I had never been so close to swans before.
They’re so tall… When they stretch their necks, so tall.
I loved them.
‘I have a relationship with them now’, I said to Anadi… We were so close, they took bread from my hands (I was glad of my gloves!) in their big strong beaks and I felt such love for these creatures that came to me for food… But that didn’t matter, I was close to them and I loved them. I didn’t need them to love me back, or want me for anything other than the food I held in my hands!
I was happy to be near them.
Like the squirrels and the birds and the parakeets… So honest and transparent and true… Like we all are really; if we just dropped all the masks and the pretence and stopped looking for love – for approval, for validation, for recognition…
And instead turned inwards to love ourselves so completely, to accept ourselves, to become whole again and return to our innocence.
Our true nature, and to know that is love.
We are love.
It so easy to love a baby, a toddler a little child, a kitten a dog a horse – a sweet wild squirrel that climbs up your leg…! Because they are true, relaxed, themselves – not trying to do anything or be anything…
Other than be themselves.
But – so often we were not accepted as little children for the way we were – but instead were shaped to the ways of others…
And so the pain began, the journey away from love.
And the quest to start looking for it all over again outside ourselves, when it is there within us all the time.
But while we search and search, ‘the other’ can serve as the mirror – and often a magnifying class when the relating is closer and deeper – for us to see where we have become separate from our
Self
And so we can become whole again through this outward journey when we learn again to look within… And discover that instead of love being about wanting the other to love us, instead love becomes about loving because it is fun to give love, to share love…
Whether it is a swan a squirrel the person you pass in the street – or buy your coffee from in the morning – or your partner or child or best friend or not
Love because love is what you are.
True love is without ego
True love is freedom
‘Your task is not to seek love, but merely to seek and find all the barriers within yourself you have built against it’ Rumi