How to Experience Love

[fusion_builder_container hundred_percent=”yes” overflow=”visible”][fusion_builder_row][fusion_builder_column type=”1_1″ background_position=”left top” background_color=”” border_size=”” border_color=”” border_style=”solid” spacing=”yes” background_image=”” background_repeat=”no-repeat” padding=”” margin_top=”0px” margin_bottom=”0px” class=”” id=”” animation_type=”” animation_speed=”0.3″ animation_direction=”left” hide_on_mobile=”no” center_content=”no” min_height=”none”]

Photo by Leonardo Sanches on Unsplash

Bringing love back into your life is a continual process of death and renewal. The world’s wisdom traditions suggest that we cannot know greater levels of love without knowing greater levels of suffering.

While some people are turned off by this concept, they still accept simple karma. There is always a give and a take. For every severe action, there’s a compassionate one to bring back the balance. And I don’t think these wisdom teachers of ages past are saying that we must endure suffering, or that we must suffer in order to love.

Transform suffering into Love

Transforming suffering is a well-worn path by most Buddhist scholars and teachers, so my intent is not to revisit the theory and methods here, just to remind us that other ways of being in the world exist.

We need a fundamental re-framing of what love is. For our purposes here, let’s say that love is an appreciation of everything that I have right now in this moment. The experience of love is connection…to everything at this time—experiences of suffering and experiences of joy are equally contained within my love when I don’t run away from them, but actually lean into the experience.

Our wisdom teachings are saying that there is an opportunity to transform the experience of suffering in this way. This is more available if we are willing to show up and meet the “negative ego” face-to-face. The negative ego being that part of us that blocks the full expression of who we really are. It’s that part that holds us back from expressing the true power of our divinity.

Everyday we are challenged not to be a Buddha as much as we are to relinquish what we think we know to make space for a new way of being in the world. It’s a choice. But it’s a choice we must make whether we’re conscious of it or not.

Not everyone relates to a missed bus or a thwarted attempt at a good night kiss the same way. It can ruin some people’s mental balance if another person cuts in front of them in line. A whole day can be rocked learning that your child got in a fight at school.

These are all teaching experiences. They are all the universe asking us a deep, fundamental question: How would you like to be (in love)? As a separated, self-interested consciousness, or an aspect of universal spirit collaborating with others for our collective greatness?

It’s all love. How would you like to experience it?

[/fusion_builder_column][/fusion_builder_row][/fusion_builder_container]

Radio Show Debut! Shifting Consciousness | Thomas Chavez

Radio Show Debut! Shifting Consciousness | Thomas Chavez

Hello, everyone!

 

We just launched our new podcast radio show, where we interview spiritual teachers, healers, and community voices. Each person has a unique perspective on spiritual growth, wellbeing, and the emerging paradigm.

 

For our first podcast, we interviewed Thomas Chavez, the author of Body Electronics: Vital Steps for Physical Regeneration and Cofounder of The Compass Way. Thomas was one of Oregon’s most prominent naturopaths, and has been on a journey of self-discovery and spiritual investigation for much of his life.

 

During this interview, Thomas discusses the power each of us has to choose our own state of consciousness. It is a myth that we are prisoners of our minds and emotions. In a matter of moments, with conscious intention, we can shift our operating angle.

 

There are 3 main divisions of human consciousness:

 

  • Self-Protection, the state of fear and aggression
  • Getting Along, the state of social adaptation and tension
  • Grace, the state of expanded awareness and flow

 

Through vivid memory, we can tap into any state of consciousness, particularly Grace. Most people have experienced one event or another in their lives when they felt boundless love, earth-shattering awe, fathomless peace, or divine joy. The key is to recall, as clearly as possible, such an experience and bring it to your awareness as if you were living it now.

 

Thomas distinguishes between 2 types of Grace: Disembodied and Embodied. Disembodied Grace is pure, diffusive being. There are no limits, borders, or confines. It is nebulous. Embodied Grace is being centered in your body, as a unique personality, while still accessing the Sacred. You are conscious and engaged in mundane activities, yet in tune with an aspect of Divinity.

 

To listen to the podcast, please click here.

 

You can find Thomas’s books on Amazon and can visit his website at www.thecompassway.com.

Are you consciously creating?

Are you consciously creating?

“As above, so below. As within, so without.”

I find it endlessly fascinating to discover examples where the macro-context informs or clarifies what’s happening on a micro-contextual level. Like to consider that, as our solar system travels through space, it’s creating the same pattern DNA strands do within our cells. Or that cell walls contain the mitochondria (i.e. power plants of our cells), nucleus, and other cell parts, like a city wall contains the structures inside that sustain it. Is it any wonder that we design computers with a CPU (brain), motherboard (circuitry/circulatory system), memory and power source similar to our own biological makeup?

We are all living organisms within living organisms, relations within relations. The quality of the food we eat affects our health, the quality of thoughts we think affects our mind. Are you a passive consumer or actively creating in these relationships? What relationships do you continue to feed, and which relationships do you let fall away? Rather than be trapped by your current relationships, make an effort to assess those relationships that serve you (i.e. best friends) and those relationships that don’t serve you (i.e. in my case, ice cream). And with that information, what are you creating?

I like to remind my clients that they’re always creating. The question is: are you participating consciously in the process?

Let me know in the comments below what you’re creating in your life.