Today, my love necklace broke. Not the chain, but the actual necklace—-the word LOVE.
I must confess that I am one of those people who gets attached to certain very special things—-to clothes that are totally natural like cotton or linen, and super comfortable. In the olden days, I had a cushy soft 100% white cotton sweatshirt with a scoop neck—-now extinct with only synthetic facsimiles unless for men and not very stylish. I wore this sweatshirt to its very end, then made rags for painting. Ahhhh. I had a hard time letting go.
When my father would have a favorite all-purpose jacket that sort of stood up on its own, he called it his “Ralph rotten jacket.” RR jackets were usually plaid and 100% wool.
If you ask any one of my 6 siblings if they have such articles of clothing, they will admit that they do, if truth be told!
Recently, I had a pair of white linen pants that I had worn threadbare and then ripped—-definitely in the RR category. It was very hard to let them go. My friend Patricia mended them for me. They are like wearing heaven, if you know what I mean.
Anyhow, back to the love necklace. I had worn this simple piece of jewelry since buying it in Salem, MA, in 2011—almost never taking it off other than for an MRI or to wear a special-occasion necklace in its place. It rested in the space between my heart and throat, like an angel.
It was inexpensive, and I received more compliments from both men and women for that necklace than any other piece of jewelry I ever owned. The gold chain cost more than the actual gold-filled piece of LOVE. It never tarnished, was pulled all about for 6 years, and it remained ever steady as a kind of “signature.”
I realize the power of the Word. As soon as I saw this piece, I gravitated to it, and saw it as a way of taking a stand for LOVE. Today, when it suddenly broke while I was at my computer, I felt a HUGE release. It was different than with the sweatshirt and linen pants. Love will not be confined to objects of attachment. It went like this:
Kathleen: Oh, you are broken!!!! Wow. Thank you so much for being with me for so long.
Necklace: You are welcome. You wore me well.
Kathleen: Do you want to be fixed?
Necklace: No. I am perfect this way. Just feel me always. Never forget me, no matter what.
Kathleen: OK. I feel you. I can do that. I am you. I am love.
I experienced a feeling similar to the way I felt when I first heard Leonard Cohen’s song, Love Itself:
The lines….
Love went on and on
Until it reached an open door
Then love itself
Love itself was gone
….echo in my mind.
Love itself was gone can mean many different things to different people. You can see how one person could write a story of unrequited love filled with longing and despair, and another could experience the freedom in no longer needing love as anything outside of the self. It is a choice. Yes. We choose.
The more authentic connection to your choice, the more free you become.
Then I came back from where I'd been
My room, it looked the same
But there was nothing left between
The nameless and the named.
Really feel into that!
Nothing left between the nameless and the named.
This is when a person is who they say they are. Maybe they don’t even say it. They just are. You feel it. You feel the congruity and integrity of the person. Not the perfection, but the truth of the person. The “Be The Change” quotient!
What you stand for= who you are and how you live day by day.
Your purpose is not what you do but how you live day by day.
Your word is your life, day by day.
