receiving love

what does it mean to let love in? what does it feel like to receive love? how much love are you able to embrace? does too much love overwhelm you? are you often hungry for more love in your life? do you ever feel like you have to repress the love you share in order to operate and assimilate in our society?

i had a massage today and we went deep into my emotional holding patterns around loving. i stayed in the immense fear that i have of being forced to temper my love, to keep my love tame. the therapist invited me to travel way back, to a past life in which i was very repressed and forced to keep my love bottled up inside. the feeling was atrocious. i was furious for having to hold on so tight, feeling the bulging and desire to explode. i felt myself turning to stone, feeling trapped inside the confines of my environment. i was completely hopeless and saw no point in living. why live a life confined to the walls of my own inner world, never able to reach out and share, give, explore in the depths of the ocean of love?

earlier this morning i received a letter from a member of integral naked. some of you may know that one of my biggest fears is that i'll come across as being, or even worse that i will become, incredibly full of myself and egotistical. the deep respect that i have for others and my devotion to being humble has, in my past, hindered me from expressing some of my more confident beliefs of self-worth and self-esteem. i share this dialogue with a heart full of awe and gratitude and for some other reason that i can't articulate at the moment!

I want to say how incredibly helpful all of your posts are and how much compassion I feel coming from you. If nonlocality really works, I swear it jumps right through my computer screen and into my heart.

At heart, I am still 2 years old and there is a part of me that really likes to have a pat on the head and to have someone say nice things to me.

oh, me too. so thank you, thank you. i feel myself glow even brighter and brighter each time someone acknowledges to me that they see the 'light'. i look at it as not only a pat on the head and something nice said, but as a shared experience of reflecting light for one another. showing each other where we see the radiance. this helps us stay centered, focused, grounded, secure in those places where we are radiant... knowing that at least one other person sees it. i consider this such a gift to share with another and am immensely grateful when people i respect share 'nice things' with me. so really, your words go straight to my heart.

You are like a cosmic blanket, warm and comforting, with an embrace as large as the universe.

this touched a particularly deep place. one day i had a vision of that cosmic patchwork blanket, warm, comforting and nourishing that just envelopes another and radiates that ease, peace, and embrace. i collect 'tools' that i find helpful in the way of connecting and being that i practice in the world. that vision of the blanket was a profound discovery and has been a meaningful tool for me. it is incredibly confirming to hear these words from you and to, in a sense, know that 'it's working'. thank you soo, soo much.

May you always receive as much love as you give out-

Comments:

I second the anonymous complimenter! =) To me, you are a fountain of subtle energy, a well-spring of ever-flowing Love, a gushing geyser of divine playfulness, and I am thrilled to have the potency of your presence in my life! BEAM ON, my easily amazed Bodhisattva! =) XOXO, Brandy Brandy | 10.09.04 - 5:26 pm | #

yeah. and you also are a very articulate & appreciative receiver...and in this way you reflect and teach others how to give, and how to receive appreciatively too, and how playful it all can be to surrender to such a FLOW...so, it spreads. fast and far! zing! love, chris weaver | 10.09.04 - 11:01 pm | #

I wish I could take credit for those words; they express exactly what I feel about your work and your writing. Goodness, Ashley. You're one of the least egotistical and most giving, generous bloggers I read. What impresses me is that you manage this in spite of your misgivings about your own self-esteem; I harbor the same, but I tend to just blather them all over the place and end up sounding even more self-obsessed than I would if I'd just accept myself as worthy. So thank you. I do hope you can stay open to the most important love of all; namely, that which you give yourself. You do, after all, have so, so much of it to give. Siona | Homepage | 10.10.04 - 3:55 pm | #

thank you brandy, chris, and siona... isn't it remarkable the synergy that spirals around us when we share in this open, receptive place. a gushing geyser of divine playfulness how playful it all can be to surrender to such a FLOW stay open to the most important love of all; namely, that which you give yourself. so you do each know that you're words are just as much to yourself as they are to me. great-full and loving! ashley ashley | Homepage | 10.10.04 - 11:38 pm | #

