Co-Commitment 1

So these blog entries are getting more personal. It is a stretch I gave to myself, to express more openly what I want including my intentions and desires for a future partnership. It feels a bit like standing at the edge of a melting glacier. If I don't jump, it's going to calve with me on it being a bit messy. So I will just jump with intention and express and get real! A few months ago I created an intention to be married within three years and announced it to the Satvatove foundational class and to the universe. I have been harboring this desire for a long time, keeping it to myself embarrassed about wanting something so big and so personal. I used to be proud of not worrying about getting married or having children because I assumed it would just happen spontaneously... and by chance I would meet a great person and we would get along and he would make me feel at home and accepted. I still do not worry about it, as I have full confidence that it will happen, but now I have intention about what kind of partnership I will create with someone. I want to create a partnership in which we both are more creative, and in which we help each other grow in our individual spiritual journeys. I have experienced that when love and spiritual connection occured in a past relationship, issues that needed to be addressed came up. But this was the stuff that he or I wanted to keep hidden. Sometimes one or both of us did not want to face our shadows, so resistance and avoidance led to confusion and pain, and eventually the end of the relationship. In other past relationships, I got bored realizing there was no spiritual connection. In reflecting, I see how often I engaged in unconscious behavior, being grateful that a fun attractive smart person found me to be attractive, adventurous, bright and energetic. These seemed like traits I wanted to show the world, so I usually responded to these men. I am still attracted to fun, smart, attractive men, but I now choose to be in a relationship based in spiritual growth. This can only exist when we both tell the truth - all the truth about our experiences, fears, desires and feelings while knowing that these are not due to anything the other partner does or says, but because of our own filters, past experiences and expectations. I guess I was wearing a mask of "everything is fine, so you have to still like me." In realizing that I did not fully share my emotional experience, I feel sad that I had fear. But I also feel elated that I had a deep sense inside myself that none of these relationships were healthy enough for marriage. More recently, I started realizing that the shadows that were coming up were not related to the other person, but still, I felt sure that sharing my experience would scare him away. In some cases I did share my experiences and that did scare him away. And sometimes I was not honest with myself about the fact that I didn't even like this person very much! I will continue to do healing work to grow into myself and to dissolve fears and desires. I will do my best not to withdraw or hide. I pray that with a future partner, we will recognize the beauty of all the feelings with acceptance and honesty, seeing the process as the sacred pathway to transformation and higher consciousness. I will focus on being loving, whole, open, and clear. When I set this intention, I did it in the space of my spirit. I do not have a list of ways that I am going to meet people to find my partner. David Wolf writes here, "Intention is founded in spirit, and spirit is superior to matter. With clear intention, we find a way to concretize the result. Implicit in the principle of clear intention is the idea that, 'I might not know how it's going to happen, but I'm certain it's going to happen.'"

Dance in Question

With my new commitment to the exercise routines that I am doing most mornings with the "Insanity" DVD to condition my cardio- and muscular-self, I am finding dance. Today after my workout, I was warmed up and moving, so it felt good to turn on some dance music and move my body in a coordinated expressive fashion after the boot-camp style workout of Shaun T. This morning I woke up being in the question of how I share myself. Do I show myself deeply? Do I share myself fully and honestly? Do people get to see the depth of the questions, passions and emotions in my life? Do they get me? I decided to dance in that question. I danced 3 times to a favorite punjab indian song... I felt graceful, strong, coordinated, natural and like a dancer. I felt true, beautiful, divinely connected and energized... like I was breaking through an outer shell that gets thicker as I sit at my desk job. It hit me suddenly - something threw the message at my heart and it hit it hard - I am a dancer. I cried - a big block felt cleared in my awareness. I should have known this more in my full consciousness. Why did I not choose to see this before? I have known in the back of my consciousness that I am a dancer and love to express in dance. My mom used to ask me to dance in the living room for her and her friends when I was very young. This morning I envisioned doing an expressive improv dance piece and recording it on video. Thank you to my friend Vrinda for inspiration. I watched this video last night of her dance... I resonate so with Indian music. It was the punjab song that helped me fully express to open up to feeling like a dancer. I am exploring and it feels brave... exploring the morning's question and exploring the dance.