This summer my emotions, like the heat, have been combustible. After a very long hiatus and lots of trepidation, I’ve begun online dating again which means I’ve been ghosted, love bombed, and bread crumbed, dating lingo for wrestling with how to be a decent human being in a virtual world. It’s been a jagged path of moving toward and moving away, clarifying my values, my offer, trusting myself, and being honest without being brutal.
Like a moth drawn to the intensity of a flame, I’ve fully engaged the dance between living with generosity and openness and shrink-wrapping my heart.
Everything and everyone are my teachers. Learning to love is learning to risk wisely, at least in part. If we’re lucky we get to learn throughout this lifetime. Mostly, I breathe in and out and through it all I keep believing in big, wide open, true love that begins within me and illuminates outward.
“Just like learning, expanding our capacity for joy and holding complexity, loving and being loved are part of the path. Being changed by pain is part of the path.”
—Staci K. Haines, from Being Changed Intensive, July 9, 2023
