My last blog post centred on acceptance of the moment, but it also touched on awareness and regulation of emotion. Learning to take a step back and notice our automatic (and sometimes overblown) reactions to things out of our control can be a useful practice. In fact, I’ve recently taken part in a mindfulness group on emotion regulation. I’m studying to be an art therapist, and have noticed I’m a little too easily moved to tears when I’m with clients. It’s understandable, sure, but this could potentially create situations in which clients no longer feel safe as boundaries have become blurred. Therefore, it’s something I need to work on. However, today I’m writing about something personal, that’s actually all about letting emotions flow when need be! I want to share how I love. Let me be a little vulnerable with you. One way I show and experience love is with my tears. Sometimes it happens on my early morning subway ride to work, hearing a song that pierces my (admittedly quite tender) heart, or while writing my daily gratitude list. Feeling connected. You move me to tears as well. When you reveal your deep secrets and feelings to me, there’s a chance you may see something glimmering at the corner of my eye because I’m so honoured you’ve shared a part of yourself with me. I’m a teacher and there are these funny little moments during class when the pretense of authority falls away from me, and I just have a guffaw with my students about something or other that is marvelously stupid. I feel raw emotion, a tug at my heart. My face flushes, usually the first sign that the waterworks could begin. I restrain myself, but it’s there. Sometimes it’s a small child, doing something so novel, surprising, and ridiculous that I have to appreciate the stunning beauty inherent in creative action. Perhaps I am also mourning how much of that creativity we tend to lose as we become ‘adults’. That’s the thing. This love, these tears, this connection. Tears of joy, absolutely, but so often tinged with the melancholy of impermanence and loss. The tears spilled (in a public place) as I recently read the ending of a book that has touched my heart: The Four Agreements, by Don Miguel Ruiz: “I turned my head to the sky, to the sun, to the stars, and put a little piece of my love in every star, in the moon, in the sun, and they loved me back. And I became one with the moon and the sun and the stars, and my love kept growing and growing. And I put a little piece of my love in every human, and I became one with the whole of humanity. Wherever I go, whomever I meet, I see myself in their eyes, because I am a part of everything, because I love” My heartstrings are connected to my tear ducts. And I’m ok with that.
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February 2019
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