You are one of the brightest stars on the night sky guiding the way for all who care to look. Know that you are loved across the ocean. jan Kojan | 10.11.04 - 6:57 am | #

I tried to put this in your blog, but it was too long winded!.... To let love in...hmmmm that scares me still and that makes me really sad. The first feeling I get when I receive love is fear and or sadness, doesn’t that suck? Once I shed a little bit of my protective shell, little by little I get a taste of love from another and it tastes sweet. Sweet like it felt when I was pregnant, full of life and hope, bodily & spiritually caught up in the midst of a miracle. I guess I should say that I am speaking of love from other people. I have a different feeling of love from the spirit world and the animal & plant world. Only because I am less duped with the illusion of separateness when it comes to non human interactions. I feel isolated from people, buying into that mindset still... ashley | Homepage | 10.12.04 - 7:14 am | #

I am not as able to embrace the love from others as I am to emanate love from my own heart. I think part of that is my innate nature, but I can’t deny that at least some of that is because I feel more in control with giving than I do when receiving. I’m not so sure that I am hungry for more love in my life so much as I am hungry for some sort of manifestation of that love in the form of a community. My heart burst with love all the time; painful and blissful, over and over again. Yes I do feel like I have to repress the love in order to assimilate. I feel limited by people’s ideas of ownership when it comes to people... my boyfriend, my daughter, my friends...mine mine mine. All the social rules that limit love based on fear and control. ashley | Homepage | 10.12.04 - 7:15 am | #

I too had past life memories come up during massage and cranial sacral treatments. But the feelings you shared here better describe this lifetime for me. That life confined by walls drove me to the edge of suicide before I was able to break through. I was graced with the experience of having my illusions gobbled up by the hunger of pure love. That love was so expansive and amazing that doubt was obliterated for me for a good long time. I feel some shame about letting doubt seep back in over time, especially lately (as you have noticed). The cool thing is that I know my attention is just wandering, I guess I have more things to learn and experience before I am totally done picking up the drama. Isn’t it ironic that the one of the things you fear is something that most people see no hint of in you? Full of yourself in a negative way?? AS IF! ashley | Homepage | 10.12.04 - 7:16 am | #

What I see in you is an amazing example of freedom in action. I’m sure you wrestle with it, but I have never seen doubt get in the way of you shining and sharing. And I love love love that about you. You are such a blessing in my life Ashley. This helps us stay centered, focused, grounded, secure in those places where we are radiant... knowing that at least one other person sees it. YES YES YES! I am slowly getting over the fear of being seen. I am starting to trust that what people who resonate with truth see in me is as so much truer than the crap my unresolved issues try to get me to buy into. We talked about this on the phone, that need to be gentle with ourselves and each other, we all have had so much untruth coming at us from so many sources it takes some time to let the truth of our beauty sink in. To learn to trust what is unfolding, to see it as the amazing and gorgeous blossoming of endless possibilities drenched in the ocean of love. ashley | Homepage | 10.12.04 - 7:16 am | #

just in case there is confusion... the last 4 comments in my name were sent to me privately because the author couldn't get them all to fit in the comment box. i resonate so deeply with the words and feelings expressed and i though others might as well so i pasted them into this comment box. ashley | 10.12.04 - 11:38 am | #

Oh, snap! Ashley, you r0x0rs my b0x0rs. May all teh pwnage bless y0u, ggkthnx. =D Teh L0v3, R0BBB!!11& narf Rob | Homepage | 10.12.04 - 3:23 pm | #

thank you so much for these words you pasted in, for sharing the giant beautiful heart of the person who wrote them...one of my favorite lines is, "The cool thing is that I know my attention is just wandering, I guess I have more things to learn and experience before I am totally done picking up the drama..." it IS cool...sometimes i feel like my dramas are like boats. they go somewhere. if i forget that the ocean is love, & is me, then i'll stay on the boat (down in the hold, banging my head against the wall). but when i remember that it's just a boat, then, well...maybe instead of dissolving it back into a wave of undifferentiated love (always a fun option), right now maybe i'll just stay on the dramaboat & use it, follow it a bit further, find out what it is teaching me, let it shine & surprise somebody... chris weaver | 10.13.04 - 6:26 am | #

