Love!

Week 23

I wrote this Hub two years ago. Enjoy. Oh and my friend's list is now nearing 1000 lol

I love you! No really!

I love you. Three words that get said without being meant but which also scare the crap out of people so much, they run from them. What is wrong with telling someone that you have love for them? What can BE so wrong about being loved? And what about the many forms of love? Can we tar those three words with the same brush for such a magnificent feeling? No, well I don’t think so.

I for one have been emotionally retarded, unable to tell someone I have love for them or that I’m IN love with them. I source this to the fact we were not told as kids growing up, that is not to say we were not shown love but it wasn’t verbal. I shall leave my childhood issues there and move swiftly on to the now. Is it more acceptable these days to tell someone you love them? Scott Miles on BBC Radio One tells all his callers ‘love you’ and they say it back. I hear teens on the phone saying ‘love you’ after a call.... to me this is a strange thing. It’s not wrong, just a bit alien to me. I suppose I’m always afraid they may think I mean romantic love and that I want to ‘be’ with them, rather than just saying ‘hey you’re a funny sod, I love you for your humour and how you make me smile’.

Or maybe that’s just me and my underlying fear of rejection? Afraid to say those three words cos they might mean that person flees before your eyes. Been there, done that! This brings me to another poignant point – why do we give our love to the wrong people? At what point does the rose tinted glasses go on and we fail to see what that person is really like? Love like that is painful and dependant on the other person to validate you as a person worth loving. That’s not healthy love. That love kills the soul and pushes people over the edge – sometimes literally. We have all been there though and most of us are better people for surviving that kind of love. I know I have. I am faced with embarrassment the things I have done whilst being in love that in hindsight you recoil at the sheer cringe-worthiness of it all. Is that love though? It sure as hell feels like it at the time but once again, upon reflection it’s almost like an obsession party going on in your head and the other person isn’t invited! You know it’s true, be honest.

So how do you define love? It is the true meaning of life (or should be) in most spiritual and religious paths. I believe that love makes the world go round. Well actually it’s the gravitational pull of the Universe but metaphorically speaking, we all strive for love, we all want love, we all want to be loved - anyone who says otherwise is lying to themselves. And I’m not talking about romantic love either, although that is what most people secretly yearn for. If you look at any book on Inner Child, or psychology it all points to the part in our lives when we stopped feeling loved. That’s when we developed our neurosis, our inner demons that we spend years and lots of money in counselling trying to overcome. Simply it boils down to the fact that love was removed, abused or denied. Bad things happen at the hands of messed up people because they are part of a chain of events that damaged them. So they damage others and the circle goes on. At some point though, we have to break the chain of our cycles and free wheel into unknown territory. It’s scary as hell. Knowing that at some point ‘love’ has damaged your hearts and minds will make you wary to love again, to give love, to be loved, to feel you deserve to be loved. That’s where I find myself. I have suffered and survived that destructive aspect of love. But what I realise is that is not what love really is. Love is pure and without cost, it’s an energy that we can all tap in to – it’s Universal. Without it we die or feel empty and dead inside. Oh you know that’s true too.

We love our new shoes, we love our cars, we love our new gadgets and we declare it to the world. But why can’t we declare that we love a stranger for making us laugh when we were at our lowest? Why can’t we say ‘you’re awesome, you make me smile – I love you for that’? Why are we afraid to express ourselves with those three words yet tell the world wide web what we had for breakfast? We share such insignificant things on these social networks but we don’t really express ourselves do we? We don’t tell these virtual strangers that are now part of our friends list that they mean something to you. I tried to have a cull of my friends list the other day, at nearly 700 it’s out of control. But I couldn’t do it. Even though I have never met the majority of them, in their own ways, they have reached out to me, they have shared their lives, they have listened to my problems and rants on my status updates and they have liked my life, my images, my opinions and become friends. People I will never meet are not without significance and cannot simply be culled. I have discovered a rich and diverse culture of people with so many interesting variances that I am richer from the experience. I can guarantee that when I am down, someone will say something to make me laugh. I have done the same for others too.

I said on my Christmas Day radio show that we are all connected and we should all take the time to observe the world around us. People fall and need catching. I have fallen and been caught. By a virtual stranger I added on the back of a comment on someone’s status. I let that person into my life and out of the blue, she read my cry for help and rang me up. That was an amazing thing to do. I felt elated that a stranger cared to do that. I am that stranger too. I have love to give the world but strangely enough, I give little to myself.

Now that’s another can of worms! How many of us have self-love? How many of us deny ourselves love because we don’t think we are worth it? How many of us don’t love ourselves? Now come on, be brave. Chances are if you are overweight you don’t like yourself much. True enough for me. But I know that love myself, I will feel better about myself, I will lose weight. But I don’t. I look at myself in the mirror and think ‘yuck’ why would anyone want that? And that vicious cycle is what keeps the weight on. And you know what? Love put it on. It did, honest. When I was in love and happy with myself, I lost weight. When that person extracted and denied that love to me, I turned on myself and gained weight. That weight is emotional baggage. And it’s so hard to lose, maybe I should take it to Heathrow, they lose luggage all the time.

