Wednesday, July 22, 2009

Sword in the Heart



Sword in the Heart

Last night I saw, “Seduced and Betrayed” with Helen Hunt and Bette Midler. It takes quite a movie to hold my attention past fifteen minutes, but this was an amazing treatment of the enigmatic and paradoxical way human relationships unfold through contrary circumstance and apparent mishap.

The Piscean (in terms of two fish swimming opposite directions) movements of the soul were depicted in an insightfully touching yet non-sentimental way.

As the plot developed, awareness deepened in the main characters from unconscious reaction to conscious choice, culminating in the knowledge that even in committed love a person will hurt his or her dearest ones - and cannot help doing so. And that this is part of the wondrous mystery of intimate human relationships.

At the very end a Jewish fable was related of a father telling his son to jump, and that he would catch him. So the son jumped, and when his father caught him he felt love. And when his father did NOT catch him he felt something more: life.

Interestingly, the character stories portrayed in the movie were almost as convoluted, complex and improbable as my own real one – but not quite.

I also believe love means willingly bearing your heart to the sword of your beloved, but success in this requires practice. Perhaps pain appears in our lives as just that - target practice. And you can’t hit a target you don’t see.

It seems the way to be at peace with uncertainty and unresolved situations is to become fully aware of them. Once consciously embraced they no longer have the power to affect. They appear simply as aspects of the miraculously complicated and impenetrable life God has granted.

But if the prospect of bearing your heart to the sword is daunting, if the many contradictions and seemingly irreconcilable aspects of life present too much threat of pain, the tendency will be to push these under the level of awareness.

Once in the subconscious they are able to influence and affect freely and ceaselessly, bringing suffering into your experience - perhaps in unexpected ways. Thus the agony you hoped to sidestep comes regardless, but remains inaccessible to treatment.

Sometimes God catches us and we feel love. But sometimes He appears to miss.

That "fall," where God's catch wasn't there, is the sword aimed for our very heart.

We know it will hurt, so the choice is whether to avoid or accept it. To push it out of awareness or to make it as conscious as possible.

This is the life lesson that our deepest relationships bring to us over and over

. . . until we get it.

8 comments:

  1. Well Good Morning Count,
    Nothing like that level of intensity and Truth with my morning tea. I think I'll add a little more agave nectar. Yes, I do GET what you were
    able to convey through the written word. That's just amazing! See Polarity HAS a purpose!!!
    Sad for all those who just rest in the Light of Love experiencing only Bliss. Who knows maybe they have been in and through and they have earned their BLISS.I told the kids yesterday If an angel showed up and said I'll make you perfectly healthy and well .I'd say no.
    I explained I am learning too much from this experience, "a forging of the iron of my being."
    One day, i will be in and through then I will be ready to be in total Love/ bliss.
    I do however visit the bridge. Thank God for the Bridge, right?
    Thank you again
    <3

    ReplyDelete
  2. 'We know it will hurt, so the choice is whether to avoid or accept it. To push it out of awareness or to make it as conscious as possible."
    It's like the three of swords in the Tarot deck...pain that has pierced your heart to the core, sadness and fear from the past being brought into the moment and by not feeling and embracing it, giving free reign to the mind to project it into the future. Just this morning I was writing about the endless times I have broken my own heart, by allowing the swords to continually pierce it, by sidestepping and avoiding it all on my very own and then even slamming the emergency break on when Love comes to town...to give me a tour of my interior. To consciously fall on the sword and see it as a means to cut out the falsehoods and embrace others knowing they hold the sword of truth in one hand is to be a true warrior.
    Really appreciate your sharing CD.

    ReplyDelete
  3. ...by continually allowing the 'old' swords to pierce it over and over that is...hopefully as we move forward embracing and loving ourselves, jumping off like fools into the unknown they will turn into daggers, pocket knives...tweezers...feathers...;)

    ReplyDelete
  4. How deep it goes.

    ReplyDelete
  5. Thank you. I will take this insight into my heart, pierced and sore as it is. I had forgotten in my insular place the impenetrable mystery of the 'fall'. Thank you also to the one who writes about the conscious fall. It is exactly this embrace that I've been avoiding, yet seeking. Perhaps absolving the sword-carrier from the responsibility of healing the uncovered wound can only be accomplished through this embrace...

    ReplyDelete
  6. The Big Hug >-)---->... 'IN' ;)

    ReplyDelete
  7. Sweet nectar,...ummm....

    ReplyDelete
  8. Target practice for sure only you can't feel the jabs you don't see, eyes wide open cry and bleed and praise God for that crown of thorns.

    ReplyDelete