My advice
Trip Start
Jun 30, 2008
1
7
15
Trip End
Jul 28, 2008
Nako,
India
Sunday, July 6, 2008
Somehow I didn't think clearly while we were talking and it wasn't until he had left that I suddenly realized what I had wanted to say to him. Here it is.
The only way of knowing whether you're following your heart, is by looking at how you feel.
If you don't, you feel bad. It starts like an itch and if you don't change course, it grows. Your happiness starts tasting less sweet although you do many things to obtain it. It feels like an appetite that you can't satisfy for more than a few moments. And the rest of the moments you spend chasing it. Eventually, if you don't stop following the mind (your own and other's expectations) blindly, all pleasure ends. Depression sets in, leaving everything in darkness. If you're still too stubborn to change, after you've chased happiness and ended up in a dark alley, there are only two options left: turn around or kill yourself. Change or die. And dying is not necessary. The happiness you looked for everywhere was always right in front of your nose - or behind and below it to be more precise. True and lasting happiness can only come from a heart that fulfills its purpose. Whether it's leading a nation or plowing a field doesn't matter. What matters is why you do it. Is it because it makes you feel happy, or because you think it does? Does it make you happy right now, or do you think it might in the future when all the conditions are right? But the future never comes. All there ever is, is right now. And whether you're happy or unhappy right now always comes down to how you choose right now. Am I doing what I want to do, or am I living in a future scenario pleasing abstract ideals?
You can't think your way to know what your heart wants. If you're used to going about life in a rational way, you're in the dark. You have to go blindfolded with only feelings to guide you. If you don't trust your feelings more than your thinking, you will have to learn. There is no other way. Happiness is a feeling, not a thought. When you get it, you get it.
We all fuck up. We're all basically thrown into a world we know nothing about, having to figure out who and what to trust. Of course we fuck up. Because most of us end up trusting people that aren't happy themselves. They haven't "got it yet". So we repeat their mistakes. But as long as we are many making the same mistakes, it doesn't feel so bad. Look at divorce rates. Could it be that our concept of what love is, is completely wrong? Don't most of us believe that love is something to achieve? And when you get it, you have to hold on to it? While in fact this is the exact opposite of love: It is fear driving us.. Fear of loneliness and failure.
Love can not be had. It can only be given away. Without fear and conditions. Most parents have noticed that their love for their children is much deeper than what they feel towards their partner. This is because they don't expect something in return from their children. If they could use the same unselfish approach with their partners, there would be no difference. If you love only because you want to love and set the ones you love free, happiness is inevitable. What it comes down to is fear. Fear destroys love and happiness.
A few words on marriage.
It is not divine and never has been. It's a social structure designed to maintain the status quo. Those that introduced it as holy, were people that hadn't "got it yet" themselves. They were, like you and me, confused about life and did the best they could. Only love is divine. If you truly love someone, why would you want to marry them when you know that true love never can be promised or expected?
We are taught that being alone is bad because it makes us lonely. Not true. You can be just as lonely with a partner as without one. Loneliness is a feeling and if you have it, you have it no matter who you're with - or not with and no matter where you are or what you social status and income might be. When you feel lonely, you're incapable of loving. No matter how hard you pretend, it is not love. If you can't be happy alone, you won't be happy with a partner for long. You will become alone and abandoned again and again until you learn to be at peace with yourself.
We have to be more careful who we listen to. This may seem harsh, but I have to say it. Why would anyone take advice on relationships from someone who keeps getting divorced and feel miserable most of the time? Why not learn from the people who are actually happy together? They are fewer in numbers but it's worth looking for them. And they're not all that hard to recognise. They smile a lot and they don't put blame on each other. Don't measure them by how long they've been together. Often real love relationships don't last forever. The relationship ends, but the love never dies. Both want each other to be happy, even if it hurts themselves.
Relationships are something to learn from. We use each others as mirrors to learn who we, ourselves, are. And as we learn and grow, sometimes we grow apart and need a different mirror or a time-out to implement what we've learned.
A simple example: How would you discover that you're jealous without someone else to show it to you? And if you use that information to look inwards and solve the issue, how would you know it was gone without someone else to show you? It's not only our partners we use as mirrors, but they are often those that know us best right now. It is those that you reveal yourself to, that in turn reveal something about yourself you didn't know.
Don't be afraid to look your fears. There is a huge freedom hidden underneath them. When you discover an irrational fear, look at it with curiosity and wonder how it got there in stead of the usual moral self-judgment. You will discover that the root problem is always a false belief. And I do mean always. The only questions that remains are then: Are you willing to admit that you were completely wrong? And are you willing to change?
M
Comments
My man Morten
I received the alterts that you have sent me four messages. Later this day I will find an hour to read your electronic letters with the attention they deserve. This message is to let you know that connection has been established. As I know from last year, it's good to know that people react, however short the message is.
As ever, your friend, with love,
Meeuw
PS Meeuw means seagull (Gaviota in Spanish) the name I chose for my camino blog. We are seagulls because we travel form the mountains to the sea.
Rabanal del camino
Morten,
Read all your stories now. Good advise of you I noticed: 'If you stop fighting the world, the world will stop fighting you'. Sounds like a good tip, specially with reference to our previous email discussion about the devil I was fighting. You know which one:). Is going well.
Soem news about my camino. Next week reunion with the hobbits in germany, Eliezer from venuzuela is coming over. Secondly I took an assignment as a volunteer in the Camino onformation Center in Utrecht. Tomorrow I;ll start ther to encourage pilgrims who will go in future. Nice 'job' strats with listening and hospitality. I will look at each new pilgrim coming in with curiosity about her/his unique story. ike you, from the bs, look at the splendid landscape unfolding.
Thirdly: got a letter from the Confaternity of Saint James, London, they are gald to accept my help as a hospitalero in Rabanal del Camino in the first twoo weeks of september 2009. A new horizon with renewed contact to the camino unfolds. I will not walk from refugio to refugio but I will stay in the refugio Gaucelmo of Rabanla and see the pilgrims walking by, day by day.
Thanks to the miracles of internet I feel more close to you then ever before.
May the road rise to meet you
May the wind be always at your back
The sun shine warm upon your face
The rains fall soft upon your fields
And until we meet again,
May God hold you in the hollow of his hand.
Love,
Joop