Happy June To You! Wishing you best of blessings
in this first
month of summer!
INSPIRATIONAL MOMENT:
(Great Thoughts By History's Inspired Thinking Men
and Women)
Kites rise highest against the wind, not with it.
-Winston Churchill
TIM's BLOG
(Random Thoughts and Tim's Daily World):
What A Week! I have been letting my head and mouth do all
the
leading. What a huge mistake. Times to stop trying
to control
things and let things be. It's when I let
my world get so full of ME
that I lose track of the things
that are really important.
In truth, I've just been very scared. My life is changing
in
some dramatic ways, and I have frankly gotten scared that
I would not be able
to measure up. Maybe I won't. I won't die.
Life will go on. All I
can do is go where the Spirit leads
me. When I have done that in the
past things turn out
just fine. It's when I let my brain battle my
heart, and
let my brain win, that I get in trouble.
All is good.
On that note, Today's Love Works is one that I have reprinted,
in part,
from a blog written by Joshua Bagby. I printed in
a couple years ago by
his kind permission, and I am doing so
again. You can find his blogs
at:
I've noticed he hasn't written quite as much in recent
months, but
he has a fascinating mind and his material
is well worth a read (or
two!)
FOOD FOR THOUGHT:
(Brand New and Classic Love Works Essays
2001-2007)
LONG-LOST LOVERS by Joshua Bagby
I feel like Billy Pilgrim, the lead character in Kurt Vonnegut’s
Slaughterhouse Five, the guy who comes unstuck in time. He wanders around time
to various points in his life, living and reliving various moments from his past
and future.
It’s not really that I have come unstuck in time, but as I look out across
my life, I look at my lovers in a way that is not socially acceptable. I still
love them.
Social forces want you to hate them, or at least ignore them as if they
never existed. I have a hard time doing that. I like to think of each love
relationship that I had as being a gift. Sometimes, and probably most of the
time, it was a gift that emerged largely after painful circumstances exposed
them.
In my current spiritual belief structure, I see each lover that I had as a
teacher. I believe that in some other dimension of reality, we still gather
outside of time and space. We shed our ego memories and exist in our spiritual
universe. That’s where we know the big picture.
I see physical life as if it were a big movie. Outside of physical life,
you are like the cast and crew of a movie. You sit around over coffee and
pastries and discuss all the nuances of the movie you are in.
Thus, say that you are in the middle of a big row with the major love of
your life. Maybe you’re in the midst of a betrayal or a disappointment or a
bitter break-up. When you leave your bodies during the night, you gather
together for a script conference, like actors discussing each character part in
the movie. “Boy, you sure nailed that scene!”
“Thanks. I noticed by your reaction that you think I’m nuts!”
“It was a very believable performance!”
Having this philosophy is why I still think of long-lost lovers as an
intimate part of my life even when they are not physically present in my life
anymore. And most of them aren’t.
In my case, I am not unstuck in time, but I am unstuck from culture. As a
creative personality, I continually play with tradition, mostly rearranging it
to see if I can dream up something better. For the most part I am not too happy
with how the planet is doing. I think there is vast room for improvement in how
we are conducting our social affairs. I am unstuck because I don’t watch much
cable TV. I don’t have any disposable income, so I can’t afford many customary
distractions. The end result of that is a positive, in my opinion. I do a lot of
creative thinking. That leads me to looking at many alternatives that people
ensconced in normal culture don’t consider.
Holding grudges, for example. If you watch much TV, you come away with the
impression that it is normal if not somehow righteous to hold grudges. Much of
cable TV is all about fighting the good fight. Talk shows often pit one side
against the other. It’s all great entertainment, isn’t it?
A juicy area for holding grudges is the arena of romance. If you were
betrayed, cheated on, abandoned, raped (metaphorically or literally), shamed,
belittled, used—you get the idea—it’s part of the ordinary consciousness of the
times to get a lot of good juice out of it. Tell great stories at parties about
how abused you were. Get some pity points or even suck up to another lover by
spilling your guts about the miseries from your past.
