Every day Anadi and I meet on the corner of our two streets … We meet at 7.30am to go running together, and then we meet there again at the end of the day to go wandering the streets, walking and talking and stopping (now) in eateries and drinkeries – sharing our day, sharing ourselves…
The other day when we arrived at ‘our corner’ there were two women there, chatting and laughing… Anadi was waiting nearby and when i arrived and saw them there, I laughingly said ‘You’re on our corner, it’s where we meet…’
‘We’ve seen you’, one of them replied, smiling and then gestured across the road – ‘we live over there…’
A day or so later we met them coming the other way in the street; we all smiled a greeting and as we passed one of them said, ‘It’s the lovers…!’
I reflected that her words spoke of the energy in the space between Anadi and I – of lovers – and it prompted me to write again about the space between us…
I have written about the ‘space between’ before, but it is such an important space, and it is so often not recognised quite how important, that I will write about it again…!
The space between all of us is the sacred space – it is the space where all our relationships live.
That is how important it is.
It is the home of our relationships, and if this space is clean and harmonious then our relationships are happy, harmonious, offering growth, loving fun, expansiveness…
The space between two people is also where children are being born and living, breathing, growing up – and they are being affected every single moment by the space they inhabit…
Is the space safe?
Is the space harmonious, joyous…?
Or is the space contaminated with tension, anger, fear…?
It is also the space where everything is born, ideas, creativity, trust, love, intimacy, fun… Our part in keeping the space safe between us and the other, is to reflect on and explore the space within us…
As the poet Rumi said
‘Your task is not to seek love, but merely to seek and find all the barriers within yourself that you have built against it…’
For ironically if it is in relationship where we are looking for the other to love us, so that we know we are loveable and loved – without looking within to where we do not love ourselves – then we can unconsciously contaminate the relational space and so contribute to getting the exact opposite to what we were seeking.
And this is in all relating, friendships, colleagues, marriages, love partnerships, between parents and children, all forms of relating you can think of…
If instead we are aware of the need to heal the aspects within us where we have built the barrier to love, then we will be in a better position to honour the space between ourselves and the other…
This practise is a forever practise, and a moment by moment practise. It is about personal responsibility and personal reflection…
In conscious relating we can share with another our own processes, when we discover a barrier to love within us… This practise, this sharing maintains safety in the space between… There are no shocks, just truthful exploration
If we always are consciously thinking… ‘What kind of energy am I putting in the space? What words am I putting there? What thoughts and feelings? what reactions?
And if we are always personally reflective from a loving stance, then we will be conscious of what we are contributing to the sacred space between us and the other…
From this place we can change our own lives and the lives of others by creating space that is loving and safe and therefore expansive with no limits to what is possible…