Winters Blessings

The most beautiful gift of love is when it is given and when it is taken away.

I thank God for each moment I’ve had my heart broken and returned to Him because it allowed for a deeper relationship not only with Him but with myself. My most recent lesson in love has taught me not to withhold it, but to welcome its appearance with open arms and to grieve it deeply when it begins to leave. I’ve learned to listen to my deeper intuition, as they are signs from the Most High and to also not berate myself for taking my time in letting go. I’ve learned to allow myself to fail diligently and to coax my wounds to close gently. We cannot begin to possess anything or anyone, only to love in whichever season they appear and to gracefully let them go as they pass into another. The idea of loving for eternity is not only romantic but resonant, only if we allow our love to pass the gates of the ego and emerge into transcendence. With this, we begin to understand that love is never truly gained or lost—but always present. But we must be present enough to witness it.

I also have learned that love is not change. By this I mean, not expecting for another to change on our time or mold into the person that we think we need them to be. It’s allowing for the constant evolution of that individual to emerge so that they can transform into whomever God have them be. I am no more powerful than the energy that coaxes petals of hydrangea flowers to unfurl and emerge in brilliance colors. Who am I but a passive observer to the colors that God allows for each petal to paint? Much like this, I pray for God to allow me to be a passive, yet expectant observer to the movements and motions that course through everything in nature including my own self. There is little that I can do to force anything to happen and really; what need to be done when resting allows for everything to be completed fruitfully? With a bit of nurturance, grace, and prayer, all begin to emerge from its slumber into wakefulness. Love has taught me that its presence allows for tree’s winter leaves to shed and springs little buds to emerge from its confines—yet all were already present at the moment the seed was planted. All it needed was grace, time, and faith. All it needed was a bit of love.

Here’s to loving, enjoying and re-meeting myself in my winter season as I await springs arrival.

A Season of Change

Lately I’ve been feeling the energy of endings coursing through my body, racing through my veins up until it reaches my tear ducts, dripping slowly to land on the corners of my lips. I taste its bittersweet saltiness as I swallow deeply and allow for it to make its passage once again. I can’t refute the fact that change is often painful as life sucker punches us with it over and over again. Yet, somehow this current change in my life doesn’t feel quite like a sucker punch. Instead, it is the gentlest, most wistful kiss.

I’m amazed to realize that much of my endings do not have to derive from deep pain and betrayal. They can instead arrive in a package that perches itself on my doorstep, a nicely wrapped bow beckoning me to wonder what its contents is. It can be a phone call that says “yes, you got the job” or a letter that reads “Congratulations! You’ve been admitted into ___”. Or even soft lips that whisper “I’ll always love you” as they kiss you goodbye.

Endings are never easy. For me each ending requires a moment of deep surrender to what was and a trust in what will be. These days that are arriving require much faith, so I place my forehead on the ground and ask for strength. I ask for God to enlighten me with softness in moments where I’d thought I wouldn’t have any and to lead me on a path that I can’t even see clearly. Yet, I know, I feel that this is destiny.

As things end, I usually take the time to look around and take stock. What are the things that I have created with my hands; what are those things I’ve unwittingly destroyed? Were my words too harsh, too passive or timed just right? Did I extend forgiveness in moments where I was a little less than perfect and simply just human? Trying to reason my way through moments where I’ve felt too much because it felt too painful to feel. Have I run away from my own reflection in the hopes of drowning myself in anothers—only to find those eyes reflecting my image once again? And this time will I sit quietly with myself? These are questions that I ask when the ending arrives, and we are left with the fruits of the seeds we’ve sown.

Though endings can be heart-wrenching, honestly all that I witness is love. I see love in the fearful gaze of another as they attempt to hide what is on their mind and shield the fragility of their heart. “I make you feel so naked, don’t I” a question frequently repeated in my mind’s eye. Well, my love, my heart is sewn right onto my sleeve—believe me I feel naked too. Endings always make me feel naked, bringing me right back to my natural self, my child self; unsure and twisting my hands at what I’ve wrought, wondering if I could’ve been anything more than human. But even in that space of remorse, grief and longing, I turn to look in the reflection of my own gaze and still find love.