You know you don’t need someone to make you feel validated, to feel loved but it helps. There’s no feeling in the world more euphoric than being in love. We shine and glow with it. And then it’s gone....here we are back to co-dependence love. How do you break a habit of a lifetime? How do you banish those demons that haunt you? How do you go on to survive a broken heart – romantically, betrayal of a friendship, rejection? All of these are ugly things. Yet we are reminded in Universal love when we stand in awe at a glorious sunset, at a babies smile, at an impromptu hug from a friend ‘just because’, a phone call from a stranger when you are down..... this is love at work.

I love you because you are you. I smile at your words, laugh at your humour and inspired by your life and what you do. We are all unique. Love is Universal and fills us all. Pass it on. It’s just three words and world may just stop spinning if we forget that. The best thing my sister Rachael ever told me is that ‘you get the love that you think you deserve’ – truth hurts. If you don’t think you are worth it you will continue to attract negative relationships. Love yourself – go on give it a try. I will if you will.

Let yourself be loved. Until you do, the weight won't shift, you won't find your true love and even if you do, you won't feel you deserve it and wil repel it. The hardest thing to do is to break the habit of a life time. It's ok, you are only human after all. Was that an 'aha!' moment? I wrote this from the heart. I put it out to the Universe. Lets see what happens... thank you for reading this. I'm great at giving advice, I just need to heed my own - don't we all!?

Love really is all around. Look and you'll see it.

C is for Clairvoyance

Minsden Chapel

I was in bed, trying to get to sleep but you know how your mind spins and you try and clear your mind but nope, it's not going to let you get to sleep. Then I started coughing. How annoying, especially as I didn't have a cough before I tried to get to sleep.  So I got up and got a note pad with the intention of writing my thoughts down.  I wrote three lines. Then I thought 'I know, I'll make a video blog' and got my son's tablet, which then turned out, didn't have a video function. So I made it using my iPhone, not at all flattering and the picture quality is pants but you can hear me. Incidentally, the cough went as soon as I'd finished. Hmmm!

I realised afterwards that I'd gotten some dates wrong. I don't know what it is about me and time but when I try and recall things and the date they happened, I can't.  Usually I try and gauge how old my son was when it happened and that usually gives me a good idea what year it was. Seriously! Lorna fell out with me prior to 2002, so I can't have gone with her to Wales in 2003-4.  Luckily I take lots of photographs and I can check the dates, only the Anglesey pics were pre-digital camera, so without going through hundreds of negatives, I can only approximate the dates to when I was still living in my flat, so 1999-2001. How pants is that?! The Petre Ifan trip with my first visit to Stonehenge and Silbury Hill was in 2004 but just me and my son visiting our friend Red in Tenby.

That is the result from a lot of personal trauma that has blocked out so much good information. I remember all the bad but only get flashbacks of normal things I did as a kid or teenager or pre 2002.  You don't need to know the ins and outs of it but it defined me for a time, I think 12 years on, I'm finally working my way through it all.   Anyway, the video is about 40 mins of me having an honest chat about my beginnings with finding my clairvoyance abilities and the person who was a very important part of that. It's also a look at how hurt can create hate and what a waste of time that is.  I do regret that Lorna and I never made amends before she died, but I do believe she has since, as I describe in the video. So here's me, saying thanks Lorna. I still remember the hurt but I now remember so much more of our time together as friends. RIP.

Lorna Summer 2000

All

Hylo again!

Well it's the early hours of Friday and I'm itching to get my next blog out. I've lit a candle on my altar, lit a shalimar joss stick (so hard to get hold of now) and have some Nigel Shaw playing. What's this... and some honey jack and mead to hand. Ace... so let's start.

To be or not to be

To be standing in the sun

To be bathed with light

To be intouch with yourself

To be surrounded by natures beauty

To be part of spirit

To be one with it All

To be one with it All

Standing in the sun

Arms stretched out wide

Twirling in the sunshine

Absorbing the healing rays

Soaking in the light

Feeling elevated and free

At one with it All

A physical body

A free spirit

As it should be

We are all connected. You've heard of the 7 degrees of separation and those on Facebook, are always amazed by 'mutual' friend connections. With the advent of the internet, this is becoming a very small world indeed.  There are other ways of being connected of course, those who are open to the All can link in to people and the places around them.  I haven't tried to explain this before, it's more difficult than I thought.

