I Love, Therefore I Am

I noticed of late the pull to be reclusive, again. I have lived with that in the background, and often enough in the foreground, for my entire life. What was also occurring during this time was that people that I love were coming to mind and, at moments, they left my mind and I instead felt them present in my experience. It was as if some essence of them was right here in me. As I contemplated this, I deliberately stopped “thinking” of them and simply invited them in. Over a period of days, dear friends and family seemed to be transiting through me. At times it felt like I was a mixture of myself and them, which I found quite easy to do. I felt their nudging energies blending into me, sometimes collectively. It is perhaps best imagined as being in pre-boiling water, considerable movement but warm and gently caressing.

What came to me was that the call towards reclusiveness might actually be the pull of the essential consciousness of each of these loved ones, acting collectively as a kind of magnified gravitational field. I might not be seeking to be solitary, but to be immersed within the many beloveds of my life.

At one point in that field, I let go and felt the rushing motion of moving into them, into that Many, and being joyously welcomed home. Moments later, I felt the Many rushing back into me and this core, this solid “I” was welcoming them back to the home that they were seeking. Back and forth We went.

In this moment it seems to me that all of the frequencies that I’ve been immersed in these many decades might just be the caresses of love in an infinite dance, leading and following, as the oscillations of I and We. This I/We is joy’d. Joy’d in the inhalation of love from the many and sharing that accumulated joy back into the ecosystem of the Many as the exhalation of this particular collective I/We. A natural breathing in and breathing out is taking over. It knows the way.

It certainly seems that I am the We of those I love and who love me, both the living and those who have passed on. I am sure that it extends beyond them but it certainly begins with those with whom I most naturally resonate. I am a fluid singular I that in some way is that We, as our resonances are always entwined. And yet often the collective energies that are present at a given moment are compacted and become experientially focused as a solid, individuated “I”. It is a matter of where and how attention is focused and it seems likely that this has always been so. I have newly conscious ways of perceiving. I can experience myself as a porous, loosely focused aspect of a blended We; as a compacted collective I – focused, lucid and distinct; or as an infinitely modulating dance between the two. It is clear that, whether in focused or unfocused form, without them I would not be. It appears, at least at the moment, that I exist only as some vortex of interrelationship, which oscillates between an expanded unfocused We and a compacted collective momentary I. I give back my gratitude, my appreciation and my love into the ecosystem of the Many when I experience myself on the leading, more uni-focused, side of the dance and I accept theirs in kind when invited to be the follower, to let go and be led. Bidirectional joy radiates at all times. This I/We is blended into the collective love that they are, in their web of loves, and we co-create ourselves in our joint oscillating resonances.

As we are joy’d by this inter-webbing, Being is joy’d in our recognition of, and active participation in, the ongoing joyful interplay of welcoming in and gifting out.

When I texted a friend with my thought of “Without those I love, I would not be,” his response was “So…..I love therefore I am?”. YES, that’s perfect.

I love, therefore I am