Heresy

Where would kisses go?

I have always been fascinated with the idea of parallel universes. The concept that each decision that we make in our lives is a point of inflection that necessarily takes us to two opposite paths: when we decide to do something, we are by default not deciding to do the contrary. If the Universe were flat and linear, which Albert Einstein already proved that it is not, then just one decision would lead to one result and the non-decision would lead to nothing; but as we know by quantum physics that the Universe is made up of infinite planes and possibilities and that time is the axis which connects these planes, then necessarily the non-decisions create parallel universes in our lives.

I borrow today’s heresy from Víctor Manuel and his song “Adonde irán los besos?” [Where will the kisses go?] What parallel universes do we create with the kisses we do not give? What possibilities do we create when we make each decision and what opposite possibilities do we also create upon not deciding the opposite? What are these parallel-me’s like? What do they live through, feel, suffer, or what would we be living, feeling and suffering if our decisions had been completely opposite to those which we made? This heresy is the contemplation that if we are the result of the decisions that we have made, who would we then be as a result of having made completely opposite decisions? And could we by chance have access in a corner of our heart to this parallel self and look at this being, as we look at ourselves in the mirror, and learn from what we see?

But I want to carry this heresy much farther; I want to propose what Richard Bach says in his book, Illusions: “Don’t turn your back on future possibilities, before being sure that you have nothing to learn from them. You will always have the freedom to change your mind and choose another future or another past.” My heresy today is impregnated with the power that we have in our lives the power to change our reality and to convert our present into the parallel present, if that is what calls us more strongly, power to change our minds and choose again, power to create at any time, from the magic void of nothingness, power to give those kisses, which we never gave...

Today I want to generate a space in our lives in which we look at the kisses we never gave and know that we have all the power to give them and to entirely create the past, the present, and the future that we want. I offer you, as a gift, the song which inspired this heresy. 

Who created Jiminy Cricket?

Today a friend told me that ATM’s should have a psychotherapy service after 2:00 AM, since anyone who would go take out cash at that hour is probably looking for trouble in his or her life. The comment made me think about a little “Jiminy Cricket After-Party” that according to everything our parents, our priests and our ethics professors taught us, we should all carry in our consciousness in order to avoid bringing these problems into our lives.

But afterwards I thought about what today’s heresy is: Jiminy Cricket should be asleep. We all bring to our lives everything that we need to bring for our learning, including the problems, and what’s more, especially our problems! There are no good or bad situations—everything that we bring to our lives is perfect because it makes us grow.

So Jiminy is an invention of an external code of values, call it morality, religion, or whatever name evokes the sacred, but the truth is that life puts us on the road that we need to be on. Rejecting free choice and sticking to this external code is perhaps creating an obstacle for a learning opportunity which we should have; we look for problems because it is in our exercise of getting out of them and creating solutions that we get trained as comprehensive human beings, as leaders of our own existence.

This is why I admire so much those who have fallen, who have been mistaken, who have erred, who have left Jiminy Cricket in the children’s story where he belongs and have dared to live in order to accept afterwards all this packet of errors and problems and, with their whole heart, look for the way out, reinvent themselves, grow, emerge, come out. Those who have strayed are the best teachers in my life, because they show me the courage of getting back up again-- these are the best Jiminy Crickets of any story. 

Pain and ego

This space is being filled up little by little with heretics who comment on these heresies and make them grow, enrich them, multiply them. Today I received a heresy as a comment on yesterday’s heresy, which seemed to me to be so profound and sublime as to convert itself into today’s heresy:

 “The intensity of the pain is proportional to our capacity to cling to something, to someone. What hurts us is the ego, life does not hurt.” Thank you, Patricia Botero, for such a heresy. I always thought that the intensity of pain was proportional to the intensity of the love. This reflection about pain was born the day of my most intense and infinite pain, when my grandmother – Aya – died. Today Patricia makes me think that it is not necessarily proportional to the intensity of the love, but to the “attachment,” which in many cases is a deformation of love.

Where does attachment come from? From love deformed by the ego, from egotistical, possessive, absorbing, intense and of course, super-passionate love. A love which is very easy for me to feel, and therefore fills me with attachments which do not necessarily lead to free love, to a love that is infinitely powerful, transforming and orgasmic, which celebrates the individuality and gives no foothold to the least bit of pain.

Today I understand that I need to crush this ego even more in order to be able to reach that love which frees us from burdens that generate chains so heavy that make it impossible for the soul to fly. Today I understand that there is still much work to do, beginning this very instant.  Thank you to these divine heretics that continue to cross my path!

