Are Love, Joy, and Peace limited?!?

This is an interesting question.  My personal exploration of this question began years ago when I didn’t understand why I wasn’t happy, even though life looked good on the outside.  The exploration peeled back many important layers over the years including: increasing my gratitude, learning the truth of what I truly want in life (versus what I “should” want or have), letting go of unrealistic ideals of how I, “they”, or life “should” be (that “should” word again…it’s a peace killer), choosing to be happy, peaceful, and to share love (yes, feeling better can actually be as simple as deciding to feel better), adding a daily focus on the expansion of Love, Joy, and Peace, and many more.  Every layer removed has increased the Love, Joy, and Peace in my life and working on each layer has been vital for my progress.  My capacity to feel, cultivate and share all these wonderful sensations is at an all time high…and yet…there still seemed to be a ceiling.  A point beyond which I couldn’t go, even though I know in my heart there are points beyond my experience.

Earlier this year, I went deeper.  I went down to the root of what lies underneath Love, Joy, and Peace and am loving what I learned and the impact of this knowledge!  Why did my Love, Joy, and Peace have limits?  I discovered that my capacity to love (self or other) is limited by my trust (in self or other).  I can only love myself as deeply as I trust myself.  And I can only love you as deeply as I trust…myself…you thought I was going to say I need to trust you to love you, didn’t you?  Nope, the time I choose to spend with you may be limited by how much I trust you, my enjoyment of you may be limited by how much I trust you, but I can love you without limits when I trust myself.  WOW!!!

My feelings of joy are limited by my capacity to allow unfolding (of myself, another, and life itself).  How attached I am to any details of how anything “should” be (there it is again…ugh!!!) is how limited I am in my capacity to experience Joy in any situation.  When I can experience anything purely with no preconceptions or judgments or attempts at control, then I can feel the highest joy.  This applies to a day at work, my lover, my child, ANYTHING!  To feel the highest and purest joy, allow everything to be as it is and enjoy it exactly as it is.  People, things, and situations don’t have to be the way I want them to be to enjoy them…in fact, I will, can, and do enjoy things more when I don’t decide or prejudge how I want them to be!  WOW again!!!

The pinnacle for me…Peace.  How is my Peace being limited?  What’s underneath my Peace that restricts it even when I am focusing on it and living in it more day by day?  Safety.  Not external physical safety (although that’s obviously critically important and without it, nothing more is possible), something deeper.  Do I feel safe to be me…to be all of me…unfiltered…and share all of me without hiding?  The extent to which I filter myself, hide, pretend, or limit my own expression of self is the extent to which I limit my Peace.  When I can feel completely safe in my own company (regardless of who I may encounter in the world) I am fully at Peace!  When I doubt, judge, second guess or criticize myself, no meditation or yoga or mantra or prayer can get me into deep Peace.

So there it is.  This is what I have been working on for the past few months and intend to write about more in the coming weeks.  The biggest key here for me is realizing how little any of these blocks have to do with anyone or anything other than me.  My capacity to love is limited by my level of trust in myself.  My capacity to experience free flowing joy is limited by my lack of allowance of life to unfold without my input or requirements.  The peace I feel in my heart is limited by how safe I feel to fully be me and fully reveal my deepest truest self.  May you trust yourself, allow life to unfold, and feel safe sharing your deepest truths today and everyday.