“The answer that I give my brother is what I am asking for.  And what I learn of him is what I learn about myself.”  ACIM (CH31:II)

 Happy Sunday!

On Friday Peter and I had a fight and something happened.
We fought outside in the snow.  I cried.  I yelled. I felt such hurt I could not think of how we could get past this.  I just didn’t want to deal with feeling this way anymore.
Before I had left the house for work Peter had said he was sorry.  At that time I couldn’t accept it or say it back.  I could only still feel my hurt and anger.  I was into playing the blame game.
The thing that was different was that I had a pain in my heart.  It felt bruised and tender. As I went throughout my day, each time my focus came back to my heart I felt the bruise and thought I would cry again.
I know from my lessons that forgiveness is required of me and of him. I was not ready to put aside the blame as I drove into work, but I was ready to understand.  I asked the Holy Spirit what I was doing wrong, How do I communicate?  “Honesty” was the response I received.
I thought about my intentions, about my behavior and how I didn’t say why I chose to act as I did.  I realized that I went out into the situation with expectations about how I thought it should be and with my expectations on how I thought he would behave.
Honesty and expectations were the two words held in my mind through out the day.  I could not fathom how I would get to forgiveness but the pain in my heart told me I had to try to get there.
We spent the evening together like a normal Friday night. I just felt sad.
Before going to sleep I committed to reflecting on my words of guidance: honesty and expectations.
I knew I was wrong to go into a situation with expectations, but where did they come from?  They came from a fear I was carrying about the future that I had not been honest enough to speak about but, due to this fear, I was trying to make him change.
I had carried for a while the expectation of changing Peter.  I felt ashamed of myself as I had learned long ago that you can not change other people, only yourself.  In the spiritual lessons I have learned, you can just be the example, the light that they may be drawn to.  The choice is always theirs.
I realized I had created the situation.  My expectations and my intensions of change had created the fight.
I thought about my tools for compassion that I realized last week and applied them here.  I thought about how it would feel to be on his side of the situation.
I thought about what I feared in him and used it to look at myself and found my fault of not being able to express love.
I could now forgive as I was the one in need of forgiveness.
Somehow through this process of reflection I felt another being there who was us as a couple, We.  We had created the situation.  We had made the mistake and we together give and receive forgiveness.  We is someone special that I don’t share with anyone else and is deserving of my honor and respect.
My heart felt healed and open when I fell to sleep.
In the morning I apologized.
We talked. I explained my mistaken expectations.  I spoke honestly of my fears and what I had learned about myself.  And then I just let it be.
Later in the day my mind wanted to go back to trying to figure out what Peter was thinking.  With tears I stopped myself and I surrendered it to God.
So what was the pain in my heart?
I think it was a crack, an enlargement of the opening.  I was either going to bring in light to fill the extra space to benefit me or it would rub and continually irritate and bring pain.
I will hold onto the lesson of Honesty.  A new tool given to me, to express the real me who only wants to be loving to all.
With a laugh I just had come into my mind this analogy of the spiritual path being like a video game where the hero travels through many stages and challenges to be given a new tool or weapon to move forward toward the ultimate goal.  The goal is LOVE.
Thank you Lord!
Namaste’
“For next to you is the One Who holds the light before you, so that every step is made in certainty and sureness of the road.  A blindfold can indeed obscure your sight, but cannot make the way itself grow dark.  And he Who travels with you has the light.” ACIM (CH31:II)