All stories are about relationships. And all of them, in one way or another, are love stories.
In this lesson, we will experiment in the quantum field of imagination, what some call the “imaginal” world, with a seemingly unlikely relationship, the one between love and death.
So, the basics: love we want, death we don’t. Love, however we conceive of it and experience is, registers as a positive. Death, in whatever way we’ve thought about it, shows up as a negative. We’d like more love and we'd prefer to put off death as long as possible, thank you very much.
What’s wrong with this picture?
Heading now into our imaginal minds, let’s pose an odd question: what if love and death are connected? If they are, in some mysterious way, then it becomes obvious that our positive/negative, good/bad, gimme more/stay away attitudes about love and death, reveal a fundamental and persistent conflict.
Let's examine these two components of our experiment. First, love. What is love? Most people think immediately of romance, and sex, and two people (or more). These days we’re expanding our concepts about gender and our understanding of the male/female dynamic is broadening from black and white into a rainbow. All of us have male and female aspects; what’s dominant in each of us and how they merge between us is unique. In fact, what’s becoming clear is that every relationship we have with another person is as unique as each individual is on their own. That’s progress!
So, we experience love in our relationships with each other, sometimes as romance, sometimes including sex, but always in friendship. What about the relationship we have with ourselves? Self-love is an issue for most of us and the unkind judgments we harbor towards ourselves invariably show up in how we treat each other. As we learn to accept and love ourselves, we tend to discover greater ease and joy in our relationships with others.
Here’s why. Just as it’s common knowledge that every character who shows up in our dreams symbolizes some aspect of ourselves, the same is true of our relationships. Every person displays a projection of something that originates in us.
Since we are all doing this simultaneously it gets complicated!
If we concentrate on self-love for another moment, we might ask this provocative question: “Who is loving who?” Which, of course, inevitably sparks another, more familiar question: “Who am I?”
How about this for an identity: “I am love.”
Read those three words a few more times to let the meaning echo through your understanding. “I am love.” This means that I am not just a son, a father, a writer, a mechanic, or a teacher. I am not primarily worried, optimistic, fearful, or happy. I am not first a role nor an emotional state. First, I am love.
“I am love.”
As love, which is not a thing or a person but a force, I flow through the roles I play and show up as the emotional states I experience. Let’s hold that thought for another few moments while we explore the second element: death.
What is death? Death is the end of our lives in these human bodies. Whether or not that is also the end of me and you can only be answered personally, when our time comes. Some who’ve returned from near-death experiences talk and write about a tunnel of light, meeting their guide, and reconnecting with their soul tribe. But brain scientists insist these are just fantasies, chemistry induced hallucinations. Who knows? I will and so will you, at the moment of death.
Finally, what’s the possible relationship between love and death?
What if death represents an expansion of love, through liberation from the limited experience possible in a human body? And since death is as natural and inevitable as birth, what if death is not something to be avoided, but something to anticipate, in the same way we celebrate a birth?
After all, it’s going to happen. Why not accept it? And why not look forward to it? We’ll find out what’s on “the other side.” That sounds exciting! I recently read about a personal development teacher who speaks about this in her workshops. She’s been condemned for encouraging suicide. I studied her work. She does exactly the opposite, and so do I. But she is fiercely criticized. Of course, because death is a taboo subject and anyone who dares to talk about it becomes a projection for the fear that originates in the ones demonizing them.
Now, to wrap up this experiment, here’s a declaration. Accept it for yourself, or not. Make up your own. But, in some way, please consider joining me in re-conceptualizing both love and death and embracing their relationship. This is the end of our story and the more we "know it," the better prepared we are to write a wonderful, loving, life story.
I am love. So are you.
Love never dies. Love was never born.
Love is the eternal force running the universe.
I am, you are, experiencing the love that “I am” in a human body.
This is a wonderful experience.
When I die, when you die, we will be liberated into an expanded experience of Love, capital L.
We can’t rush that moment because life and death
are inextricably intertwined. Our moment of death will dawn
in the natural seasons of our life.
Love your death and die into love.