Love is the thing that makes a fool of us all. And saves us all in the same instance. Love is the thing that makes each moment of laughter, joy, pain, heartbreak worth it—love as a never-ending source of life. Its love that whispers “this door needs to close so that another can be opened”. Its love that rocks me gently as I cling to the past in the hopes that it’ll never reject or abandon me. Its love that wipes my tears, holds my face gently and gazes at me with a knowing that it remains present even when my mind is convinced that it’s going. It’s love that allows for me to pick my head up, look at that closed door and bow in complete and utter reverence. It’s the surrender that makes me revere loves presence. A divine surrender so spiritual my mind cannot conceive of it. It is only my heart that falls into a stupor, drunk with it. Love coursing so deeply within me carrying me to the new door that awaits with hope, inspiration and faith. Love that whispers, “are you ready? You got this, let’s open it together” leading me into a new energy. Love, that awaits on the other side with open arms, accepting, transformative and eternally present. Love that whispers “endings are an illusion that brings you back into presence helping you to realize; I’ve always been here. I have always been the ultimate reality. This is the ultimate truth.”

Love as a space of remembrance, continuously bringing me right back home.

So with love, I thank you for your presence. I thank you for your lessons. I thank you for bringing me back to remembrance.

A heart filled with love.

Xx Heaven

10 Years of Longing

Times passing idly

Beckoning me to make my peace

Is it that I see your face

My heart confounding itself trying to match your beat

Do we miss each other coincidentally?

Or was it that once we fit perfectly,

Like a puzzle piece

Only now to fall into the trashes debris-

Chipped and out of shape

Unable to fit fully

Has the tale of “the one that got away” stolen our stability?

Nights of longing with partners lying beside both you and me

Drawn into a hazy dream of what used to be

Has life has lost is lustre and presence?

Its golden glitter turned into a sinners heaven

Using sex as a pawn to meet in the depths

And emotional distance to shield our hearts from what comes next

There’s something about this story that makes it so difficult to complete

Even with the impossibility of finding equal ground to meet

Timings off, no wait, persons wrong

Like falling crescendo’s and flat notes in an old song

Gone are the days where we used to dance together right on beat

Stories of yesterday building the foundation where we meet

But yesterday is gone and tomorrow waits for no one

Holding the reality that this songs chorus will inevitebly be done

Can this love transform, grow and finally meet?

Or will times departure force this love train to leave?

In this space of mystery and wonder, allow our hearts to fill in the beats

And perhaps we might lead our own paths to finally make our peace..

The Tides of Destruction

I’ve been in a space of deep-seated anger.

Deep-seated anger—you know, the type of anger that makes you feel restless. When you hear something that feels so contrary to your nature, you feel the slightest bit of resistance in your body and suddenly, the need to lash out! To yell, to scream “SEE ME! HEAR ME! Feel me”

Yeah, that type of anger.

I think we each feel it. It’s been such a wild two years hasn’t it? All the hopes and dreams of what we built on the fragility of “security” wasted away as a virus came in and snatch the rug from underneath our feet. Reminding us that safety and security was never quite that safe. Oh but we knew this. We knew it. Don’t lie—haven’t there been a many of times that you walked outside to take a stroll around the block and a young man smiled in your face, his eye lingering a bit longer than you’d like? And you found yourself confused, wondering “do I have something on my face?”

You felt it—in times were you were prompted to speak aloud in front of a group of people and not only to speak aloud but to speak CLEARLY. Efficiently. Effectively. To move people with a deep sense of conviction and admiration. And safety was stripped away just as quickly as you were asked to speak, wondering “what would they think about me?”

Living in the illusion of safety has helped us only in as so far as we are able to see it’s illusion. To understand that safety means to truly feel that you have a right to be here. Deep in your bones, to feel it vibrate in your soul, “I have a right to be here. To exist”. But a good majority of us do not feel this.

