Sundowns are Golden

One of my core spiritual beliefs is what is meant to be will always find a way- that things work out just the way they’re meant to in the larger cosmic sense. Our hardships are lessons, opportunities, experiences that we can use to enrich ourselves as human beings. The universe teaches each of us exactly what we need to learn, when we need to learn it.

I make peace with struggle and loss and heartache by finding the lesson, the meaning, by accepting my tiny place in this big ol’ world. Whether it’s luck or strength or the support I have, my life has evolved in a way that allows me to look on the past with this lens of faith. Whatever happened yesterday put me where I am today, and today’s purpose is to prepare me for tomorrow. This isn’t where I operate from by default- it’s a level of grace I attain through enough grasping and doubt for approximately half a dozen people.

Over the last three months, I’ve fallen in love with one of the most incredible men I have ever known. Knowing and loving him has spurned a transformation in me that I always knew I needed, that I always knew I was capable of, but that I never could quite pin down. His character, his perspective, his way of living and loving, even his flaws; everything about this man just hit the very center of my heart with the stunning accuracy of a carefully thrown dart.

He unlocked a gate no one had ever reached before, and just as it’s written, I had absolutely no control over the rate with which he threw off the locks. He didn’t either, and he would have rather had some say in the matter.

“The very essence of every woman’s heart is the peak of wisdom, the peak of inspiration, the peak of sexual desirability, the peak of soothing, healing love. The peak of everything. But it’s protected, for good reason, by a series of concentric walls. To move inwardly from one wall to the next requires that you intensify your capacity to devotion, and as you do so, you are rewarded with Grace. This is not something you can negotiate verbally with a woman. She doesn’t even know consciously how to open those gates herself. They are opened magically and invisibly by the keys of worship.”

The beautiful irony of that, though- he changed me forever as person by telling and showing me how to allow my intensity without taking it so seriously. His manner of worship- the devotion that unlocked that inner gate- was his ability to absorb my intensity without indulging or denying it. He simply held it in silent acceptance and gently, respectfully, lovingly, patiently put it in perspective. Because of the type of man he is, that isn’t anything he doesn’t give to the other people he makes room for in his life, though I probably did require more loving patience than any of them. Which is the other gift he’s given me: a little more patience of my own, both by trying mine and by giving so much of his so gracefully.

And now the universe has called on both of us to learn some very important lessons, work that must be done alone.

For the first time in my life, I face the end of a romance without anger, hurt or doubt. The circumstances surrounding our parting and the discussion that we had leave me with nothing but gratitude, sorrow, and a deeper love and respect for him. In fact, it isn’t even the end of the relationship, in the sense that we plan to remain a part of each others lives, just a significant change in tone.

My understanding of love and life is we have everything we need within us, but some are seeds that lay dormant until the conditions are just perfect for germination. Our time together, who he is as a person, they just created the perfect environment to sprout this seedling of enlightenment.  I have to raise it on my own, that fruit must come from my effort and not the loving direction of another. This is the only way I will ever really be whole. By doing for myself what he did for me- to hold my intensity in silent acceptance and let it slip away like smoke on the wind instead of reacting with grasping and attachment or shame and fear. That is my lesson, the work I need to do.

I can only hope that I’ve sprouted some seeds in his soul as well, that I’ve given back some small measure of what I’ve received, and that those seedlings will prove valuable for him in his own work.

and some things are over
some things go on
and part of me you carry
part of me is gone

but you got a heart so big
it could crush this town

-tom petty “walls”

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