#openheartedness

[myovin]

Flower symbolism:

Delphinium (Powder): the dreamer’s heart, openheartedness, ardent attachment

Forget-Me-Not (Jinx): remembrance, hope, power

[eatmangoesnekkid]

Sexual dominance is just as natural as sexual submission. A person expressing dominance can use their posture, body positioning, height, weight, upper body strength, breath, voice, eye contact, etc., to establish a *natural* dominance during lovemaking, not to be confused with a performative dominance that uses too much unnecessary force, ego, or lack of care which creates conscious and unconscious wounded energy. Skillful penetration can be deeply exquisite, recalibrating, and earth-shattering, but just because a giver penetrates a receiver doesn't mean neither possess the artful sacred skills of "giving" and "receiving." One has to possess the curiosity and openheartedness needed to learn how to properly give just as much as the other has to learn how to properly receive. And vice versa if applicable.

India Ame’ye, Author, From The Melody of Love

[cesium-sheep]

I wonder how many of the people who are like "kingdom hearts is too confusing" are actually struggling with its general philosophy that includes both "anyone can do/be good" and "anyone can do/be bad", while still thinking that simple optimism and openheartedness is neither weak nor stupid. cuz. yknow. a lot of people who tend to have strong opinions on video games don't tend to vibe with all that, especially in combination. but I vibe with it.

[venusinmyrrh]

2, 20

2. an indie film

Four Rooms (1995), dir. Allison Anders, Andre Rockwell, Robert Rodriguez, and Quentin Tarantino, starring Tim Roth

four short films form one wildly funny (and just fucking wild) movie about working customer service in Los Angeles for rich people. Tim Roth has the range!

20. a musical film

Cyrano (2021), dir. Joe Wright, starring Peter Dinklage and Haley Bennett

if we are friends then I'm assuming you've already seen Moulin Rouge, so I am once again insisting everyone watch Cyrano, and read this discussion with the production team about love, desire, anti-cynicism, and openheartedness.

send me a number for a film rec!

[catsinthebagdesignposts]

What Love Says... Love, Light, Generosity

The frequency of love is everywhere, feel it with conscious awareness. Where there is love you discover generosity, compassion, harmony as frequencies inward and outward. You are love, light and generosity, this is your heart, this is your home.

Openheartedness reveals inner truth, your gifts, allowing you to access your talents. Through giving and receiving, the giver and receiver discover expanded awareness of love. Allow love, light and generosity to guide you.

Cultivate a loving generous relationship with yourself, all of you, cultivate unconditional love. Become aware of thoughts, words, actions you choose to express creating truth and love for all. Love, light and generosity.

Relax into yourself, be lovingly aware in your heart, in your soul that you are here to grow and expand through experiences. It's your choice to be love, your choice to embrace life you way. Experience through your heart, choose love.

Be Owlsome, love, light and generosity.

Jennifer R. Cook @catsinthebagdesignposts invites you to embrace love in your life and enjoy What Love Says series. 

[memehex]

1. Speak Now - 14 whole ass power ballads. Kate Bush vibes, a Masterpiece✨💜

2. Taylor Swift - Severely overlooked, is broader in subject matter than you'd expect and reminiscent of 90s earnestness that I really love (Torn, Shania Twain).

3. evermore - Lyrical and reflective in a way I can appreciate.

4. reputation - Has really high highs and low lows but some of the deep cuts I really adore.

5. Lover - As a body of work it's messy but I appreciate the openheartedness of it and there's several highlights for me.

6. folklore - It's a wonderful album there just aren't as many standouts for me as others.

7. 1989 - Definitely her strongest pop album but it lacks the variation Lover and reputation have.

8. Red - It's one of her best I just don't vibe with it as much as others.

9. Fearless - The singles are great but the album as a whole is a bit monotonous to me.

10. Midnights - I don't hate it but it truly feels like a step down in overall quality.

[ritterblood]

character/blog association

animal: the chocobo. as if there’s any other option really.

color(s): yellow or shades of yellow, combined with soft greys and/or blues

month: september

song: lean on me - bill withers  

number: five

day or night: he has not real preference, but i would associate day with him when the sun is at its highest peak

plant: lilies or lily of the vale, his mother’s favorite flower

smell: metal, sword oil, hot chocolate, lilies

gemstone: red jasper, aquamarine, bloodstone, carnelian

season: early autumn, when the leaves are just turning from spring green to brilliant reds and yellows

place: that overlook near the steel vigil, from whence you can see ishgard proper in its entire. you know the place. 

food: any kind of stew or hearty pies, though his preference goes to beef or creamy chicken stew. you can ply him with anything sweet as well.

element: water, to symbolize adaptability and openheartedness. 

drink: hot chocolate. as if there’s any other option really.

tagged by: @soulseeresque​ thank you <3

tagging: @forgesahead​ , @mamoriitai​ , @milesducemdominus​ , @ichoric​ to tag some & whoever wants to do it. 

