It’s beautiful Molly, the love inside, you take it with you. – Ghost
Sam Wheat had it right. This little gem at the end of Ghost succinctly tells one of the most profound truths with so little fanfare it’s easy to miss its deeper ramifications. It speaks to the infinite power of love and how deep and abiding love can change absolutely everything we think, feel, and live. This is not the kind of love that expects or demands, it’s the kind of love that moves through us and alters our very foundations the more we open to it. In fact, we can take it with us, we’ve just gotten confused about what it is we really want to take along as we move through our lives.
I think difficult relationships of all shapes and sizes can sour us. We had all this love that somehow went wrong, we weren’t grown up enough, not gentle enough, not insightful enough, not honest enough, or whatever it was or wasn’t that didn’t work. But the love we had doesn’t have to evaporate because someone didn’t give us what we thought we needed or didn’t behave the way we wanted them to or expected them to or hoped they would. That love is still there, it is inside of us hiding under betrayal, regret, heartache, accusations, and mistrust. It’s up to us to liberate the love that remains and let it transform into a lasting love that starts within.
That’s the love inside we can take with us.
The great loves of our lives, whether familial, friendship, or romantic are a gift, because they make the love hiding within us tangible and more easily seen. And no matter which way these relationships pan out, in the end it’s always better to be thankful for the people who made us feel as though we could fly instead of dissolving into a puddle of hatred and resentment over losing them. It’s important to honor the love that can change us, deeply move us, or make us see ourselves and the world in a refreshing new light. This softening, expansion, and acceptance are just some of the gifts this kind of love can bring.
It can also take us on a roller-coaster ride. We are euphoric upon its arrival and devastated if it shifts form or vanishes altogether. Somehow it always seems easier to love another than it is to love ourselves, and this is where love can get complicated and convoluted. The problem comes in fixating on another person or situation to bring us the gifts of the heart that are really our responsibility to tend. But if we can begin shifting gears, we can keep the love that rushed in and profoundly changed us by anchoring it within us. Then we can take it with us wherever we go, letting it ripple out into everything we do. Truly living in this kind of love is living in a state of grace.
So now what? Now it is time to practice this profound level of loving and live it out loud in everything we do. Start with yourself. Love all that you are as much and as deeply as possible. Then let what you feel inside expand out, opportunities can be found everywhere. Love your family, love your community, love your home, your job, the people you meet, the food you eat, stars and silence. Then try loving what you think is impossible to love. Let that transformative kind of love sit in your heart and slowly unfurl. Courageously embrace it. This kind of love has the power to heal everything that’s ever been broken.
The journey always starts inside. Begin traveling deeper into your inner world to find the love you’ve been searching for. Cultivate it, tend it like a garden. Let this love begin to weave its magic in your life and then take it with you wherever you go.
kb
