Moments of Grace

I spent my lunch hour with Knight today. We hadn't spent time together since Sunday morning and it flowed for us to have some time today.

For my part, I desired to see him and it came from a healthy, loving, present space. I enjoy spending time with him. One of my favorite things in the world is talking with him, especially when I can lay my head on his shoulder, press my body up against his, make contact at every possible point, and put my hand over his heart. There is such ease in our conversation, and such incredible openness. I have never been so honest, so transparent. We have deep intimacy. While we may have some shadowy and unhealthy patterns between us, we also have many incredibly light and healthy aspects of our relationship. We do intimacy really, really well, which is carrying us through this transition in our relationship with incredible grace.

Last night we talked about what we might do at lunch. I have been taking a walk every day as part of my practice of self-care. We talked about walking. Or having lunch. Or having sex. He made a half-joking comment about the apartment being empty and the possibility of sex. He's such a man when it comes to these things (I find it endearing and flattering). I felt powerful desire and temptation at the thought of sex. I also realized there were light and shadow motivations at play, so I quickly tried to resist the idea with a comment about meeting somewhere safer than his empty apartment. Ultimately we did decide to meet at his place and didn't settle on what we would do.

The flirting and the possibility of sex being bandied about turned me on. And for the first time since the "break up," it didn't make me sad to touch myself or fantasize about being with him. It felt good. It felt joyful. It felt loving and damn sexy.

I showed up this afternoon and we decided to cuddle on his bed while we talked. Because of my reading last night and the flow of insights that followed (a post on that coming soon), I wanted to talk about the spiritual aspects of our relationship and was distracted from thoughts of sex (mostly). During our conversation I was profoundly moved and cried several times, not out of grief this time, but out of immense gratitude for what is unfolding within each of us and between us, for our desire to truly witness each other and for having someone with whom I could talk about spiritual partnership and know he gets it. It is so strange to suddenly feel comfortable with the idea that we are not returning to what we had. I no longer want to. The parts of our relationship where we were relating from our wounds rather than our love need to die. Our attachments to the illusions of security need to die. I can feel how much more real, loving and vibrant the relationship we are capable of can be when we free ourselves from the past.

Toward the end our time together I asked if I could kiss him. I asked because I wanted to respect boundaries and offer the opportunity for him to decide whether it would be an authentic expression for him. He said yes. After our kiss he asked if I wanted him to ask me from now on. I said no. I am open to whatever unfolds naturally from love. He said he feels the same way. We both emphasized our commitment to act from healthy and authentic places rather than shadowy and habitual ones. We are making no commitments. We are not "back together." We are focusing on the spiritual and emotional rather than the socially conventional and domestic.

As we break our habits we are able to see what we have that is rich and good and that which came from our need, our attachment, our insecurity, and our fear of being alone. We see where we need to work on ourselves and learn to relate in healthy ways before we can know if sharing a domestic life is desired and good for us. Perhaps there is a different relationship structure that suits us better. As our relationship unfolds we will see where it leads to act in integrity rather than from a sense of expectation or obligation because we call ourselves partners. We don't know those people-living-in-relationship-integrity yet, so we cannot know what kind of relationship they will have.

What we do know is that we have these moments of grace and we can create more of them. It doesn't matter what we call our relationship or whether we live together or whether we remain lovers. What matters are the moments in which we act from love, towards ourselves and each other and everyone else, and increasing those moments through self-care, open-heartedness and spiritual practice.

Toward that end I bought us each a gift: The Book of Awakening by Mark Nepo. It is a daybook with reflections by a poet who survived cancer, which was an experience of spiritual awakening for him. Someone shared passages from it on Facebook and it resonated with me. I gave Knight's copy to him today with a homemade bookmark*. My hope is that we will both be inspired and that we will have a shared spiritual practice every day, even though we will not be together every day.

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*The quote on the bookmark: "A true soulmate is a mirror, the person who shows you everything that’s holding you back, the person who brings you to your own attention so you can change your life. A true soul mate is probably the most important person you’ll ever meet, because they tear down your walls and smack you awake.”

I wrote a personal note that said," Thank you for smacking me awake."