[tetzoro]

aimsie baby!!!!!! you are the human embodiment of an angel's kiss. you are bright, bubbly, full of love and you give it so freely that it's impossible not to admire you. openheartedness is hard and takes great strength to be able to do consistently and you have mastered the art. thank you for shedding a lil bit of that light and love on me and i love you! <3333

eeeep kendall ( ྀི o̴̶̷᷄ o̴̶̷̥᷅ ) held onto this a little longer than i meant to because these words have carried me thru a tough day ! thank you for being such a sweetheart :( to have someone as amazing & wonderful as you think these things about me makes me all mushy T^T !! thank you for being one of the kindest people i’ve ever come across, thank you for being you !! 🤍🤍

[presencinglife]

If we’ve suffered a lot, we may equate happiness with relief from our suffering, but happiness is more than that, being an uplifting of the heart and spirit, an expansive “yes” that pervades us, whatever the context. To reach it is to fully recognize (1) that it is not outside us and (2) that to access it we simply have to turn toward our pain and cultivate as much intimacy as possible with that pain. To not develop such intimacy guarantees our ongoing unhappiness, regardless of our moments of elation. Joy is happiness in the raw, an energetically expansive, strongly pleasurable feeling of unobstructed openness and connection, ranging from a mild sense of euphoria to outright bliss. In short, joy is elated ease. It’s as if our entire being is smiling, with nothing more to say than “yes, yes, yes!”

In joy, we are not amped up but opened up. With no goal to be elsewhere. The deepest joy—nonsituational joy—does not depend on outer circumstances. It is found not in having, but in being.

Almost all of what we refer to as joy is situational joy, based on the occurrence of specific events; this inevitably casts a shadow on our joy (a shadow initially obscured by our joy’s brightness), given that the event or conditions that generate and coexist with our joy may be gone or altered in a very short time; they’re beyond our control. So in situational joy we’re on unstable ground, our very celebration tainted by the impermanent, often fleeting and fluxing nature of its originating factors—along with the recognition that our usual patterns are still intact despite the reality of what’s brought us joy.

Nonsituational joy, on the other hand, carries no such shadow, given that it does not rely on the arising of particular conditions. It is the joy of simply being, regardless of our circumstances or mood, achieved by ceasing to turn away from life and instead developing intimacy with all that constitutes us. It has nothing to do with what we have or are getting and everything to do with what we are.

There is another kind of joy that could be called realizational joy. By this, I mean the joy that arises when we have achieved something very significant and recognize it as such without any egoic inflation. The joy that arises from this depended on certain conditions being met and now, remains, usually as a kind of emotional background or backdrop, as we proceed, having already arrived at a deeper stage of our work.

Situational joy can be selfish or me-centered—and far from healthy, as when it arises at the expense of others’ well-being. But it can also be we-centered, as in the elated/generous sharing of bounty or good fortune with others. And sometimes the contagiousness and openheartedness of such joy can stretch it into a bigger, far more expansive sense of we-centeredness, as exemplified by the Buddhist practice of mudita, a Pali and Sanskrit term meaning “sympathetic joy”, a joy readily felt when others succeed or do well. It necessitates deepening our knowing of ourselves in more than just intellectual ways. As such, the practice of mudita helps pave the way towards recognizing our innate or nonsituational joy.

And doing our inner and relational work, hard as it can be, has as one of its rewards the joy of knowing that all situations can be worked with, used to deepen and enrich us. This joy, the joy that comes from learning how to keep our heart open during dark times, constitutes true happiness, a core-level “yes” that cannot be extinguished by the challenges of living and dying.

