The Love Within

It always happens like this for me: I go through an experience, a theme, something I’m reclaiming, a life lesson, a deconditioning, a remembering - and literally in those very days, almost all the social media and newsletter posts I come across speak of it too. I am fascinated with this mirror game.

This month I have had the most physically and emotionally painful moon cycle pain in a long time. I had planned a super exciting outing that day, everything was set, I was going to the movie theatre with my two film lover sisters, I had had great news the day before regarding my upcoming year, everything was per-fect. And bam. Suddenly, two hours before leaving, my womb starts burning inside. Like hell. I usually go slow in those moments, as I mentioned in my previous post, I honor this sacred time as a moment to dive deep. But this time I was literally nailed down to the sofa. Could not move. I called off the outing, and started feeling. I surrendered to the call and chose to let it "kill" me. Tears, cries, pillow hitting, breathing and meditating became my day. I let what needed to come to the surface be seen. I won't go into the details here, but ultimately it was about - as it always is - deep parts of me desiring to be seen and loved. Deep grief of maybe several lifetimes, needing to be felt. These parts were asking to be loved by nothing else than my presence, not a wonderful movie outing, or laughter with dear sisters, or talk of any kind, just me. My presence. The love that one feels when becoming aware of the constant support of the earth beneath our feet, or the constant return of the sun at every dawn. The Love that is.

I couldn't quite word it then. I was just experiencing it, surrendering to it, hearing the call and doing what I could to respond, remembering who I choose to be in this chaos. Before I got to the grief and feeling into what was really there, I was feeling so much anger, so much resistance, so much sadness "now that I finally, after literally years of loneliness, feel like I have friends I can truly enjoy things with, it's taken away from me" (I always start by feeling abandoned and such a victim, it's normal, then I become aware it's just a story, and I validate the child that feels betrayed by life, and I go deeper to ask what is reaaaally there to be seen). None of this is possible without trust, devotion to Self and letting it all be felt in all my humanness.

Then, as I scrolled through newsletters and social media later that day, I realized I could see this theme in many of my fellow light warriors' shares: one poignant article I read was about literally feeling this inner love ignite within you like burning embers warming you up from within. So beautiful.

So yes, the message coming through these days is about embodying Love when nothing else remains, when everything crumbles.

It can be the disruption of a planned afternoon, the grief of a lifetime, or several years of illness gluing you to your bed instead of accomplishing the dreams you thought you had, it doesn't matter, it's always about the same universal message:

There is a deep well of Love living within us, always, that we can activate. And it's saying that, truly, everything crumbles JUST SO THAT we find out how to activate it.

Because it’s actually the only thing that matters. It’s the only thing we’re truly deeply looking for, here on earth. LOVE in all ways: safety, freedom, joy, abundance, power, success, peace… they’re all aspects of Love, if you think about it.

Some of us spend our lives thinking it can only come from outside of ourselves because at this point in time, this is the way humans think it is, and that’s what is taught from birth and unconsciously passed down.

But it’s all changing now.

We are realizing. “Only I can activate the Love from within, and I CAN”.

Even if it’s through partnership: there will always come a time where one realizes the love of their partner is so deep precisely because it’s allowing one’s own inner love to blossom safely and freely, and for no other reason than that.

This is at the core of self-realization, because only from that realization can all the true creativity and free expressions of one's being be birthed.

For me, this realization is taking a LOT of deconditioning and learning how to regulate my nervous system. My wonderfully sensitive nervous system will simply not let the inner love valves open until it feels extremely safe. And finding the patience to learn how to regulate a nervous system is itself an immense act of self-love.

I wish to reassure you, I started integrating what regulation meant at 35 years old after 5 years of fully devoting myself to my healing. Just to give an example.

I have spent my life hearing this love yourself thing everywhere and wondering what it meant. I just kept going, sometimes in faith, sometimes in utter despair, but I kept going. Awareness is the key. Trillions of people have ended and will end their lives without finding it. If you haven’t quite grasped it, it’s not too late. It’s never too late, because only one moment can make your entire existence so worth it. There is no actual time, each moment is a brand new gift. In fact nobody is ever "done" with it. There is always more to discover, you never "get there" that's the mysterious beauty of life.

I desired to write these words today to remind you of the fact that You have the power to find it. Because You Are it. You actually only came here for it. And only you can do it for yourself. And every complicated and uncomfortable experience you might live, now or later will only bring you closer to it. Because this is precisely what we’re here for. Humans have spoken and written and prayed about this reunion with Self for thousands of years, in many different words.

It’s not about our careers, our wealth, or our prizes anymore. Really it never was. But now we simply won’t be able to move forward and do any of those beautiful bonus things without finding it: the Love within. The foundation. The only thing that matters.

For those of you wondering, or feeling a little triggered by the word “Love”. It means the same thing as presence, as embracing the power of now. It also means the same thing as healing. It also means the same thing as allowing the Feminine to rise. Believe it or not. And as finding redemption. It also means the same thing as finding Nirvana. As remembering Oneness and embracing duality. All of these terms, from uniquely different cultures, ultimately speak of that One same thing. The fact that it has all of those different names is also a part of the mysterious beauty of Love: Love creates many uniquely different babies. I don’t know if you see the fractal beauty here, but I find it absolutely wonderful.

That, too, is what Oneness means. There can be only One, in multiple aspects. All of it is the same, because it’s the only reason for this current existence.

So I invite you to find your unique way to find “it”. But know that it’s already there within you because it’s who you truly are, and it’s more about undoing the beliefs that tell you otherwise and allowing “it” to fill you up than actually “doing” anything.

Rafaëlle Cohen