|
Meditation: Let Us Talk of Love
By Bob Murray, PhD
Walk through the gardens a bit with me. From the knoll to the right of the house you can see the mountains: snow capped peaks silhouetted against a pale blue sky. And through the gaps and beyond, far beyond them the sea, the beginning.
Between here and the knoll is the maze were you can get safely lost and beyond that the formal lake and a small dinghy to sail across it. You get to the dinghy through the maze and over the lake to the knoll. It's an easy process if you take my hand. My hand will give you courage, and peace.
The first step is the hardest, convincing your body that it's young enough and your mind that it needs the rest that the maze brings. Your senses, perhaps, also need to awaken and the flowers in the formal gardens beckon.
Oh, I know it's hard to leave the house. Here in each of the many rooms is a bit of your past--memories of people and events that you dwell in and on--and your future. There is the left wing where you were born and where your parents still live, even if they are dead. Your childhood was spent in the wing's confusing corridors and staircases. In the right wing of the mansion is your future--it's an area you've thought about but never had permission to visit. You're allowed to peek in one room at a time, but someone else has the key.
It's hard to leave, I know. Even when you see the world outside, even when you know that there is a pleasant world outside, it's hard to leave. It's hard to leave even for a while, even with me.
Come, take my hand. I will lead you down the steps at the front of the house and into the gardens. Let us talk as we walk together.
You want me to talk of love--of caring, of support, of being there for you. You who find it hard to be there for yourself. You find it hard to love yourself. In the house every room has a mirror by which you define yourself. You move from room to room yet the image you see is always the same. Someone else's you. How can you love what you do not know? How can you love a reflection?
Sometimes you see the future as devoid of love for you. How can it not be so when the wing of the future is also full of mirrors and identical reflections? How can there be love where nothing changes? Where the future is a mirror image of the past and there was no love in the past. But out here, in the garden, there are no reflections, no stasis, just process. And beauty at every stage of that process.
Come, let us enter the maze. A maze is a future and a process. Dead ends and setbacks, double backs and progress. Living walls and living avenues. At first the possibility of the possibility. Then the probability of the possibility and finally the certainty of the possibility. And the possibility is Love. Love is at the center of the maze. It is this that the maze is for. Love without mirrors. And you are here with me, your hand in mine. However you start you can reach this center. As you find Love, you find love of you.
Past the maze there's a flowered walk to the lake and the waiting boat. There is a gentle breeze of supporting spirits to fill the sail and to take us over. Come!
"Let us talk of Love," you say as we cross. I am silent. Love is talking through everything. Through the waves as they lap against the hull, through the breeze, through the birds, through sounds so subtle no human ear can hear. Yet the mind registers each cadence of earth and sky, each nuance.
"Let us talk of Love," you say as we reach the far side of the lake and climb the knoll. Here the mountains call. You glance back toward the house with its denial of love and wonder how you believed the mirrors. And then your gaze is fixed on distance. On the beginning.
"Let us talk of process," I say.
"Yes, let us talk of Love."
Top of page
RELATED LINKS
Check our event schedule for workshops and seminars.
!-- #BeginLibraryItem "/Library/body_authors_bob.lbi" -->
About the Author
Dr Bob Murray is a widely published psychologist and expert on depression, post-traumatic stress and relationships. Together with his wife and long-term collaborator Alicia Fortinberry, he is founder of the highly successful Uplift Program, and author of the new book Creating Optimism: A Proven, 7-Step Program for Overcoming Depression (McGraw-Hill, 2004). They offer seminars, courses and audio-programs teaching people how to beat depression and improve self-esteem by creating healing relationships.
Do you like our site? Recommend this page to a friend!
|