The problem with all that is that spiritually—and this comes from different
sources—many of the instances of abuse were scripted in advance, just like in a
movie. For example, a common thread running through past-life regressions is how
certain souls volunteer to play the heavy in a next life just like an actor
elects to play a role of some creepy character. This is ostensibly done to teach
and learn lessons in our cosmic journey.
Over the years, several of my lovers turned out to have been raped or
otherwise sexually abused as children. They suffered for it greatly. A few of
them had what appeared to be multiple personality disorder or borderline
personality disorder or narcissistic personality disorder. Ultimately, they
could not sustain a relationship and did some pretty mean things to me as they
unleashed torrents of anger from their emotional past. Yet before that phase, we
had some delicious experiences.
I like to remember those delicious experiences the most.
From what I understand from reading spiritual books and listening to
near-death experiencers, these women all signed up for their abusive childhood
experiences. It’s not much different than Halle Berry signing up to endure a
lifetime of angst in Monster’s Ball—except that they don’t get the fame and
fortune for being a Hollywood star! Meanwhile, all the other actors signed up to
play their roles in the experience, too. It’s one big happy tortured
family.
If that’s true, it makes sense to me not to hold grudges against these
women for what they did to me. And chances are very likely that as a soul I
chose to be with them for a reason. The fact that I ran into so many of them
even indicates to me that I needed the exposure to women severely damaged in
childhood. It’s all part of the plan.
Sometimes when events evoke memories of the pain I have suffered in the
past, I do find myself feeling anger or hurt or sadness. But as I become aware
that I am just churning through old emotions, I switch channels and envision
happier times with that person so I don’t stew in the bad feelings.
It often turns out that it was the incredible highs I felt with someone
that eventually led to the lows. Had those highs not happened, there never would
have been a relationship leading to the lows. There would have been
nothing.
Feeling this way, I must confess, does lead me to missing former lovers. I
want to share with them what I have learned. In my idealism bubble I think of
them as equally open to sharing and forgiving and celebrating. I think of them
as eager to step into the light with me and shine.
At times I want to write former lovers love letters. I want to share with
them this bounty of good feelings. But I don’t. This world seems compelled to
highlight the negative. If I sent a love letter, they’d wonder what I wanted
from them. Or they would think I was needy for affection and choosing them to
victimize with sentimentality over bygones.
If a past lover were hooked up with a new lover, she would see my love
letters as an invasion into her new life. Or if he ever got hold of it, he would
see it as a threat against his claim of his new relationship. I have experienced
the flip side where former lovers have contacted me while I was in a new
relationship, and the woman I was with threw jealousy tantrums, convinced
(through her imagination) that the old lovers were attempting to steal me
back.
So I don’t write letters that I send, but nothing stops me from going there
in my imagination. Oh, baby…
Love In Thought! Love In Word! Love In Action!
Love To You Today!
"May we endeavor today to increase our understanding and appreciation of
what others have given and contributed to us. And develop constant,
mindful consideration of how our thoughts and actions will
BENEFICIALLY
CONTRIBUTE to others"
The best to you today in discovering the answers to life's difficult
questions!
A Final Thought:
Love is always the right thing to do. Even if it isn't the easiest
thing to do.
May we have compassion for the struggles of others, wisdom to
acknowledge our own, and courage to address them both every day.
Respectfully,
Tim
This is a daily newsletter of LOVE WORKS DAILY:
A collective of
individuals of different beliefs and
backgrounds, dedicated to a better world
by living LOVE in thought,
word and action. Compassion. Wisdom. Courage.
Nam Myoho Renge Kyo
Peace be with you.
From LOVE WORKS DAILY 11/02/05
Joshua Bagby's Material (C)2005 Used By
Kind Permission
(c)2007 T.Thomas Henry