It has taken me over two months to gather the courage to share this creation. It was so personal that I would break into a sweat and my heart would beat fast at the very thought of any one else seeing it. The painting represented a burgeoning realization that was growing in my heart. The realization risked rocking my foundations to the very core:
One can love more than one person at a time.
A little kid would probably laugh. Its such a simple statement, and put like that it seems so silly! Of course you can love more than one person. Love is free and open by its very nature. The idea of restricting love, only makes sense, it strikes me, after religious and social conditioning take their inevitable grasp.
There are many ways to love, from that of a child to its parents, to that, in my case, of a man to a woman. Yet at the core its love. Why should it be restricted, constrained or limited in any way? Why should one be ashamed of feeling love-- romantic even-- to more than one person?
In fact, it would seem to me that even labeling or categorizing love as romantic, motherly, friendship, or otherwise limits it in a way that is counter to the spirit of love.
I've struggled with this idea consciously for the last four months. Unconsciously, for years. My conclusion is that all the reasons why one cannot love more are social and religious constructs that no longer resonate with me.
I've struggled with this idea consciously for the last four months. Unconsciously, for years. My conclusion is that all the reasons why one cannot love more are social and religious constructs that no longer resonate with me.
Intellectual and social constructs like 'finding the One' or saving 'True Love' for that one illusive life partner, have taken me out of beautiful moments with people and put me into the abstracted, hypothetical and non-existent future. Moments where I would have been lost in joy I was lots in anxious analysis.
There are so many silly thoughts that conspire to stop us from loving!
It strikes me that love is beautiful and the more of it one feels the richer and deeper one lives. The more we are in the moment with someone the richer and more beautiful our lives. It strikes me as profoundly beautiful to be able to love someone without commiting them or oneself to obligations in the future. I've had some moments like that lately and they have sky-rocketed off the charts of any rating scale I thought I knew. Rather than having a limited capacity to be only able to love one person, what in fact happens is the love you feel and share doubles and triples and just goes crazy.
Of course, things like honesty and candor become paramount. Indeed this is love. Ironically, my fears, trepitation and anxiety about Love have kept me from the honesty necessary to keep things clear. But I am working on it. I am facing those fears head on.
There are so many silly thoughts that conspire to stop us from loving!
It strikes me that love is beautiful and the more of it one feels the richer and deeper one lives. The more we are in the moment with someone the richer and more beautiful our lives. It strikes me as profoundly beautiful to be able to love someone without commiting them or oneself to obligations in the future. I've had some moments like that lately and they have sky-rocketed off the charts of any rating scale I thought I knew. Rather than having a limited capacity to be only able to love one person, what in fact happens is the love you feel and share doubles and triples and just goes crazy.
Of course, things like honesty and candor become paramount. Indeed this is love. Ironically, my fears, trepitation and anxiety about Love have kept me from the honesty necessary to keep things clear. But I am working on it. I am facing those fears head on.
Thank goodness for art. You can't hide yourself in art let me tell you. It all comes out.
This is one such creation.
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