Love and loss

This is something that I wrote on my facebook page a couple of months ago.  I'm re-posting it here because I woke up this morning thinking about it.  It's as true now as it ever has been or ever will be.  And I think it's a good thing to be reminded of from time to time.

 "Tonight, I have witnessed the extremes of the human psyche-- from unconditional love and passion, to hate, fear, and the ultimate of repressed pain. Some of these are my own, and some are from friends that are closer to me than family. 

I have seen what unconditional love can accomplish in the face of extreme adversity, and the pain of losing those we've held most dear to our hearts, completely blind to the fact that those we held were only here for a moment-- simply to teach us something. And I learned that no matter how deep the pain at losing those special someone's can be, if we dwell on the pain and loss instead of the joy, love, and basic life lessons they taught us, then we might as well have never had them in our lives at all. Pain and loss are a part of our growth as both physical and spiritual beings. We have to learn from the pain and move on-- not hold on to it as if it were the only thing worth living for.

I saw the power and intensity of true love when combined with complete open and honest communication. I felt the betrayal of someone making excuses for the pain and hurt that they, themselves, inflicted.

I'm going on a tangent here because I don't understand why WE as humans, all equal to each other, cannot simply say what we think and feel the moment we think or feel it. Why must we hide for fear of being hurt, ridiculed, condemned, out of guilt, or for whatever other "reason" we can come up with for not being true to ourselves and those that we truly love? Why do we let those who care only for themselves impact us more deeply than those who would lay down their lives for us? And even those that did truly love us but left us for whatever reason, why do we hold more tightly to the memories and "what if's" than what they wanted us to learn?"

It's easy to  to slip and slide into that pattern of grieving for persons or experiences that have passed.  There is a time for the grieving.  But then there is time to move on.  We mustn't lose ourselves in our memories.  Rather, we should cherish them, and then move on to create new ones.  I don't know why this is on my mind today.  But I wanted to share it as I though it.