I was listening to Beyonce’s Spirit, and it made me think about this quote: “Our deepest fear is not that we are inadequate. Our deepest fear is that we are powerful beyond measure.”
Spirit sounds like love from the soul. A call to “rise up” and “burn your flame through the night”. It got me thinking about those words from Marianne Williamson.
From the moment we are born, we are categorized. We are judged. We are labeled unequal. Our humanity is stripped by those who are architects of fear.
How do we do better? Could it be as simple as love? Loving ourselves so that we may love others. In spite of virulent hate.
Love. It overcomes fear. It is the ultimate expression of freedom and vulnerability. To love–really love–is daring to endure hurts, hate, scorn, ridicule… It is living naked–stripped of all pretense or prejudice.
Love is truth. It is peace. Lies, chaos, violence…they may be used as weapons in attempts to kill it, but love will always survive–even if reduced to a flicker.
Love is fragile, but it is not weak. It is resistance. It takes strength–and sometimes strength of steel–to push forward, resist, rage against the dying of the light.
Love is light in the darkness. It radiates from within and has the ability to ignite another’s spark.
When you’ve been in darkness and a light is turned on, it hurts. You close your eyes. You try to return to the darkness. Like the darkness, fear is comfortable. The light, at first, seems too brilliant for us to take in. Then, when we are able to see, we realize our reticence and anxieties were unfounded. We may also find that the light is frightening to those who prefer the comfort of its absence.
There are moments in my life when it has been especially difficult to lead with love. It’s hard to not react when people who are hateful or vicious try to invade and disrupt your life. In those moments, I’m reminded of what my grandmother told me in my adolescence: “Know who you are.”
My grandmother was a deeply rooted tree. She was steadfast, prayerful and highly disciplined. Her presence was powerful. She was love personified.
I didn’t know it at the time she said them to me, but those four words would come to be my root. In moments when my will is tested, I remember I am a child of God. And God is love.
Love is a gift. It is seeded in every one of us from the moment of life. We must decide every single day to actively cultivate and grow that seed into an immovable force… an inextinguishable flame.
When we love–ourselves and others–we are stronger than we know. It is not always comfortable. It will not always feel secure. But, it is the greatest power we poses.
“We ask ourselves, Who am I to be brilliant, gorgeous, talented, fabulous? Actually, who are you not to be? You are a child of God. Your playing small doesn’t serve the world. There’s nothing enlightened about shrinking so that other people won’t feel insecure around you. We are all meant to shine, as children do. We were born to make manifest the glory of God that is within us. It’s not just in some of us; it’s in everyone.
Real Life Chic 