Secrets of Self-Love
Healing ourselves by opening to transcendent Love
Announcement: Men, the new circle within Brothers of the Ever Innocent Heart begins in just 5 days, on April 11th. This is a beautiful opportunity to embark on the journey of Men’s Work with an awesome cohort of conscious men who are about to ‘set sail’ together. If you feel called to join this new circle at its genesis, now is the moment to do so. Apply here, or reply to this email and let me know why you feel called. I’ll let you know next steps.
The only time to love yourself is now.
The only place to love yourself is here.
The only way to love yourself is exactly as you are.
You were never meant to be flawless or perpetually undisturbed.
You are human!
Not a sculpture carved in stone.
You’re a living, breathing poem.
Ever new, ever unfurling, ever refreshing itself, always a surprise, never predictable from one moment to the next.
Be honest about this.
Be with yourself as a living poem, not a motionless mannequin.
You are akin to a patchwork character in a Dostoevsky novel: Complex, layered, tempestuous, a conglomeration of many threads.
How do you know how your character ‘should’ be?
How do you know how your character ‘should’ feel?
Do you know better than God?
Do you know better than a Wisdom older than time?
No! Hah-hah!
This is the liberation, you see.
You are not an automaton who must act and feel and exist in all the ‘proper,’ culturally-approved ways in order to deserve Love. No!
Say it with me: “NO!”
A sacred “No,” for Nietzsche.
You are what you are.
What you are, cannot ultimately be said.
You are a child of God.
A flowering of the Eternal Mystery.
A dynamic, shape-shifting art-work crafted by the Loving Hand of the Creator.
Every hair on your head is of the Divine.
Your every whim and drive and impulse and emotion is an essential string in the total tapestry of what you are—and the total tapestry of God’s Infinite Creation!
None can truly judge or condemn any part of you.
And God would be the very last one to judge or condemn you, for God is uncaused Love, with no trace of judgment.
So, who are *you* to judge and condemn yourself?
Yet even when you judge and condemn and hate what you believe yourself to be, this too is part of your poetry, your music, your once-in-existence riddle. Even this, is absolutely allowed and essential.
So let it all flow through.
Wind through a hollow bone.
Let it all be.
Even the self-judging and self-condemnation, let it be. Let it run its course. Love it all.
The judge is a part of you, yet you are much more than the judge.
You are the one who watches the judge.
You are Emerson’s ‘transparent eyeball.’
You are the unconditionally loving Heart in which the whole dance moves, you see.
You are Love.
All of Life, is Love.
Let it all be.
Let it all dance.
When pain-filled parts of you knock on the window of your awareness, welcome them.
Invite them into the warm home of your Heart. Cradle them in your tender arms as if they were your own wounded children—‘prodigal sons’ and daughters who were lost or rejected, yet who have now returned to you, wishing only for your Love.
Just as “the stone that the builders rejected shall become the cornerstone,” so too shall the pieces of you that you once rejected, be the foundation of your own resurrection. Hold them dearly in the fires of your open Heart, and watch their apparent ugliness reveal its hidden beauty.
— Slug of Atmosphere
Ask each wounded fragment where it came from, what stories it can tell, what messages it brings, what it needs from you, and how it wishes to help you. Each part has a role to play in the orchestra of your being, if only you will allow Love to mend old lacerations and reveal the secret harmony.
The open and ever innocent Heart, is the keystone.
Its center is found in your chest, yet its true breadth is immeasurable. It enfolds you and all.
Hold all of you, at all times, as best you can, in the cozy Bonfire of the Ever Loving Heart.
This Heart is already all-present and all-active. Already loving all of you. It is simply a matter of opening to what is always, already there.
You are breathtakingly gorgeous, child of God.
Exactly as you are.
In all your triumph and all your ruin, all your completion and all your brokenness.
You are Loved beyond all reckoning.
Let yourself feel that.
Now and always.
Each day, a new opportunity to melt into transcendent Love.
Bear Hugs,
J
Afterword
Men, if you are ready to open to the healing power of Love, and to become more of what you truly are, apply to join us in Brothers of the Ever Innocent Heart.
And, for anyone seeking to deepen in self-love and heal through Love, you can read about my one-on-one work here. If you feel a calling to work with me, book a complimentary exploration call with me here:
Lastly, for anyone wishing to open more fully to Love, I invite you to listen to my new album, Jordan’s Heart Jazz Medicine For Our Grandchildren’s Grandchildren’s Grandchildren.
I loved this Jordan! So much beauty and wisdom in these words. Thank you for writing this. 🙂💙🙏