Compassion Mind: Being in the Love

For awhile now, the universe has been sending messages my way about "being in the love." And while it sounds like the simplest response to a multitude of questions I ask, it has been deceptively difficult. Until today. This morning I woke up half an hour late to discover that my phone had died. Hence, no alarm. Once it was on I discovered that I needed to be at my destination half an hour early - which meant I had about ten minutes to finish getting ready - nowhere near enough time to do yoga or meditate. Normally this might cause me to feel in a bit of a funk and expect the day to not go well. Instead I promised to do yoga earlier and as for the meditation - well, I would try to be mindful every moment and not just while sitting on my floor.

I can't say that I managed to be as zen as I set out to be - but somehow I did manage to stay in the love. And amazing things happened. I felt bad just low in energy, so I donned my sunglasses, went outside, and picked a tree. And I sat there, peacefully, enjoying the beautiful day. Soon some honey bees appeared in the flowers near me. Being a fan of honey, and decently informed about bees and their importance, I concentrated on the bee and thought about how grateful I was for his presence and how much love I had for him at that moment. After collecting his nectar he paused to buzz by my head for a few seconds before zipping off. A second bee appeared and we repeated our dance. It was a wonderfully magical experience.

Then my three year old niece appeared and began to ask me questions about what I was doing and why I was sitting with a tree. And just as I had chose to love the bees, I chose to love her questions. We talked about spring and nature and types of trees, and where fruit came from - which was pretty amazing. Then we spotted two spiders in a beautiful web inches from my head which allowed us both to see them up close. Being a spider woman myself, I was blessed to hear my girl say, "Hi Spider. Hehhe, they're so cute! I think that one's a little girl like me!" And then, I got to watch her play hide and seek with the faeries.

Later, when my niece was tired, and not being a good listener - I as again presented with the opportunity to choose love. She was running around, giggling, and wearing grandma's patience thin. I felt myself feeling impatient and wondered what exactly I could do - punishing her wasn't going to work. So I firmly told her that it was nap time - and that she would need to practice before school. She could choose to lie on the couch alone and angry, or come and cuddle with me, but she had to lie there. We struggled for ten minutes, her wiggling, me loving - and talking softly every time I told her to be still. Finally I wrapped her in a giant hug, curled up behind her and deliberately bathed her in love. I focused on how much I love her and how safe and comfortable she was. And then the yawning began. Soon enough, the wiggle monster had disappeared to be replaced by a sleeping angel.

The ride home was just as magical. When a slow car was in front of me I focused on loving them, and choosing it over the annoyance and anger I would normally feel. They shortly turned and everything went perfectly well. Other people used their turn signals, lights were green for me, and I didn't have to wait to turn. The world was a stunning landscape bathed in light and I was traveling through endless beauty. And somewhere along the way I realized I was having a WONDERFUL day. I could fill the screen with adjectives - or simply say I was in love.

Yes, you might say my results were simple things - but I was happy - and the world around me flowed perfectly, and I in it. And as a result - things worked perfectly for me. I realized and recognized that I was choosing love each time I was faced with a choice - and brushed away negative thoughts by focusing on love and beauty. For a day that started with the potential for disaster - the sort of day where everything goes wrong - my simple intention to live mindfully led me to find a wonderful day and be conscious of choosing it. All I had to do was be mindful - and stay in the love. Simple, right? Hopefully it is now that I know the way.

Why Pagans and Buddhists Should Roleplay

Every experience in life presents us with an opportunity to learn a lesson. Repetition, ironically, provides us both with a vehicle for learning lessons but conversely creating patterns, habits, and modes of responding to situations which are repeated unconsciously. In many cases we already know who we are and how we respond to things - and so many lessons in life are repeated in a seemingly endless cycle because of our unwillingness to change the patterns that we have defined as our personalities and selves.

This is where true roleplaying begins. Learning to truly roleplay means to let go of the personalities and identities we see as ourselves and becoming someone else. If you can engage your child personality fully in the act of play and embrace your character, you are in a very real way, consciously choosing an incarnation in which to learn karma and life lessons that you as an individual are resistant to learning.

This tool works best when you are a fully engaged player and are blessed with a fully engaged storyteller and rp group. As with thought forms, astral constructs, and other "advanced" forms of magical creation, group effort produces the most intense effects. There are a couple of reasons for this. From a magical perspective - more people = more energy = more "concrete" construction. Society is an excellent example of this principle at work. From a scientific perspective, there is a point of mathematical "critical mass" that defines the point at which reality is altered by the belief of people. This number is always the same in relation to the population at large. Thus, when a small group of people are present, their collective belief system alters their immediate reality. Ergo, get a bunch of people together who create a communal reality - and you wind up with a very complicated, intricate, and large world (or worlds) - that is also very REAL.

Another means of allowing roleplaying to work most effectively for you is to grow to the point of creating a character who seems least like yourself. This allows for surprisingly new perspectives on life - and profound spiritual realizations. My admittedly favourite character at present is one that I still marvel at playing. She is many things I thought I would never play - but I have learned incredible life lessons from her. As my spiritual journey informed the perspectives from which I approached her life trauma - her amazing growth in response (which also makes her the thing I never thought I would do) has informed my spiritual growth in return - intertwining our karma. This is due to the degree to which I have allowed myself to step outside of who I am and what I do - and experience situations from radically new perspectives. In playing her I allow myself to fully experience "crazy" - which is perhaps her ultimate gift to me in terms of mental shift. By completely shedding myself of cultural boundaries and definitions and disregarding the concept of "crazy" I have found the freedom of my authentic self.

So how do you reach the point where your roleplaying character teaches you karmic lessons that you were ignoring for years? Play. Play. Play. Play until you fall back into make believe again - and find a troupe of friends who make believe with you. Better yet, find a game everyone enjoys, and bring your whole spiritual group into it. Incarnating as alternative selves with the people you attend ritual with speeds your development as a group - and alters social relationships to the point where people can more easily overcome shared karma and learn shared lessons. That is what breeds healthy and strong spiritual groups - and honestly, makes the most amazing games.

And then go lose yourself in someone you never once imagined yourself to be - and give yourself the freedom to change.