Love can be tough : a sense of perspective

We all long for love.  I think some of us more than others if that love, attention and self soothing of hurt was not tended to in childhood by available parents, if someone left and that theme like the sad and agonising refrain to a painful love ballad just kept repeating and repeating in our lives.

For me the astrological sense I make of this is in the mythical figure of Chiron who got wounded in the Achilles heel by a poisoned arrow Hercules (Mars) left lying around his cave after a particular severe battle with the Nine Headed Hydra.  In astrology the Hydra relates to Scorpio/ Pluto and deep fears, demons, hurts and longings a human soul battles with and as hard as Hercules tries to cut off the heads of this beast they kept growing back.  It was only when he got to his knees in the mud and held the creature up to the light that a jewel grew in place of the severed heads.

Anyway back to Chiron.   The poison from this battle goes into his system and he learns so much about suffering through the experience, others come to him and he shares his wisdom, he helps them but his own wound never goes away.  It forms into a scar and will forever mark his life.   This was what I was trying to tell someone recently about my own hurts.  I see more and more clearly lately how they have defined my life and at times become self fulfilling prophecies.  I find it so hard to believe something good could come again or even come out of something difficult.

I am listening a lot to Sam Smith’s song Too Good At Goodbyes lately and it makes me cry I get visions of all the times either I was walked out on or walked away… too, too many times it seems and yet somehow I survived and on some days even get to feel good about life.  But what pains me about that song is how a necessary self protection can make us feel so different or cold or detached to what we truly are inside.   How it can block us opening up our heart. And to be honest I don’t think that is what I want any more in my life.

That must be some kind of miracle. What about if I just accepted this is my life, accepted I have this relationship wound but should not allow it to always dictate my life with fear, realised I could answer with love, realised that in the deepest part of my soul I may often feel alone but not all the time.  Lately I am realising how I do treasure those magical moments alone when sunlight streams in and through me and poetry rises up like a gift as I touch base with feelings that have always be a part of my soul but may also be capable of transforming through witnessing?  What if I stopped trying to ‘fix’ it and just accepted this is it and let change happen on its own organic schedule.  And the truth is sometimes I will find love and sometimes I will find betrayal.  How different would my life be if I just accepted this and surrendered?

I am still corresponding with my online connection.  I don’t know how he can give me a primary school he attended here in a very obscure suburb in a small local town he went to if he really is an overseas scammer…Or some other details.  I just don’t know.  When the money/flight issue comes up now he just asks me to forget about it and keep our connection.  I don’t really know what is going on but I won’t break the connection.  It is giving me something as my therapist says.   At least its connecting me to someone out there and so what if the beautiful words of love are lies and everything comes to nothing?  I am just going to take them in.  Its better than the critical voice that goes on and on and on in my own brain most days.  And I can then make a new plan.

I know the most important thing to start is to love ourselves.  To find ways to fill up that empty space from within.  For me I have my walks in nature, Jasper my dog, beautiful music, my garden and poetry as well as healthy food.  Two people reached out to me this week which was so lovely both on Tuesday (mars day).  But our own love is worth nothing at all if we cannot share it with others, even maybe with scammers (who knows??)  I m not suggesting allowing ourselves to be taken advantage of but taking things a little more lightly and with a sense of flexibility and sense of humor.

A sense of humour or irony was not a strong point or character trait in my ultra serious family growing up.  We all got to learn to take ourselves a little too seriously really.  Not that it isn’t important to think we are important and have value (are worth our own and other’s care and love) but it’s also important to keep a grounded sense of perspective.  I love the two AA sayings like “Easy Does It” and “How Important Is It?”  They are both great grounders and levellers in our increasingly frenzied manic world.  Antidotes to some of the anxiety, craziness and drivenness we confront on any day.

So for today I guess I am in a more peaceful place.  The moon passed over my natal Pluto Chiron opposition when all of this wounding and suspicion and doubt and mistrust issue came up this week.   Mars is on top of my natal Saturn so I am just perservering.  I watched a You Tube video on Mars Saturn Moon the other day and he said that with these aspects we feel as though our inner child has a bully on one side and a boxer on the other.  We get beaten up by our thoughts and doubts and fears all the time and fear taking action.  It wasnt an easy video to watch but it made sense of a lot for me.  For myself I would like my inner child not to be in such a desperate place, surely she is worth more than this after all these years why not surround her with love within and without, why not open my heart and mind and body and soul to unconditional love?

And as I look at my life now I do see all the gifts I have. Connection is growing for a soul who even a few years ago was so deeply buried in aloneness and disconnection, slowly slowly my higher power has been working in my life with my own help to deliver me from my dark night into a life that is, on most days, full of light and life.