The bottom line: Deep truths. They do not come when looked upon by judgmental eyes, or met by nonaccepting hearts. But with an inner shift, from a harsh inner dialogue fueled by judgment and nonacceptance, to one of doing gentle with an edge, those deep truths come more easily, being both revelatory and transformative.
”… deep erotic truths do not reveal themselves to judgmental eyes and nonaccepting hearts.” Jack Morin wrote in The Erotic Mind. I find this to be true for all personal truths, not solely erotic ones. I’ve also come to learn, the hard way, that not until I learned how to do gentle to myself, did I start to know these deep truths.
I shared what I wrote above on Forward Link, only to have Sana Fayyaz respond as follows:
”Thinking about times when I wasn’t gentle with myself (judgmental eyes and non-accepting heart) and hell bent on ’there is only one way’. That was not a fun way to live and for sure the deep truths did not reveal themselves to me. Meanwhile when I’m gentle and flexible, I’m open to receiving the deep truths. This is one of those things that should be obvious but are not really. Jack Morin expressed it so well.”
Inspired in turn by her suggestion, deep truths, judgmental eyes and nonaccepting hearts turned into the topic for the monthly Zoom in August, for the Tankespjärn community.
And oh, what a magnificent, open and vulnerable conversation it was. (They all are, to some extent. But this one went deeper, invited an unusual level of vulnerability, opened up personal aspects that I am not sure any one of us were quite prepared for, but nevertheless very welcoming of.)
Can you be safe with yourself? That requires nonjudgmental eyes and an accepting heart.
The quote that inspired the topic was erotic, but I deliberately invited a wider take on the topic of deep truths in general. But, alas… we did turn to the erotic, at times in such a way as to make my heart overflow, as a testament to the space we’ve created in these monthly Zoom’s. That we can go so deep, and speak about topics that are loaded, in the culture(s) we live in, regardless of the fact that all of us on the call have very different background and roots.
Crying while looking at a painting, that’s the vulnerability that the erotic stands on.
Writing this, sitting on a train headed north to give a hygienic design-training for a machine developer/manufacturer, I read the doodle, remembering who said what, and what made me want to turn specific words spoken on a call into form, picking a color, writing it down, trying to convey the essence of it while staying with the ebb and flow of the conversation; my heart overflows yet again. And again, and again.
People fear being alone, afraid of the deep truths?
Personally, it is true that I did not start to truly explore the deep truths within, until I grasped I did not have to be so harsh towards myself. Before, whatever deep truths I excavated from within… well, let’s just say I had a hard time digesting them. They were hard to carry, to act upon, to integrate, precisely because I was so hard on myself due to judgmental eyes and a very nonaccepting heart.
Upon learning how to do gentle with myself, no longer habitually viewing myself and the world through judgmental eyes, no longer filtering everything through a nonaccepting heart, those deep truths started to be easier both to come at and work with. And that’s the edge that I seek. Not the edge of walking along a knife’s edge, going too fast, recklessly, refusing any help, which inevitably has me slipping and cutting myself badly. No. Not that edge. Rather, the edge of balancing on that same knife’s edge, finding my footing, helped along by supporting hands when I so need, discovering and appreciating the ability that lies within me, brought forth by me daring to take step after step.