Last May I had a series of wonderful spiritual experiences followed in November by a physical setback from a car accident. I believe that both of these events are gifts to open my old structures to accommodate more Spirit. As someone once wrote, “The path is easy for someone who has no preferences,” and I try to embrace the setback with the same gratitude with which I accepted the original blessing. Reflecting on “why” these things are happening, I receive the same answer for both events—that Spirit wants me to love without boundaries. Scientist Stephen Hawking speaks of the “unboundaried condition” as the realm of Spirit, and loving as Spirit loves us is where we are all headed, isn’t it?
Meaning of Aloha
Actually, I think this journey started in Hawaii a year ago, and the spirit of Hawaii, the spirit of aloha, has taught me many things that I think will help with this process. Aloha means both “Alo” the bosom, the center of the universe, and “Ha” means the breath of God. Knowing this gives you some idea of what aloha means. And how is it lived? To the Hawaiians of old it meant to invite a stranger into your home and to feed, not only his or her physical body, but also the spirit of God within that stranger. This aloha spirit is also the core of Buddhism to “Love everyone as your mother,” and resembles the Christian tenet to “Do unto others as you would have them do unto you.”
Aloha is not only a ‘doing’ love, but also a ‘being’ love. Sitting in Hawaii, as I did for two weeks last year, I became aware of how lacking in this principle I am. I am too boundaried in my modern ways, and in Hawaii I discovered that sitting on the veranda for days at a time greeting the neighbours as they passed was the best way to feel into what aloha means. Aloha is more a yin than a yang principle, or is it that I just need to move deeper into yin in myself to find the balance of yin and yang? I suspect that is the case.
Science Proves How our Hearts Affect Others
I heard a story related by Dr. Paul Pearsall that gives scientific proof of how great love affects not just those around you, but moves throughout the ethers to affect those you have never met. A woman Dr. Pearsall knew, Cindy by name, was dying, but she did not want to surrender to death. She was in a coma and all her organs were failing except her heart, which was beating at 120 beats a minute. Her sister was wearing a Holter monitor that measured her heartbeat 24 hours a day, and, surprisingly, her sister’s heart was also beating at 120 a minute. Their hearts were communicating.
Cindy’s sister told Cindy that she did not need to fight to live anymore and could let go and, as she spoke, Cindy’s heart slowed to 100, 80, 60 and then down through the 40’s but then started to increase again. Cindy was afraid to die and was fighting the process. Paul Pearsall and the sister started chanting to Cindy —the Hawaiian words that mean that your heart overflows with love, and soon Cindy’s heart slowed again and then stopped at exactly 8:40. Most interesting was that, at the moment of Cindy’s death, her sister’s heart monitor stopped working.
But the story continues. A year later Dr. Pearsall was at a conference recounting this story at a talk related to the heart as a thinking, feeling, communicating organ. A cardiologist, also from Hawaii, listening to Pearsall’s story related that he had a patient with a heart murmur whose heart had stopped at precisely 8:40 that same day for approximately 80 seconds and then began to beat afterwards at its own steady, normal rate.
We see in this story how much our fears and loves create our heart rhythms that affect others, not only those whom we know but, through the ethers, those we do not know. Our world is truly an unboundaried condition and we need to live that reality, not in theory but in experience. I hope that you, too, can relate to the need to uncage your heart and to free yourself to love beyond your current bounds. This may be an ongoing journey for many of us; however, nothing is more important. My goal for 2014 is to commit ever more deeply to this unfolding process. May our hearts unite in love in the ethers.
Living Love meditation retreats with Tanis, CLICK HERE.
