It’s ALL LOVE (And Sometimes It Hurts Like Hell)
I used to feel that all emotions on our polarity planet were rooted in either fear or love. That e-motions (energy in motion) rooted in fear close our hearts, and that emotions rooted in love do the opposite—they open our hearts.
I used to believe that “following your heart’s” guidance would guarantee a joy-filled journey and that opening your heart—and feeling emotions that are rooted in love—would be a pleasant experience, with a side of glitter rainbows and floating pink hearts. Right?
In my journey of growth and self-discovery however, this has not been my experience.
This past moon cycle is actually the first time I have intentionally journeyed with Pansy (RESONANCE) in the seven years since I self-published the deck. Also known as Heartsease Pansy or Johnny-Jump-Up, she has “jumped up” as plenty of my daily picks over the years but never as a moon cycle guiding plant spirit… and now I know why.
Her medicine is intense.
Deep. Heart-opening. And frankly, in my 10 year journey (so far) of remembering how to listen to and follow my heart, I’m not sure I would have been ready for it before now.
Of course, I believe there are no mistakes in the realm of spirit...
Consider, what does RESONANCE mean to you?
How do you feel when you resonate with something or someone?
What I have come to realize is that what resonates with me doesn’t always feel good—sometimes it hurts like hell.
A simple example: I deeply resonated with the understanding that it was time to let my deck go. I felt deeply that it was the “right” thing to do. Still do! But releasing control to the publisher has been a lengthy, uncomfortable process—and now moving through empty-nest feelings of loneliness and grief—there is a hole where my deck used to be.
There’s also disappointment (from unrealized expectations of external validation), you know, there’s no fanfare for my life’s work… no New York Times best seller list for me… 😂
There’s doubt (did I make the right choice), worry (where is my income going to come from now), and boredom even, as it’s deeply uncomfortable to sit within the unknowing of the creative void. All emotions rooted in fear.
What will be next for me?
My mind wants a clear “safe” plan, but my heart and my body deeply desire rest and deep integration of all the wisdom I have remembered before it’s time for new seeds to be planted.
“HeartsEASE or flow,” whispers Pansy, “is found in the surrender, in the letting go of attachment to “knowing” or planning and attempting to control outcomes. Ease is found in the acceptance of WHAT IS, without judgment.”
In other words, you are going to have to quiet the bossy, fearful and opinionated mind, so that you actually hear the whispers of your heart. AND, if you choose to follow your heart, you are going to have to feel ALL the feelings.
Pansy has been reminding me how to feel better… or rather, get better at feeling.
Almost every night this moon cycle, as my mind quiets down from the day's activities, my body begins literally thrashing around unable to get comfortable and experiencing deep muscle aches and pains rolling around my whole body from my head to my toes. Restful and restorative sleep has been hard to come by!
My mind retreats to dark places of fear—what is wrong with me? Do I have Lyme’s Disease? Am I having a heart attack? Did I unknowingly poison myself somehow?
Then I remember my breath.
I place my hand on my heart, (where I have a Pansy temporary tattoo to help me remember), and I call in gratitude and light and grace.
My heart softens and opens.
“Just feel it all. Really FEEL it,” says my heart, or maybe it’s Pansy.
“You are feeling all the emotions you have ignored and bypassed for so long. All the painful feelings, (and joyful ones too that you believed you didn’t deserve), that have been stored in every cell of your body this lifetime and handed down to you from generations past.”
“You are feeling the pain and trauma of the Earth herself moving through your body, her body, all bodies. There is no separation.”
“Remember how everything in the Universe is always in motion? Remember how everything is energy vibrating, and always changing? Dance, sway, stretch. It doesn’t have to be graceful. Move it around and through. It’s all energy.”
This is remembering how to feel. This is the healing process. This is growth. This is the Nature of the Universe of which we are a part. This is the power and perfection of our amazing human bodies which are always moving towards healing and balance.
And with gratitude for it all—every experience, even the painful ones—we can allow these emotions, this energy, to move through us to be released into wholeness, fertilizer for our growth and the growth of all.
I used to believe that all emotions on our polarity planet were rooted in either fear or love. My truth now is all there is is LOVE and that FEAR is an illusion created by our minds to keep us safe from feeling. Fear distorts the truth of who we are and what the world is, and obscures what Nature is always reflecting to me…which is LOVE.
