Valentines day Bravery

So I got to thinking last night about all the misconceptions surronding valentines day. Some people feel it's a greeting card holiday, and is essentially meaningless. Others celebrate with chocolate, which i do love and appreciate but a part of me just felt like there was definately more to it. I also quite like the idea of  celebrating it as a love holiday, it makes sense, but still I felt as though there was missing piece of the puzzle.

Now I know the history of valentines day and have known it for quite a while but for some reason all I ever got out of it was"love". Maybe that's because I was too young to get the true meaning when I first heard the story, or maybe because when you're a kid all you really need is love, so there was no need to find an additional lesson in that story. But these days love isn't always enough. The more you grow up the more you realize that love often needs a companion..popular choices are often trust, and communication, but for Valentines day I think bravery is much more appropriate.



In case you're unfamiliar with the origins of valentines day, I'll give you a quick rundown.
Saint Valentine was somewhat of a defiant roman priest that lived during the 3rd century AD under emperor Claudius the 2nd. Claudius ended up banning marriage because he thought it would distract his soldiers from fighting the war. However, Rebel fatherValaentine was not buying into any of Claudius' foolishness so he continued to secretly marry young couples. Now if that isn't brave I don't know what is! I mean to do something you truly believe in even when you know you run the risk of being executed if you're found out, that takes A)an amazing amount of conviction and B) a steel set of balls.



So yes Valentines day is undoubtedly about love but it's also about bravery and conviction, and being true to yourself no matter the risk. Those are lessons we often overlook, but they're clearly the biggest part of the story.

Now with that being said take a moment to really let that sink in and think about your own truth, your own convictions, and be inspired to have the bravery to live them.
Today make it a point to not only celebrate love, but celebrate the bravery it takes for your heart to accept and give love openly, willingly, and without conditions.. because that in itself makes you absolutely amazing and akin to a warrior.

So I encourage you to go out take a risk, do something brave, say something loving, and feel like the awesome badass that you are.♥

Attachment Sucks!

I have an amazing amount of empathy, it's part of what makes me kinder, and gentler at times but also kind of haunts me. Not quite sure when i developed this, but it's a part of me now and i don't see it going away any time soon, nor do I want it to. The only downside is feeling stressed and worried, and hurt for someone else, even if you're not involved in the situation.

I think a lot of people get really good at turning off their emotions or maybe they've just mastered the art of detachment. Whatever the case may be, I've noticed not all of us have this issue with empathy. However, for those of us that do, it's definately a struggle. It's like there's an automatic energy exchange between you and someone else and suddenly you're the one feeling burdened even when you don't personally have a reason to.

I didn't even notice this was that big of deal until I started seeing a couple I cared about go through a divorce. I know there was nothing for me to do, and it was not my place to try to fix anything. I'd come to terms with the fact that everyone is going through their own process and sometimes there are difficult situations we choose to bring into our lives because they're necessary for our growth. I knew all of this but still I wanted to fix it. Not the marriage, but the hurt, and sadness, the anger, and resentment. It was then I realized just how much I felt all of their emotions, and how badly I wanted to stop. I wanted to fix things because I was at a point where I couldn't take it anymore, I was hurting right along with them and I felt awful.

Clearly I was too attached, to the people, to the situation, to everything. For several weeks I felt like I was being guided toward a single lesson...releasing attachments. And I understood that lesson on a superficial level before but now I really get it. I've peeled back the layers of that lessons and gotten down to the very core of it. Suffering comes from attachment. Now I know this probably sounds pretty rational and you think you understand that statement enough but odds are you don't. You can't possibly understand how deep that statement is until you've managed to disect it and proceeded to see and feel how it's relevant to every aspect of your life.

So today I challenge you to think about that statement "Suffereing come from attachment".
Think about what that really means for you in your life.
What are you attached to? how has it caused you some level of suffering?