Love conquers all

Fill what's empty, empty what's full, and scratch where it itches. (on the secret to a long and happy life.) Wallis Warfield Simpson, Duchess of Windsor

I don't know who makes these days official, but June 3 is, "Love Conquers All" Day -- at least according to an email I received this morning with the above quote. And if it's on the Internet, it must be true, right?

I've often wondered about the idea that 'love conquers all'. Is it true? Just because you say it, does it make it real?

Truth is -- love conquers all.

It is we as human beings doing what we do that complicate it.

A girlfriend mentioned that to me last night when we met for a glass of wine. "Don't complicate things," she told me. "Ask yourself -- What do I want? What am I willing to do to have it? What am I not willing to do? Focus on you. No one else."

And thus, love conquers all.

When I am 'in love', all things are possible. In love, I move with ease and grace through my day.

When I am 'in angst' or 'in fear', all things are possible too -- just not necessarily with the ease and grace of my in love state and not necessarily with an outcome I want to explore.

Therein lies the conundrum. All things are possible. I determine the state of their unfolding in my life. I cannot control their unfolding. Only how I respond to their appearance in my life.

If life is viewed as a continuum, and love is the foundation of everything I do, as I move away from the centrepoint, I become out of balance, walking a delicate line where each footstep must be carefully measured to not tip the scales in one direction or the other.

In the centre, balanced on the solid foundation of love being all that I am and all that there is around me, I do not worry about tipping the scales. I focus on breathing deeply into the moment, feeling the air around me moving against my skin as I move with grace and ease through the moment.

In life, there are events that will trip me up, tip me over, tie me down. In life, love keeps me from falling into the trap of believing, the trip ups, tip overs and tie downs are what matter.

What matters is -- Am I being all I want to be in the moment? Am I creating opportunities for more of what I want to grow in my life?

As I lay in bed this morning, thinking about trigger points and all the stuff going on in my life, I realized that I was feeling overwhelmed by the enormity of some of the tasks at hand. Last night, as C.C. and I were walking with Ellie I commented that some days, the sheer number of wounded people I witness walking through our building, is overwhelming.

I work in a world where lives are continually out of balance, off kilter. I witness people doing things that hurt them. That abuse them. That destroy them.

And I cannot stop them. (Just writing that phrase causes tears to push up against my eyelids. I want to stop them. I know I can't.)

I can only bring my best to bear and hold a space for them to find themselves, where ever they're at. Sometimes, all I can do is hold out a plate of food in the hope that it will nourish their bodies and their souls.

In love, all things are possible.

I have fallen out of love with serving others. At least, from the perspective of doing it without wanting to control the outcome, change their lives.

I am powerless to change someone else's life. Powerless to force them to wake up, to get up, to get going in some other direction.

I have fallen into the trap of believing what I do is futile. That people will continue to destroy themselves -- and nothing I do will change that.

Truth is, people will continue to do things that will destroy them. I can't change what they do. I can change how I struggle with that truth.

I can let go. Surrender and fall in love.

I can move back to the centrepoint of my continuum. Balanced in love, knowing that whatever I'm doing, when I focus on creating more of what I want in my life -- love -- I let go of having to make other lives fit my creation. When I let go of being attached to the outcome, I turn up in love and trust that all will unfold as it's meant to be. My job is to experience the moment -- whereever I'm at. However I'm at in it.

Love conquers all. It's me trying to conquer the world that creates the problem.

The question is: What do you want? Are you willing to surrender and fall in love with where ever you're at to have all that you want in life?