The moment you climb over the sand dunes and see the vast expanse of the sea. The salty air whips your hair in gentle wildness, the waves crash on the beach and the gulls cry.  The sun breaks through the clouds and beams on the sea.  Or maybe the moon reflecting millions of smaller moons on the forever moving surface. That moment you feel in awe of the scene, the rawness of nature and feel that awesome connection to the All.

(Click the pictures to view full sized)

Whitby Regatta

Oh the moon! You step outside to empty the bins and look up to the clear nights sky. Stars and planets beam their lights down and we feel part of it All.  Small in the great Universe but still part of it. Or my personal favourite, you're lying in bed and the full moon fills the world with silver. So you open your curtains and lie there in it's silvery liquid magic. And it is magic to me.

That moment you're standing near trees and can hear the wind blowing the leaves, reminding you of the sea as it hits the beach.  The feeling of growth under your feet as the roots reach down, the bark and the endless patterns before you as it envelopes everything, the colours of the leaves and the dapples the sun makes.  The sense of beauty and life and life within this living ancient thing. Connection to the spirit of the All.

The way you can stop walking in a seemingly plain place and stand there, still, absorbing the life around you. The birds calls - mating, protecting, warning, greeting.  The little usually unseen creatures darting past like you're not there.  The grasses waving in the breeze. The river eddies swirling, rippling, running forever on as life goes on under it's surface.  The clouds up above - huge rain clouds or high wispy ones. The colours of the day as it starts and ends - the world as it becomes lighter and darker.

Princes Risborough

Watching our creatures of the the world. That moment an owl swoops across your vision as you drive along, lit up by your headlights, a ghostly wonder. I love seeing owls, it makes me smile.  Or seeing a huge buzzard being chased off by a gang of crows.  Crows... I could watch them all day! They don't take any shit of anyone, regardless whether it's prey or maybe a great hulking grey heron. They stand their ground, chase off any invaders and protect their territories.  Their calls change in the year too. You get the spring time calling of their territories, their body bobbing up and down with each shout, tales go up.  Then there's the mating game shortly after this.  They seem to go somewhere for a couple of weeks in the summer and you suddenly realise it's been rather quiet outside, the usual racket has dimmed.  Then they are back.  Crows are fun to watch.  I used to spend hours gazing out of the window at their antics.  That is where my name comes from... which is for another blog!

White Crow

Crow at Castlerigg

Then there are the extraordinary places. Those truly sacred places built to honour something long gone from a world that demands evidence and proof or reason.  Yet these places tap into something deep inside our psyche and wake us up. We are drawn there, we feel the need to gather there, to raise our cups and give thanks to our ancestors who built them thousands of years before us.  These places can be a great stone circle, a burial chamber, a henge or perhaps ancient woodlands with trees that saw out world wars, some times hundreds of years old, standing guard, watching over Time as it sifts past.  We connect to our ancestors there, we wonder how they built these great stone circles and why.  The scenery is usually wild and spectacular too, add the rising or setting sun and the world around this space explodes into colour.

As I said to Warwick Davies whilst filming at Long Meg last summer; each place is different, each place has it's own special kind of energy.  Long Meg is peaceful, serene and calming. Castlerigg was described by a friend of mine as buzzing and feels like you've been sandblasted clean.  Stonehenge is a wonder. You drive down the road and there it is - a WOW feeling, inspite of the fences and the fact it's being milked as a giant cash cow.  Avebury - each part of it is different. It's best to go when there isn't a Gorsedd on!  I find it peaceful and it radiates great power too.  My favourite place is Uffington White Horse. Over 3000 years old, 'ta'int how a horse looks like, it's how it be'  (as Terry Pratchett so aptly describes it via Granny Aching). The sky is huge under that hill and those hills just pop out of a relatively flat landscape. It's almost like someone has tried to fold it into pleats too. At the bottom of the hill is Dragon Hill. At the top of the hill a mile up the path is Waylands Smithy.  You can't help but stand on that hill, by the Eye and get lost in the world surrounding you.

Filming at Long Meg

Long Meg and her sisters

Uffington White Horse

Avebury

Stonehenge

Uffington White Horse - one of my all time fav pics

For those moments you stand there, connected to All around you. It takes your breath away. You are aware of that moment that you are part of it All. All of this without adding people, ritual, ceremonies, mead or a specific day of the cycle.

Meridians - we are all connected.  Before getting absorbed in coloured candles and all the trappings of ritualised dogma, take the time to connect to the Universe first.  Plant your feet in the richness of the life all around you. Feel the life forces in everything.  Become part of it All.  Otherwise, without that connection, you have no real power because you cannot truly understand what you are not really part of.  How can you heal if you cannot connect to the Universe, to channel it, to be the vessel? Exactly!

I'm proud to say that took all of these images (more here). I see the world and capture it for a moment. My final word is you can find beauty in anything if you plug in and open your eyes, all your eyes.

Love really is All around!