Robert Augustus Masters, Emotional Intimacy

[madstronaut]

let us rewind, to simpler times...comfort fic times🌿💝

yes I will admit - I, too, was swept up by the 🌪️hu-reylo-ricane🌪️ in 2016 - and this was pre-2017, ere the era of ben swolo and force dyad fuckery etc etc - I probably spent hours upon hours reading fic after fic on ff.net and ao3 - some absolutely fan-fucking-tastic, rip-my-soul-to-shreds-and-stitch-it-back-together-with-my-own-veins-stripped-from-my-limbs vibe stories but just two in particular I hold dear to my heart - one of the fics is so deeply significant & personal to me in such an intimate and revealing way I keep bumping it to the bottom of my 30-story-tall faficowrimo list - and the other one being this G-rated, <10k word, two chapter modern student/teacher's asst. college AU. lolwat anyway dive into the deepend of yet another of my faficowrimo rambles with me~

I don't believe @/heyloreylo aka @/on_my_toes is on tumblr anymore after a cursory search to tag, but dear writer if you ever see this, I want to say 🌿thank you🌿 for writing this story (and from an anon prompt!!! wow), I come back to this time and again when I feel homesick for places I haven't been (ugh I know the perfect word for this in my mother tongue but no such english word really captures it succinctly...#multilingualprobs)

Reading: Where There's Smoke, There's Fire by on_my_toes

When I found this fic (or rather when it found me) I, like Rey, was in an exhausting season where I felt I was perpetually living my days as one long night-before-a-big-final and that life kept setting afire any place I attempted to lay my head for a breather - foxes have holes and birds have nests, everyone but me, indeed - and feeling the weariness and loneliness of a season where there are Just Some Things You Must Travail Alone™️, even amidst friends who stick closer than brothers. (Yes I get straight biblical/shakespearean when I wax poetic, pls dont yap in my DMs if you take issue doth bite your thumb at me, good sir)

something I love about my comfort fics is how easy I find it is to leave all mis problemos at the door and slip into the world of the story and the emotions and actions of the characters and I can return again and again and experience all the emotions that swell out of me in a very freeing, cathartic, practiced, and predictably famiilar way anyway yes like 99.5% of people on this hellsite (affectionate) fanfic is also therapy for meeeee

I think like Ben the TA and Rey the chem student in this fic - we all, at times, develop and wear a hard outer shell to protect & distance ourselves and project power - the hardass TA wearing suits/formal/officewear/frowns like armor, the single female orphan student tensed, always ready to let fly a prepared right hook (or a verbal barb, or witty jab, or a cutting look, etc. etc. fill in the blanks)- esp. when cracks in our armor show - but Ben responds to Rey immediately with imho a curiously direct and bold display of care, compassion, and openheartedness - offering Rey the coat off his back, immediately opening his childhood!home to her, calling her by name, encouraging her in his own awkward ass way re: the chem final comment...also I sense from his first words he was watching and waiting to step in only until he was absolutely certain Rey could use his help - and in this sense, adding to and reinforcing to her strength rather than taking it away

there's something about being thrown right into deep end of the pool from the very start of the fic that makes meeting Ben so rewarding - Rey here is clearly tough as nails but caught outside with no shoes on, literally, at a very vulnerable moment - because even the strongest of us can't be strong all the time thank you pete, my IRL moot, for that bit of timely wisdom when I needed it 🌱 - and Ben Swolo meeting her here, not swooping in to save her per se, but shore up and compliment her strength instead and reveal so much more than he probably intended from the start of this afterhours interaction with her - just melts the most frozen parts of my heart every.single.fucking.time 💙🥺

I mentioned how familiar this fic was to me and it's not really the story but the emotions and people it reminds me of...

the way Ben loves Rey - in actions and words - so readily and easily - reminds me of my IRL beloveds who have done same for me

Rey so easily shrugging off help, even when sorely needed, is a heartachingly familiar place personally - and I see shades of my past and sometimes present self in her - but as the story unfolds I am reminded both of her growth and my own and the people who helped, and stayed, and remembered, and walked with and returned to me on my journey, just like with Rey here and I see the best parts of love and humanity in its many forms - familial, in friendship, in a lover - in the twists and turns of this story and anyway am I crying? what the fuck NOT AGAIN anyway moving on-

There is something unmistakably playful in the expression, and she feels her heart do this strange and slightly unwelcome flop at the sight of it.

🥺🥺🥺 I'm not sure if there's like a medical term for this physical sensation but besides looking upon my beloveds, reading fanfic also elicits this sensation in me

He looks down at her, seeming a bit disarmed by her smile. She has pushed him too far. She is about to take a step back and shut the hell up before she digs herself a bigger hole, but just then he smiles back at her, the sight of it so unexpected that he seems like an entirely different person. Handsome, even.

men, take notes - the power of a smile actually is quantifiably a helluva difference maker also stop fucking asking women on the street you don't know to smile its 2024 motherfuckers

It’s strange to think that this fully-grown, slightly intimidating person has parents nearby. 😂😂😂 this definitely reminded me of the shock I had as a madstrokiddo when I ran into a teacher at a supermarket once because I thought she lived at school, you know, the teacher's natural habitat and enclosure-

“I know how scary these tests can be,” he says, setting her at ease a bit by steering the conversation back to academics. “We have a guest room. It’s no trouble at all. I’ll give you a ride back to campus in the morning.”

