It changed everything

The title of this blog post above is taken from a great newsletter email that I receive regularly.  A girlfriend told me about this website that sends affirmations that are tailored to your personal wishes and dreams.  The website is called Tut's Adventure Club.  You register with them, fill out a brief form and then you begin receiving these wonderful, positive, happy emails from The Universe.  I encourage anyone reading this post to check the website out at the link provided above. 

Now, to get back to my point.  Today's email from The Universe was as follows:

"Thanks, Dawn, for every single time you ever fell in love.  Whether or not it was obvious. Whether or not it lasted. And whether or not you were loved back.  It changed everything." Notes from The Universe

That was such an electrifying comment to me!  How beautifully simple and concise a thought to ponder.  We as humans are more apt to focus on the attendant baggage of love, aren't we?  "I loved him, but..."  or "It was almost perfect, except for..."  or "If only..."  or "What if..." Do any of these sound familiar? Who hasn't had at least one, if not all of those thoughts? It's so much easier to get distracted with all the detritus of a romantic relationship, and indeed, many of those details are very important and deserving of our focus. There is so much more, however, to remember from past relationships, with much of it being positive. 

This note from The Universe in my Inbox just stopped me in my tracks.  I call those "polarizing moments", where a thought, a book, a remark - something grabs your attention with such impact that you are literally forced to stop and ponder.  Personally, I love those moments.  They cause me to consider different angles and perspectives that I might not have reached as quickly if left to my own slower approach. I might end up not agreeing with the polarizing moment, I might not adopt that new perspective, but I always come away from those moments changed.  I always learn something new about myself.

How refreshing a perspective from which to view love.  If we're alive, we're going to meet people, fall in love, fall out of love, be blissfully happy, plumb the depths of despair and feel every minute facet, shade and nuance of love.  Love found, love lost.  The loves lost are usually ones that spark feelings of regret, anger...a whole boatload of negative emotions.  How freeing, may I say, is it to draw an imaginary mark on our personal journey or calendar and say that perhaps this is the moment that I learned to think about past loves in a completely different light?  I kind of like that idea.

We are all the sum total of our experiences - the good, the bad and the ugly.  Change an experience and you change who you are today.  Obviously, we can't turn back time and cherry pick the moments.  I think most of us can admit that the difficult times, difficult relationships and memories taught us valuable life skills.  "I'll never do THAT again!"  Right?!  I've had plenty of those epiphanic experiences, haven't you?  And I'm a more balanced, more richly evolved person as a result. 

Today, as a result of that lovely email from The Universe, I am reaping one of those unexpected lessons that I always find such a delight.  I've shifted my habitual tendency to view past loves with predominantly wistful perspective.  Mind you, I don't dwell in sadness or negative thoughts in regard to every single romantic relationship I've had - many of them make me smile when I look back. 

I just happened to feel very struck by the quote above - having loved anyone, anything, anytime, is never wasted or misplaced energy.  I have always firmly believed that to be written in stone fact.  I do not regret loving anyone.  I have, however, regretted some of the outcomes.  The above quote magically lifted that need from my heart - it is simply unnecessary.  Instead, I choose to focus, from this point forward, on the fact that by the simple, open hearted act of loving, this can be nothing but positive, uplifting and lasting.  Perhaps we might not see the repercussions and outward ripples of our moments of love, but they happen.  Perhaps we cannot reach into someone else's heart and change their perspective to just simply appreciate the fact that love was given and received.  Indeed, we can change nothing but our own perspective. I would suggest that by shifting how we feel about those past loves doesn't mean the bad stuff ceases to have happened - it just means that we can release some of the burden we've carried in relation to those past loves.

I am not, by any means, intimating that if you have lost a loved one to death, that you should not grieve that loss.  That is a process all its own and deserves your time and attention to reach a balanced point of acceptance.  I will say that I see, quite often, people who have become stuck in the grieving process to the point that that is who they become - "My name is...and I lost this person to death."  They cannot move beyond the grief to recognize that they are no longer the vibrant, wonderful person their loved one would wish them to be today.  So, I say this gently to everyone reading this post - if you have lost in love, whether it is because one person needed to move on apart from you, or whether it was from losing a loved one to death - think of shifting your perspective.

I'm sharing the quote above with you in the hopes that it gives you one of those moments to ponder that I experienced myself. It is up to you how you receive the statement and how you feel, think and react to it. One immutable point is this: if you have loved, you are/were existing in the most positive energy it is possible to feel on this planet. We cannot see love, except perhaps in the happy faces of the ones upon which we bestow this gift. Love isn't concrete or tangible to touch, unless maybe we're talking about loving touches, embraces, etc.

Rather than eternally grieving the loss of any love, endlessly looking back with regret, for anyone or anything, contemplate celebrating that love existed. Let me repeat that I am not writing this to tell anyone how to think or feel about love.  I was changed by the email message in my Inbox and wanted to share it with you. Celebrate that love has happened numerous times in your life and recognize it in a positive manner.  Be joyful! Love is an energetic presence.  It has a physical, lasting energy that never dies.

And that does change everything.