Remain true to yourself, but move ever upward toward greater consciousness and greater love!

— Teilhard de Chardin

Greetings, Inspired Seekers:

Suppose that love is an evolutionary, creative process meant to unfold throughout our lifetimes? If that were true, how would that change us and, by extension, our relationship to each other and the world? How would that unify us, in all our glory, as intended by our Creator? These are some of the big questions that permeate wedding season in my mind and heart. Heavy lifting for the final weeks of summer – I know. But if we are to develop our spirituality, indeed our very being, then lift we must.

The greeting card writers of the world would like us to believe that love is a romantic adventure where two hearts become one, so similar that they cannot be separated. While that may be partly true, there is a deeper sense to love, a more profound and enduring richness available to us, a more complete experience of love that won't fit in a greeting card message.

That experience, I posit, is not the result of “two hearts becoming one” but, rather, as two hearts becoming more of their authentic selves, rising to their full capacity through exploration, discovery, discernment and acceptance. Two hearts, not schmussed (I'm sure that's a technical term) but, fully and singularly developed and breathing in sync with each other in sweet interdependence. Then, and only then, can we reach our full capacity to love, to offer compassion and, yes, to open up and fully receive it from another.

We are not well served – and neither is our beloved – when we lose ourselves to the other; music is most beautiful when the notes, fully developed and richly sung, are in harmony with each other. The richness eludes us when everyone sings the same notes.

Love blooms best and the notes soar when we evolve to our most profound heights, where we are our most authentic and deeply vulnerable and when we stand in our truest self.

Then, our notes unite, the music is glorious and we sing with each other uniting our most sacred and individual gifts. Sing out! Love on!

Grace, Fully Yours,
Reverend Deborah

Monthly Affirmation: As I develop my truest self, I experience love more fully.

The Reverend Dr. Deborah Darlington helps her clients develop and find their paths through the process of Spiritual Direction. She can be reached at GraceMatters@TheSpaceForGrace.com or 215 260 1611.