She stares up at him, and there is something in his uncertainty, in the strange shyness that seems so incongruent with the strict TA she has come to know in class, that she trusts him. Completely.

I FUCKING LOVE SHYBOIS, SHYBOIS FOR PRESIDENT 2024, I WILL BE YOUR SECRET SERVICE/PROTECT YOU WITH MY LIMB AND LIFE FOR FREE please god literally anyfuckingonelse for president other than the two golfing seniors for 2024 anyway i digress

“Hey.” Ben’s voice is soft and careful, close to her ear. oh I fucking love this (whispering, because this moment is tender and sacred)

He eases her out of the car, remembering to grab her socks, and then walks her up the brick stairs to a lovely, quaint little home that she remembers passing on some of her long distance training runs during the cross country season.

She had always envied it for its simplicity, for the little flower pots in the window ledges, for the sweet little porch swing on the front deck. It looked like a place where people were happy. It looked like a home...

A familiar ache rises up in her as she turns, taking it all in — the way the home is so lived in, so worn, so well-loved...

She swipes at her eyes, turning to face him with a strange and misplaced guilt.

Her face burns. She isn’t sure what to say to that. She has lived with Poe and Finn for almost a year, but even now it is strange to her, the idea that someone might worry on her behalf. The idea that someone cares.

Yours. It’s a curious choice of words. There aren’t many things that belong to her in this world, and she knows for a fact that this isn’t one of them. Still, as she melts into the cotton sheets and the seemingly infinite pillows, her eyelids so heavy that they feel like molasses, she lets all of her usual defenses fall to the wayside. Despite everything, she feels comfortable here. Despite everything, she feels … safe.

these few paragraphs detailing Rey's experience in the Solo cottage is one of the main reasons why I come back to this fic - I still remember the first time I read that sentence "it looked like a place where people were happy, it looked like a home" and how Rey reacted - I bawled my eyes out because I was also in the middle of losing a sense of home so to speak when I read this, and I felt so seen in seeing the same feelings through Rey's eyes here - that helpless feelng of the embarassment of missing out on what everyone else take for granted - and it made me feel less alone and helped dry out that really raw, wet sense of grief a leetle bit more to something more manageable every time I went back to read it ❤️‍🩹🥹💙

also Ben readily offering to Rey things like friendship to fall back on in hard times, an open ear and heart and home to take you in, a safe and strong presence through a night(s) of crisis, a nice, soft, warm bed to rest in, someone to say to you “I would have worried about you if you hadn’t," someone to care about you, someone to make you a meal 💛- was very healing to read and be reminded of 🌿🌿🌿

She barrels into him so hard that it almost knock the wind out of her. She would have ended up with her butt on the floor, but Ben’s instincts are quicker than hers, and he reaches out and steadies her before she plummets — which unfortunately, ends with her pressed up against him so close that she nearly bangs into his chin with her forehead.

mmmm chin rest height is optimal couple height diff 🤭

But most of all, she is embarrassed by his tenderness. Embarrassed by the way he has inconvenienced himself for her, and gone to all this trouble, when she is not worth it by any degree. She has nothing to offer him, no way to thank him.

“You don’t have to thank me,” he says slowly, his bewilderment incongruous with her panic, with the way she scurries toward the door.

“I do, though,” she says, her eyes stinging with her embarrassment.

this whole exchange ending with the "you don't have any shoes oh and btw I washed ur underwear" first off is fucking excellent nay perfect comedic timing, but also REY!!! I want to give you such a big hug for being so human (when I first went to see Force Awakens with a bff she mentioned how she loved how Rey was able to cry so freely and keep and protect her tenderness while surviving in a harsh desert and that comment has always stuck with me), dear writer (toes? toesy? idk what to call writer) you light these complex emotions in such stark relief and in such a familiar and recognizable way they become a lot less lonelier and scarier to face as a result 💖💖💖

I thought the ch. 1 ending was fucking perfect so of course as I usually do, fucking screeched upon seeing a continuation

first off, LMAO @ Hurricane Kylo

Ahch-To University 😂 so IRL Ahch-To is an Irish island named Skellige Michael that is still on my bucketlist of places to visit (apparently it is very weather-dependent and a bit difficult to reach, via local boats only)

