professed might not see it though, but people are as they are and it's good enough.

You and me can say what we think and describe love the way it's experienced as well as anyone, and I only concern myself with what people mean, so I want to make it more about listening that about telling, about communicating more than lecturing... about sharing.

Now I have seen one person tell another person some kind of profuund truism and call it sharing, but that's not like sitting around the table and partaking in the food, coz sharing is in the togetherness.

Anyway... it's late and my tooth hurts... so see you another time.

Originally Posted by Mr Interesting

Yesterday I sold something on the internet and the people came round and handed me an envelope and told me to open it and count it. I said I don't have to... they said why not. I said it's not my karma if it's not what was asked for but yours.

It wasn't a matter of trusting them but trusting myself.

If one is truly, and excuse my pushing out the sacred texts, is in love you cannot be hurt and as Jesus said 'render unto Caesar that which is Caesars'

sooo dig this! Thank you, help put some things I've been struggling with in perspective.

[IsleWalker]

Originally Posted by Tanemon

Your comments about letting go of the past are very good, Silent. I'm a Reiki-ist. I've experienced a huge amount of letting go - and I'm glad and grateful for it. I've experienced what I'd call 'the painful past' dissolving, and the dissipation of confusion. I help other people in that process. And more recently I've experienced Reconnective healing - which in my experience goes even further in removing the impacts of the past. So I agree with you, and not simply on the basis of 'what sounds reasonable' to the surface intellect.

Yet my question came from a slightly different angle. It's the topic of the importance of intuition in preventing abuse or harm (for instance, to oneself and one's family).

Tanemon--

Maybe I'm all wet here, as I seem to be the only one thinking this way--but is it not possible to be open, loving and finding the best in people and at the same time recognizing their ability to do the wrong thing? And, knowing that, it should be possible to know or sense when another is struggling with that boundary, while still loving them?

To me it's like watching a child struggle to crawl or walk. You stand back and give them freedom to learn on their own, even to fall within limits, but you also recognize when a situation is clearly unsafe and outside their boundaries of negotiating safely. You are protecting them from hurting themselves (in your example--hurting you or another) while still allowing that they have the ability and drive to "walk on their own".

In short: Can't you maintain both love and self-protection at the same time? I don't see them as mutually exclusive.

Lora

Originally Posted by IsleWalker

Tanemon--

Maybe I'm all wet here, as I seem to be the only one thinking this way--but is it not possible to be open, loving and finding the best in people and at the same time recognizing their ability to do the wrong thing? And, knowing that, it should be possible to know or sense when another is struggling with that boundary, while still loving them?

To me it's like watching a child struggle to crawl or walk. You stand back and give them freedom to learn on their own, even to fall within limits, but you also recognize when a situation is clearly unsafe and outside their boundaries of negotiating safely. You are protecting them from hurting themselves (in your example--hurting you or another) while still allowing that they have the ability and drive to "walk on their own".

In short: Can't you maintain both love and self-protection at the same time? I don't see them as mutually exclusive.

Lora

I realise you're speaking to Tanemon, but what you've said here is beautifully balanced, and is somewhere I believe it is possible to be.

[Tanemon]

Originally Posted by IsleWalker

Tanemon--

Maybe I'm all wet here, as I seem to be the only one thinking this way--but is it not possible to be open, loving and finding the best in people and at the same time recognizing their ability to do the wrong thing?

I wouldn't say you're all wet. This question, in the first part of your post, is pretty much the same as he one I put to Mr Interesting, up in post #13 on this thread.

Originally Posted by IsleWalker

And, knowing that, it should be possible to know or sense when another is struggling with that boundary, while still loving them?

To me it's like watching a child struggle to crawl or walk. You stand back and give them freedom to learn on their own, even to fall within limits, but you also recognize when a situation is clearly unsafe and outside their boundaries of negotiating safely. You are protecting them from hurting themselves (in your example--hurting you or another) while still allowing that they have the ability and drive to "walk on their own".

In short: Can't you maintain both love and self-protection at the same time? I don't see them as mutually exclusive.

Lora

I'd say you've expressed this very well. Unconditional love is something we sense to be the Source or Core of the cosmos, and also can be (for us, incarnate as humans) a state of being, or heart... It underlies our experience, even when we feel the practical need to dodge harm, or place boundaries.

[IsleWalker]

Originally Posted by Meadows

I realise you're speaking to Tanemon, but what you've said here is beautifully balanced, and is somewhere I believe it is possible to be.

Thanks, Meadows. Glad you understood where I was going.

Lora

[IsleWalker]

Originally Posted by Tanemon

I wouldn't say you're all wet. This question, in the first part of your post, is pretty much the same as he one I put to Mr Interesting, up in post #13 on this thread.

Yes, I think that's where I picked up the quote--or where I read your um...restatement of the question.

I didn't address where the intuition comes from. I just assume you've got it!

Originally Posted by Tanemon

It underlies our experience, even when we feel the practical need to dodge harm, or place boundaries.

Right. Do you feel this is difficult for you to do--to anticipate that another (whom you want to see the best in) might do you harm?

I don't see it as non-loving to be circumspect, to use all the skills (both those "human" ones and the "spiritual" ones) in sussing out a situation.

Did you find it difficult to see that coming, and it was the pain of being surprised--in the past?

Lora