Chris, Thank you for helping me see that I can view these times where I am banging my head on the boat wall as just a learning experience. I need to be constantly reminded of this as I have a habit of adding panic on top of the drama and assuming I will end up as depressed as I was in the past and suffer endlessly. Damn the mind is good with its tricks. And to let my head banging be a lesson for others, of course. I seem to relate to people the most when they are being deeply honest with the tender parts of themselves. Naked is good! Thank you! ~leela leela | 10.13.04 - 12:08 pm | #

sure leela! if our feet were in the same zip code i'd invite you to a long walk, cuz i sure remember my own version of the panic of feeling myself circling back into the prison-boat of my own depression (clang)... & so i sure have paid attention to every nuance of the miracle when someone took my hand, held it for its own sake, guided it to a pocket i didn't know i had, & wrapped my fingers around the key to OUT. tears of gratitude. here's rumi (approximately): i have lived on the lip of insanity trying to find reasons, knocking on a door. it opens. i've been knocking from the inside! love, chris weaver | 10.13.04 - 1:46 pm | #

slowly making my way down in responding to these amazing comments. kojan, please know that it was your comment here that inspired the self-doubt post. i noticed how hard it was for me to really take in your words and felt how incredibly touched i was by your expression... by the love traveling the waves across the ocean. thank you deeply. ashley | Homepage | 10.14.04 - 12:34 am | #

Thank you, Ashley With your subtle radiance of love I resonate and in that moment you become an expression of love I feel for myself too. Jan Kojan | 10.14.04 - 10:22 am | #

Chris, I assume I'll be in a closer zip code in November. Do you have a blog too? Holding a hand for its own sake...thats one of the coolest things I love to do now that the door opened from the inside. Touch is so much more real. Hugs, ~leela leela | 10.14.04 - 11:20 am | #

hey leela, check your email c. chris weaver | 10.14.04 - 5:39 pm | #

hi leela, "I am not as able to embrace the love from others as I am to emanate love from my own heart. I feel more in control with giving than I do when receiving." i find it so interesting, this common trait of people that emanate an intense radiant love from their own heart, and the shield that we keep around our own hearts, so protective of letting it in. i really appreciate your bringing control into that equation. that's helpful for me to remember that it is just a game of control that i'm playing. ashley | Homepage | 10.15.04 - 10:10 pm | #

once i was meditating and felt this tremendous weight upon my heart. my mind labeled it as longing for others that i could openly connect with and deeply love in the way i know how. however, when i sat with it longer, i realized that it wasn't longing at all, but the weight was all of the love trying to get in, and my own resistance, my own controling blocks that were keeping it out. it really helped me to reframe that feeling of longing as intense love knocking at the door. "I am slowly getting over the fear of being seen." that's convenient because i love seeing you!! ashley | Homepage | 10.15.04 - 10:11 pm | #

"Yes I do feel like I have to repress the love in order to assimilate. I feel limited by ...All the social rules that limit love based on fear and control." let's change that! do you remember that thread on social norms about love? i think that i even started it with borrowed words of yours. oh, there is so much work that we have to do in this world expanding the social rules that limit love... loosening the control, lightening the fear, embracing the depths of unbounded possibilities to express the deep sense of connection that is so lusious to share with others. perhaps this type of 'work' could be fiddled with at the easily amazed workspace one day... stay tuned! with love, ashley ashley | Homepage | 10.15.04 - 10:11 pm | #

jan wrote: "With your subtle radiance of love I resonate and in that moment you become an expression of love I feel for myself too." isn't that the magic of this whole game called life... reflecting that love for one another... illuminating those hidden doors to greater depth and adoration for love we feel for ourselves... ahhhhh!!! ashley | Homepage | 10.15.04 - 10:14 pm | #

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