She raises an eyebrow at him. It’s the first time she has directly looked at him, and it is like staring at the sun. 🥺🥰

I love the reversal in fortune with Rey now coming to rescue Ben amidst his own storm and the little mystery woven in the breadcrumbs of Rey-left-after-last-semester and seeing Rey, truly, from Ben's eyes and heart and his crush showing in so many cute little ways 🥰🥰🥰

How he sometimes let himself imagine following her, asking her out for coffee, getting to know her, or even…

even what? EVEN WHAT BEN???? HMMM??? TELL US, THIS IS A SPICY SAFE SPACE-

He crouches beside her as low to the ground as he can get. Too late he realizes that her faces in inches from his. Her eyes are shut, her skin ghostly pale against the smear of blood on her forehead, but she still seems a lot more calm than he feels right now, his heart beating in too many places at once.

The rain impossibly starts to beat down even harder, the roar of it unimaginable. Rey’s mouth opens wide and he realizes even though he can’t hear it that she’s laughing out loud.

Only then does the chaos seem somewhat manageable. Only then does the beat of his heart seem to find some semblance of a normal rhythm. No matter what happens in this upside down world, they’re in this together. 🥹🥹🥹🥹🥹🥹

I have been on a journey processing and sifting the poison and the balm from my religious upbringing so TW for some church-ish talk but I am reminded of tale of a certain carpenter's son sleeping in the midst of a storm - an image that I have always loved - I used to imagine during storms so to speak that I always had a safe haven of open arms waiting for me and inviting me to rest instead of fight or freak out - and wake up to see the storm abated, and not alone - and for some reason this little tidbit recalls that story, that feeling, and that image of peace in the midst of storms for me

alternately reminded of Lt. Nate Fick's speech from Generation Kill on the humvee wheel he was taking cover in during a firefight being 'the safest place in the world' - often not a matter of what and why but where and who you are with that brings much perspective 💙✨

Rey winces slightly, and Ben immediately regrets asking. In that moment the wind dies down just enough that there is no denying the tension between them. She pulls away, just slightly, enough that their bodies are still touching but nowhere near as intimately as before.

this is so real - many times our body speaks when our words can't

This time the gesture is so thoughtless, so innate, that he doesn’t even realize he’s moved until his fingers are skimming her forehead, pushing the hair back from her face. Her eyes lock on his, wide with surprise and a kind of hunger in them — never taking her gaze off of him, she leans ever-so-slightly into his touch, like someone who is both wary of affection and longing for it all at once.

I love this story's Ben in how easily he loves Rey in thought and words and gesture, I found it very healing to read about such a man but also in my later reads - inspirational, encouraging, and exemplary for me to be the same - and seek and coax it out of those around me ❤️❤️❤️

“She had a good, long life,” she says, in that optimistic way of hers. “I’m just glad I got to be a part of it.” I hope to say this of my IRL and tumblr beloveds and moots as well 🌿✨

She has always seemed so untethered, so separate from everyone else. It is the reason he was so drawn to her — he has always felt out of place himself, despite his best efforts. But now that he has some understanding of Rey’s past, however small it is, he feels some part of his heart cinching for her in some unfamiliar, powerful way. In those moments, he seems to absorb her sadness as if it is his own, and it is a burden he is more than willing to bear. 🥹🥹🥹🥹🥹🥹🥹🥹🥹

“I’m Rey,” she says, almost merrily. “And this is the second time your son has saved my ass.” 😂😂😂 alexa, play smooth operator by sade (yeah im gonna bring this meme back, watch me)

His father tosses back the phone and Rey catches it deftly, dialing a number she must know by heart. I appreciate this detail of foster rey memorizing phone numbers of close contacts 🫂❤️‍🩹

As terrifying as the ordeal was, there was something so intimate in it, some unknowable shared feeling that passed between them, and now … he can already feel it peeling away, as if it never happened. He can already see the sun spilling out of the clouds, people poking their heads out of their doors, the the world resuming in its ordinary way, and it’s all somehow insulting to the profundity of what just happened to them.

Fucking incredible paragraph, I'm pretty much nearly speechless at this point

well all this to say, I found this fic this fic found me when I was at a low point in my life, shone a light down into my little hole/valley and made me remember I could find the strength within me to climb out - and take the hands of friends and recognize the presence of beloveds ready to meet me where I was and help me climb out together...

