Relationships as mirrors: Lessons in learning to be a reflection of love.
5 tenets to build connection and bridge the space between.
Love is the ultimate lesson. Life is our training ground. Throughout it all there’s an endless orbit of relationships to teach us more about ourselves. Our boundaries get pushed, hearts get broken, loss overwhelms us, yet there are infinite possibilities for more love.
These are five inspirations to strengthen all of our relationships. Starting with deepening that connection to yourself!
Show up in Innocence
Put down your baggage, settle your hurt, release your blame. Meet your relationships with innocence. We lose our wonder and open-heartedness, when we come to another person alive in our wounds. Over-come with the pain of the past, we can’t be present for what is in front of us. Especially if we project the suffering someone else has caused on someone new and make the pay the price.
Trust that you are stronger from your battle scars and you have grown from any cracks beneath the surface like a blade of grass making it’s way through concrete. Come in with an ease and a purity of spirit that let it become a fluid endeavor. Allow everything to be new again.
Intimacy Heals
The essence of love is to build connection. It is the courage in ourselves to step out of the shadows into the light to be seen and held in a space of acceptance for everything we are. As we learn to love our darkness and imperfections, we realize that these are the definitive intricacies that make the uniqueness of who we are. Then in our courageous love of self, we allow a vulnerability that takes down walls.
Intimacy is allowing someone in close enough to be a part of your healing. When you move toward another to let deeper parts of you reveal - - the pain, restless, and distrust soften in the space between us.
Hold on to Nothing
In the maze of love, we get lost in expectations. We want certain outcomes and behaviors, beginning to envision how the relationship will play out. In our minds we make demands and decisions without even the slightest bit of communication. Then, fall into grave disappointment when things don’t go our way. There is no room for emotional bargaining, tit for tat.
Instead of focusing on what you’re receiving, go into the giving. In what you are giving without expectation love becomes expansive. It grows and flows in your creativity. Hold on to nothing, release all expectations. Be unconditional.
Playful Responsiveness
Relationships get sluggish. The heaviness of the world weighs us down making it hard to let go into spontaneity. With too many days of solemn responsibility, we distance ourselves from laughter. We start to believe - Fun is only something for Friday nights and vacations. Why do we love like that? When did we allow our joy to be so restricted and constricted by an inevitable perception of stress?
When we communicate through play, we are receptive to our relationship. Let love be an infectious enjoyment that’s a remedy for any drudgery of days. Date. Flirt. Create chemistry. Get curious. Initiate freedom through love.
Give what is Given
To be in careful study of our relationships is to be invested in love. Respond to the other person in kind. Pay attention to how they extend their care. It is a signal of what they desire in return. We often show people how we’d like to be treated. It’s the golden rule. Tried and true since kindergarten.
If they give affection, return it. If they listen intently, give your undivided attention. When they pay you a compliment, tell them what you admire. Be generous with these love languages, relate and resonate.
We make a conscious choice in every experience to expand or contract. In our armor, we construct protection. With our commitment, we push to heal. It’s like an exacting heartbeat that resuscitates our growth.