All there is is LOVE/CHI/SPIRIT/LIGHT flowing and refracting through a billion different hearts that have experienced a billion different human stories of trauma, suffering, joy and fear, and every vibration in between. A full spectrum of heart vibrations, or frequencies, but it’s all the same light.
And all hearts, no matter how hardened and closed, deep down are longing to break open to the LOVE that they are.
“The world doesn’t want to be saved. It wants to be loved. That’s how we save it.”—April Peerless
As we grow and expand our consciousness we shed parts of ourselves that we have outgrown. Humans don’t like change because then their truth has to change, and we have to let go over and over again of all we used to believe or resonate with. If we don’t grow with it, or fight to control it, it hurts. If we let go and flow with it, it also hurts. But not in the same way.
Love is what nurtures growth, never force, never control. The way to open minds is through the heart. Through love.
Plants don't grow because we stand over them forcing them to do so.
The breaking open of our hearts is not a comfy process but it helps us to remember and to unleash the LOVE that we are.
Pansy reminds me that it is only with a direct connection and resonance with our own hearts and the unique expression of LOVE that flows through them, that we will ever know which path will lead to the “more beautiful world our hearts know is possible.”
Focusing on gratitude is the key, (alongside trust, compassion, and forgiveness) that opens our hearts to let LOVE in alongside the grief and disappointment and all the other e-motions that we are collectively feeling.
Pansy assures me that, with practice, we can all come to a place where we can hold many intense emotions at the same time, remaining present and without judgment, as we wildly swing between the depths of despair to the heights of joy and back again. As we flow with life and all that life is!
It is the ego mind that tries to protect us from feeling the hard feelings through the illusion of fear and that we are not safe to feel them. By attaching a narrative, and/or a judgment to every e-motion, our culture, friends and family, lovingly perpetuate the FEAR and we close our hearts further. But when we can understand all e-motions as joyful and/or painful expressions of love, we can let go of the fear of feeling them.
True freedom is when we are no longer slaves to the illusion of FEAR that is manufatured by our minds.
Not easy to express let alone practice, especially as fear is getting louder and louder in the outer world. Pain and dis-EASE are physical expressions of the repressed emotions of lifetimes and generations of lifetimes. My heart says that even so-called “evil” actions are the product of a fear ridden mind, and a closed and hardened heart, that has deeply forgotten the truth of who they are under layers and layers of trauma and pain.
Love heals. Love is all there is. This is my truth now.
Iris (INSPIRATION) last moon cycle inspired me into sabbatical— a great reset for my life—telling me that I have done enough for now and it was time for some deep rest to integrate my journey so far.
Pansy and my heart is asking me to stay there. I am not sure how long for.
My heart is calling me to return to my gardens, where this Soulflower journey began and spend as much time as possible in Nature, not just an hour or two every morning.
Working, or rather playing in my garden is where I lose track of time, where I am fully present with everything that actually is (happening) around me, and where my mind definitely takes a back seat to let my heart lead.
Lovingly I am noticing the fear that arises when I contemplate not tending to my Soulflower business for a while. Lovingly I am witnessing all the ways my mind and old habits override what my heart knows to be the highest and best direction for my life right now.
There is an overly responsible part of myself that is telling me that I cannot rest… but I also know that if I don’t rest I will have nothing left to give.
I’m hoping Hellebore (EMPOWERMENT) for the next moon cycle will help me begin to envision the seeds of what’s next. But it’s a process after all, and Nature never hurries… right!
Life is best lived by focusing on your heart's wisdom and dancing through all other distractions of the mind.
Does this RESONATE with you?
Thank you for witnessing me. May my lengthy rumination be of some support and inspiration for your own journey of growth, healing and self-discovery during these heart-opening times. We are not separate.
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Also in Plant Spirit Deep Dives
Wintering: Coming Back to Life
Over the years, the Soulflowers have lovingly helped me to understand change to be the natural order of things. They have helped me to trust completely in the inherent intelligence of Nature and the necessity of all the seasons to support life, sustainably.
We are cyclical beings. Life (life force energy) is never lost—it is only constantly changed, transformed.
Finding Grace
“All suffering comes from resistance to the truth of who you are. All suffering comes from resistance to What Is.” Milk Thistle adds.
Let that truth bomb sink in.