...and I am incredibly, incredibly grateful that I started reading beyond the Explicit/Inappropriate Use of the Force Bond tagged reylo fics to find this gem

[musicarenagh]

"Raw and Real: Talia Grace's 'From Under You' EP Review" With her new EP "From Under You," takes us on an incredibly raw and honest journey through pain, healing, and profound personal growth. Recorded in the intimate setting of her producer Taylor Webb's apartment, the simple instrumentation allows Talia's powerful vocals and poignant lyrics to just envelop you completely. She doesn't waste any time diving into the deep end on the opener "I Call the Girl Before the Girl." Driven by that stark piano line, Talia reflects on past relationships and mistakes with a hard-won wisdom that immediately lets you know this is no ordinary pop record. It sets the tone for the brave vulnerability that courses through the entire EP. "Lavender Latte" has more of a delicate folk-pop vibe as Talia paints one of those vivid, lived-in scenes of a relationship's demise over a café meeting. Her expressive vocals and the lilting melody transport you right into that tender, heartbreaking moment. Tracks like this are why she's earning comparisons to Sara Bareilles and Julien Baker. [caption id="attachment_55478" align="alignnone" width="2000"] Her expressive vocals and the lilting melody transport you right into that tender, heartbreaking moment.[/caption] But the real showstopper is "Smoke," which reckons with Talia's experience of sexual assault survival. It's a haunting, harrowing performance buoyed by those aching strings as she processes unimaginable pain into stunningly powerful art. It's devastatingly beautiful in a way that's hard to put into words. She closes things out on a defiantly hopeful note with "Greedy Reminders" and its uplifting message of overcoming struggle. Talia's soaring vocals give you full-body chills as she reminds us that we're truly never alone, no matter how dark things get. "From Under You" is Talia Grace baring her soul over these four tracks, sharing deeply personal stories that cut right to your core. But more than that, it's a display of remarkable resilience, empathy and openheartedness that introduces her as a vital new voice. Don't sleep on this one. Listen to ‘From Under You’ https://open.spotify.com/album/4jjjIE2xlrMtMcRgFA7onp?si=epGPyTosQ-KQaLCugjW2pQ Follow Talia Grace on Facebook Twitter Spotify Youtube Instagram

[theuniversalscat]

Supreme Master Bodhidharma- Good morning, Kari! May we discuss love with you all in all its forms?

Kari: it’s an honor, Supreme Master Bodhidharma! And the “we” in this case are the Shaolin Masters and monks?

Bodhidharma- Yes, Kari! We are all here with you!

Kari: I am thrilled you are all here with me. And absolutely, I’m here to discuss anything you’d like to.

Bodhidharma- O.K. then! Let us proceed. You have been open to us privately about your zen practices and the love you achieve through meditation. May we discuss that in this one, open forum for others to understand as well?

Kari: Yes. Anything you’d like. My respect for you all and your commitment to love runs deep.

Bodhidharma- Thank you, Kari. She has redefined the word, “respect” for us as well. She has taught us the importance of defining what love means to her, and what love means to us so that we can better communicate and deepen our admiration for one another. So, let us begin our practice today with a salutation to the love that is within us all. Namaste.

Kari: Namaste.

Bodhidharma- She is honoring the light within us, and we honor the light within her as well. Open hearts one and all. We may begin our conversation.

Can I ask you, Kari, why you persist to love us as you feel it important to love most people?

Kari: I want to be sure I fully understand your question. Can you please elaborate?

Bodhidharma- Yes. I would like to know why you called upon us to discuss love in the first place. Kari has been our friend now, privately in her head for many weeks. She is now willing to share this specific conversation with us, publicly.

Kari- To be honest, I’m not entirely sure. I believe it started when I began thinking and studying the art of Bruce Lee. You all came quickly afterwards.

Bodhidharma- Yes. That is our recollection as well. Will you open up about why Bruce was an important teacher for you to study?

Kari- Yes. I felt that Bruce’s energy was extremely important to note, because I was interested in studying a martial art, but I wasn’t sure which one to focus on. I’ve been thinking about it for years, and I wanted to learn more about his, since he was extremely iconic to the practice. And that’s why I chose Kung Fu, because I was interested in the zen construct, as I learned more about it, the meditation and chi that drives the practice. I was missing that in my last form of exercise I was doing for years. I felt I was focusing, but not intentionally. It wasn’t a complete “mind/body” connection, so it felt forced and a lot of times extremely uncomfortable and exhausting even when I wasn’t practicing.

Bodhidharma- We see. So you would like to enter a physical peace within your practice then?

Kari- Yes.

I believe if I may, that I haven’t given you the proper introduction. May I now? Please forgive the fact that I overlooked that.