How could we? Our history is convoluted with so much pain and suffering, the stripping of our very humanity and oh, the tales and stories of slavery! A sure disease that makes us feel so unworthy.

Yeah, this anger is layered deep.

I’ve been frustrated. How have we sold ourselves a tale of lies? Lies that have made us so unseemingly, we have forgotten that to walk on this earth is not a privilege but a birth right. That to exist is to play out Gods plan perfectly and to create is to truly be free. I’ve been angry.

And so many will say—“a woman?? Angry? A black woman at that, not a foreign sight—it’s to be expected! They walk the earth so bitterly, of course you would find the likes of her angry.”

But you see…my anger is holy. From the same womb that created this existence, I gaze into your face and witness bliss. The sweet symphony of all of humanity, a gift that has been graced to touch the Holy Mother, as feet kiss the ground that created our flesh. As spirit sanctified our breath.

So you see, hell yeah, I’ve been angry. We are so much more that we have become to be if only we would allow ourself to ascend gracefully. To remind each other that money, prestige, the likes of intellect and the mind can hardly superseded the stirrings of the heart and spirit that created all that be.

I hope our anger allows us to wash to the shore of God’s feet and infinite awakening gently.

I pray that our anger allows us all to be free.

Releasing the False Self—Ramadan Reflections

This Ramadan has been quite peculiar for me.

In this place of merging tradition with intentional ritual and releasing faulty conditioning of the Ultimate Truth, I have found myself at the seat of paradoxes one can find lying beneath the tyranny of the false self.

Where are the people, the items, the identities that will bring us to The Most High? We find ourselves seeking practices, ritual and information as a means of searching for this Ultimate Truth. And still, many will miss it.

This search for truth is often found when the haze of clouds disappear overlooking the sky. As Rumi writes, “God has shown us the foam and obscured the ocean”. We see the dust but missed the wind. How is it that we are searching for that which has existed all along?

We search and search once again, only to find consciousness peaking beneath the level of our awareness. Then attention becomes displaced and once again—this awareness escapes us. How is it that we have missed the gold that peaks from beneath the surface? Or even more importantly, how can we grasp the gold when we are confounded with the earth settled on top of it?

This is what it means to operate under the false self, to be consumed by the evils of our own minds—fear, doubt, shame, guilt, judgement and compulsion. Many of us condemn the hell we are afraid of entering—yet perpetuate its presence in our lives through each waking moment.

In moments we choose our false selves over the reflection of the Divine, we have lost Ultimate Truth. In moments we find ourselves tethered to unnecessary impulses, compulsive needs of the lower self, an inability to sit in the wake of nothingness, of silence—we are forfeiting our birthright to the Ultimate Truth. And what is this truth exactly? It is the presence of God that is so apparently in our face, we lose vision of Him each time we turn our face.

It is nothing to be ashamed of, but everything to be conscious of. In this world where we are faced with so much distraction, temptation, anger and strife—remembrance of God becomes not only a necessity, but our saving grace. And I do not mean the God that is defined through religious dogma and rules to regulate human conduct. I mean the Creator that exists beyond space and time—residing, etched deeply into every facet of His magnificent Creation. Including ourselves.

This is what I have learnt this Holy Month. That behind routine, there is the intention and importance of ritual that brings us to a place of purposeful remembrance. And this remembrance allows us to let go of ourselves, let go of our false identities in favor of remembering the fullness of that from which we have come. To embody our divinity and let go of conditioning, false idols and hatred. To release our arrogance and fall to our faces in humility and lack of perfection. And even in those shameful reflections, find the need for the love of God.

💛 I pray the Creator purify my speech, in my intentionality to bring forth His magnificence.

💛 I pray this month be an opening to each of our awakening.

For this, is the truest, most enduring healing 🌸

Have a wonderful second half of this Holy Month.

Your sister,

Xx Heaven