How Your Peaceful Relationships Are a Shelter From the Storm
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MAUDE: These are tumultuous times. I’ve been feeling tension battering at my outer self. I am what some may call an optimist. But the vision I have of how we will evolve and come together is a long road away still. Right now, I feel battered by the imminent election in the US and all the division and disinformation; by climate change and its devastating effects, and the wars still raging on. I think I am troubled most of all by the willingness of so many to believe the worst of each other.
I won’t pretend that this does not bring me to tears sometimes, but I do want to stress that as troubled by all this as I am, this is not my inner reality. I am quietly, calmly peaceful inside. I have joy in my heart and gratefulness for every moment and every connection with others. I am buoyed up by those people who are willing to live in peace and love while standing firm in this world and doing whatever they can to make things better.
Phil and I share an inner peacefulness that is beyond any of the effects of the changing world we live in. Through the practices we share with you every week, we experience a path of peace that never wavers and serves to strengthen our individual struggles. This is true of a number of my deep relationships where this peace we speak of is a living quality. I can turn to those in moments of distress to help me and strengthen me. These peaceful relationships provide the shelter from the storm that all of us need sometimes, while we renew and refresh ourselves.
Sacred Space is a term Phil and I use to describe our evenings together. I’m not sure how early in our relationship this ritual began, but it is something we have been doing, without effort I might add, for a long time. We retire together at a certain time every evening, and yes, I do mean every evening barring a very few exceptions for events, shutting down all outside communications and just being with each other in the peaceful energy field we generate together. We share laughing, playing games, watching shows, doing crosswords, being sexual, talking, getting the ideas for our blogs, to name a few. We eliminate all other influences except this place of peace that we dive into with our whole selves, with no distractions.
Find your relationships of peace and develop them, strengthen them, learn from them. We all need this to stay the course and breathe through all we are confronted with. Find and create your sacred spaces, both between you and another, and within yourself.Find and create a Sacred Space for yourself #quote #peace #relationships Share on X
PHIL: I don’t remember how or when it started, but from early days, we have set aside the end of the evening to be with each other. It may involve word games, Netflix, this blog or sex. Not all at once, of course. It’s a ritual we call our Sacred Space. We shut the door on the outside world and are present with each other. Even Netflix counts as us both having the same experience.
It has become a source of great strength. The echo and the promise of our connection sustain me throughout the day. It works for me because I have come to see that our relationship is a sense, an experience. The agreements, vows and day-to-day interactions are the words with which we communicate, but it is the experience of our peaceful connection that seeps into my body beneath the level of language.
There are so many worrisome events happening, from wars to hurricanes to elections, that I feel an undercurrent of anxiety running through my days, but I recognized recently that in our Sacred Space, I close the door on that and let it go. I think this nightly cleansing is so good for our health. Maude described it well the other night as our shelter from the storm.
You, too, can draw strength from your relationships. Find someone else who is able to be present, and be present with them. The world will take care of itself overnight.
Photo credit: Phil Mayes
Photo note: Dark Park, Larkspur, CA
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I love that you call your nightly together time sacred space. That’s beautiful. It must well set the tone for real connection. We share alone time every night around 6 for an hour or so before dinner, but Ive just considered it time we choose to be alone together. I love that your special time you call sacred space. How great. It’s almost like it’s sacred ‘grace.’
Jeanine
I don’t remember how we came to use the term sacred space, only that we’ve been conscious of it for a long time.
As for sacred grace — do we create the relationship that we have, or is it grace that has offered it to us? (Long discussion about free will goes in here.)
Our family hiked up to Table Rock, the highest elevation in our neighborhood, yesterday. Being in this beautiful sanctuary gave us the opportunity to rise above the turmoil of all the troubling differences that people fight over in our ‘civilized’ world.
I love the idea of creating that special time to share with your partner at the end of the day. It’s inspiring and I’m going to try doing that more mindfully with my husband tonight.
Esther
Thank you, Esther. Please let us know how that goes 🙂
Maude
Thank you for addressing the daily horrors that are confronting the planet
Unimaginable suffering and threats all around us. Tapping into my core of inner peace is not always enough to assuage me. Reminding me that harmony in my relationships recharges strength and optimism is exactly what I needed!
Sonia
Glad you liked it! I often panic that the crises today are like nothing humanity has ever had to deal with, then I remember having nightmares about nuclear war, or think about amputations before anesthesia, or the many torture devices that were used in the name of the church, and decide that I won’t use my time machine today…