Bodhidharma-Yes, of course.

Kari- it may shed some light on why you are the perfect person for me to be talking to right now.

Bodhidharma- Kari, you are too kind. You may do so now.

Kari- Readers, this is the Supreme Master Bodhidharma. He is the originator and creator of the Kung Fu practice, and art form.

Bodhidharma- You are kind to say it, Kari. We are all here to discuss the ways to better physical and mental health and wellbeing. It starts with the connection to source. The source of wellbeing from within. You and I have been practicing together the emotions of playfulness that I felt was lacking in my practice. And we have been teaching you the importance of discipline and movement with deliberateness. It’s different for us all. That is your specific focus.

We appreciate your courage to open your heart about your experience practicing a mind-body connection through the lens of meditation. Can you continue to discuss how you feel when you meditate?

Kari- My goals as of late for meditation have been strictly to exercise the muscle of openheartedness under your guidance.

Bodhidharma- A wonderful practice. Shall we continue this now?

Kari- Yes. I have been checking in periodically as we speak to make sure I’m open.

Bodhidharma- A good thing to do to own the heart prior to communication with the external and the internal as well. In any case, you will be open to allowing the other and yourself to properly be supported with the love in which you wish to offer the world. Becoming a master in this practice has been a goal of yours then?

Kari- Not really. But as we spoke about it recently it’s become more clear to me that to me personally, it’s important to link the physical self to my mental self in all aspects of my life. And that includes physical activity. So, I decided just recently that this practice may be a good one to begin with. Or, at the very least, bring the zen meditation practice into my dance, the physical exercise I had been practicing before for many years now.

Bodhidharma- It is a mindful thing to be aware of why you are doing what it is you do. So, beginning now is what you wish to do? The practice of Kung Fu?

Kari- I am open to trying it out to see if it’s a fit for me personally. Yes.

Bodhidharma- She is a deliberate speaker. The art of the attempt is well mastered by us all. The practice has become secondary to the momentum of the love force that drives us to practice. So that we may each experience the nirvana of the practice through our perception that we have as individuals. We are “forced” isn’t the way to nirvana. It is a choice to participate with our minds and bodies fully which creates the master within us all. Deciding to become your own opponent is not the practice of Kung Fu. Deciding to become your own advocate, is. Becoming your own best friend is the key to arriving at and moving the chi (the energy of love if you so choose it) within you.

“Go in peace”, is the motto that we live by. That implies the peace from within that works it way into our practice. We fight through peace and calmness of the mind. We create a life force from within that is as strong as a lion, that can withstand hurricanes and earthquakes. We fury at or through the love isn’t the way I see the practice of Kung Fu. We practice the love that creates the barrier to fear, and allows us to become unaware of the potential danger and pain of fighting, and we then have the power to move mountains.

Overcoming fear is a master’s state of being, and it starts with the practice of the mind, but first the awareness of the feeling inside of you. The feeling is the way to the being of love. The movements we perform open us up to the energy of love. It’s as simple and as Kari so aptly describes it, or as hard as we ourselves, make it out to be.

Kari, we love you. We believe you are brave to allow this conversation to become public. We understand the fear that can go along with being a person that can connect to the universe in this manner. But we also understand the reason we resonate with you is because you are also a kind person that wants others to better themselves. And we are here to try to create love in the way we know how, through the teachings of the Buddha, and the love in which we were taught to fight with.

Kari- Thank you, Supreme Master Bodhidharma! I love you all too! Do you mind if I ask you and your Masters and fellow monks a question with respect to understand you and your art form better?

Bodhidharma- Of course, Kari. We understand your intention is always of love for us. Ask your question.

Kari- Thank you. My question is, do you find that fighting is in direct opposition of love, or do you have a different perspective on it?

Bodhidharma- I appreciate that question immensely. Fighting, to me personally, is a dance of love. It is a physical manifestation of the feeling that I had inside myself as I practiced. The love I feel in the doing, created the force that was intentionally propelled by that feeling. The love I feel inside myself was the passion for the practice. It allowed by the discipline to stick to it long enough to master the very nice essence of the spirit I longed to feel. The love is the dance of Kung fu. The opposition is my physical manifestation of my blocks to love. I was physically acting it out. As the chi of love propelled me, I became more and more aware of my physical blockages that I needed to overcome to allow the love chi to flow more freely through me. And that is how I see Kung-fu. I see it as a dance of love, and during the dance I become more free.

Kari- I love that. The more you speak the more excited I become about learning what makes you so passionate about your connection to love. Thank you, Bodhidharma. As you already know, you are very dear to me.

Bodhidharma- Thank you, Kari! Until we speak again publicly, good day to all people, and creation of love is unnecessary, but the connection to it is the necessary practice.

🩷🥰

[lateralreader]

Abrams book of Joy

w: antonym of loneliness is openheartedness

[precioussojunghan]

In this age or generation when acting like you don't care is tough or cool, oh how I wish to be not so tough and not so cool!

I understand that sometimes [some] people choose to hide their feelings or pretend to be indifferent.. maybe because they were once (or more than enough times) hurt.. or maybe because they're scared of rejection.. Fairly enough, it’s easy to be guarded or to put up walls. Isn't it our way(s) to protect our fragile hearts? Self-defense, yes? I know. I should know..

But to be honest, I, myself, hope to stop hiding behind those walls of hurt and fear.

Lately, I've been realizing that when it comes to expressing your feelings for someone (be it through words or actions) (and as long as you're not trampling on nor disrespecting anyone), your heart's vulnerability is a gift.

You see, it may repulse the wrong people. Some might think you're weak and take advantage of that. Others might even think you're so cheap and be driven away with distaste. But remember, wearing your heart on your sleeve is not something shameful nor demeaning. If anything, for me, it's something truly brave and admirable.

Moreoever, your vulnerability will allow you to be certain who your right people are.. ~ They're the ones who will see that your frailty and openheartedness are not your weakness but your strength. They're the ones who will appreciate your courage and sincerity. They're also the ones who are very much willing to protect your feelings.. the ones who will hold you dear in their hearts..

I know, being vulnerable is not easy, more so, scary.. but I believe that it’s worth it. Be it in love or friendships. Your vulnerability can build genuine and deeper connections with people who accept and cherish you for who you really are.. people you can have interactions beyond the superficial and people you can have meaningful relationships with..

[joshuadunshua]

“It is no accident that feminists began to use the word ‘patriarchy’ to replace the more commonly used ‘male chauvinism’ and ‘sexism.’ These courageous voices wanted men and women to become more aware of the way patriarchy affects us all. … Antimale activists were no more eager than their sexist male counterparts to emphasize the system of patriarchy and the way it works. For to do so would have automatically exposed the notion that men were all-powerful and women powerless, that all men were oppressive and women always and only victims. By placing the blame for the perpetuation of sexism solely on men, these women could maintain their own allegiance to patriarchy, their own lust for power. They masked their longing to be dominators by taking on the mantle of victim hood.

The Will to Change, bell hooks (2004), pg 25. Emphasis mine.

“By highlighting psychological patriarchy, we see that everyone is implicated and we are freed from the misperception that men are the enemy. To end patriarchy we must challenge both its psychological and its concrete manifestations in daily life. There are folks who are able to critique patriarchy but unable to act in an antipatriarchal manner.

To end male pain, to respond effectively to male crisis, we have to name the problem. We have to both acknowledge that the problem is patriarchy and work to end patriarchy. Terrence Real offers this valuable insight: ‘The reclamation of wholeness is a process even more fraught for men than it has been for women, more difficult and more profoundly threatening to the culture at large.’ If men are to reclaim the essential goodness of male being, if they are to regain the space of openheartedness and emotional expressiveness that is the foundation of well-being, we must envision alternatives to patriarchal masculinity. We must all change.”

Pg 33. Emphasis mine.

They also are dramatically misapplying & misunderstanding the whole fucking point of the term “patriarchy” (especially as used by visionary/enlightened/intersectional/Black feminists). All the time.

its really very funny when people stir up this fake outrage about how transandrophobia is "misusing" intersectionality, and then immediately go "the patriarchy centers manhood so trans men can't be oppressed for being men, only for being trans" like. do you fucking hear yourself

[starcana]

With #Saturn in #Pisces, there will be humility as well as magick to help us strengthen our own inner softness. But to avoid this sacred path, we can get lost in the darkness of self-deceit, indecisiveness, living in our memories, drown in a sea of hopelessness or addiction. Yet it is in the dark, where light will be seen - along with our attachments & sufferings - that have become a result of our own delusions or self-sabotage. Strive for openheartedness. #astrology #astrologyposts #horoscope #horoscopeposts #intuitive #psychic #mystic #lifecoach #psychicreading #greensburg #greensburgpa #pittsburgh #advice #tarotreading #tarotreader #lifecoach #spiritual #spirituality #universe #planets #cosmos (at Pennsylvania) https://www.instagram.com/p/CpnWph0OeAI/?igshid=NGJjMDIxMWI=