What we create in our lives

Yesterday I shared with a great friend, one of those who topple the soul with words that can come only from the heart and strike every one of our fibers. As it is always the case with my great friends, I came out of this encounter strengthened and in peace, full of questions and loaded with transcendence, with my burden lightened, and reinvigorated with love.

I owe today’s heresy to that space created with her and to the great conclusion of the night which was that whatever we have in our lives, good, bad, difficult, painful or full of satisfaction, is exactly what we have created because we need to learn from it. Even more so, we come to difficult moments in our lives because we are growing and still do not know for sure what will come afterward, or what future will be created. Whatever it is it will be absolutely perfect, precisely because we create in our life and we attract, what we need.

We come to our existence to grow; everything that happens to us are vehicles, tools and pretexts for this growth. Pain is part of the cost of growing; pain is part of the growth itself, in fact. If it doesn’t hurt, we are not “stretching our rubber band.” Thus, in that way, we have in our “right now” the perfection of the magic of life, a life in which we have created all that we need in order to grow and learn, in order to evolve ourselves from our own Self.

Gladys: a hug for you, one of those that also make you grow!

To be insignificant

We struggle every day not to be insignificant; it is one of the greatest challenges of any life: to have meaning. Nevertheless, it is precisely this search for meaning which sometimes carries us to the crisis of meaninglessness, after all: what does it mean to be significant?

As they say in Landmark Education: “Life is empty and meaningless, and it is empty and meaningless that is empty and meaningless,” it is not a tongue-twister, it is an invitation to understand what I bring in today’s Heresy: we put the meaning there ourselves, every instant and every act can have a billion meanings, since no act in and of itself has meaning, not even ourselves. We are also empty and meaningless.

To try desperately each day to be significant is the main cause of stress. Not only do we want to have meaning, but a particular meaning. Letting go of this struggle to be significant is simply giving ourselves over to life as it is, to live it from the essence and to understand that we are insignificant and that is precisely the source of our freedom.

Since today’s invitation is to “let go” of so much meaning in our lives; let us be how we are from the foundation of our being: empty and meaningless—from there our souls can paint millions of colors and can continue being just as transparent as ever.

When we build from love

This theme serves for a million heresies and today words fail me when confronted with the evidence of the infinite power of love, of building from love. Today I have witnessed miracles created, bridges, which are magically generated if, when faced with obstacles and insurmountable challenges, we stand up from the love that is in our hearts, and generate transformation in our lives.

Today my heresy is profound and simple, and infinitely magical: there is no obstacle that cannot be overcome when we stand from love.

So today, dumbfounded before the evidence of the miracles of love, short on words and swollen with pride toward those whom I love and who have been capable of creating transformation and new bridges in their lives by building on love, I leave you with one simple question: what miracles can you create today in your life, if you always rise up from the love which fills your heart?

When our skin becomes uncomfortable

I read with astonishment a few days ago one of Stephanie Sinclair’s excellent graphic reports about the self-immolation of women in Afghanistan, a horrifying practice that is becoming more and more common, in which the heartrending pain which these women are living every day leads them to seek the sacrificial fire to burn their skin in search of death. As this method is too slow, in the majority of the cases these women are found before dying and then they face, not only the pain that devastates their soul, but also the pain of a body without skin, the pain of social rejection, the infinite pain of someone who must continue with a life they do not want.

My first reaction was close to horror, but as I read about the lives of these women I began to feel compassion and to understand how the reality of the Taliban regime, which affects every aspect of their lives, drives them to a determination which goes beyond any reasoning about the pain. Today in my heresy I can feel how in some moments the pain touches every fiber of our being in such a way that we wrench away the skin in order to be left in raw flesh and only in that way can we sacrifice in some way our heart, destroyed by the thorns of life. My heresy is that, as painful as it may be, there are moments in which this self-immolation is necessary.

In raw flesh we experience the bitterness of each one of our wounds, we feel the sharpness of the pain in the midst of the curative process and when some day we have skin again, the scars will remain there to remind us of this pain that marked our soul and our very life.

One minute at a time

A few years ago as I faced one of the most painful situations I ever faced in my life, one of my professors came to me and said that the only piece of advice he could give me was to "live one day at a time."  It took me some time to understand his words, but especially to be able to live through those times of darkness when you  feel that you're far from the "light at the end of the tunnel" and you should simply concentrate on the incredible journey of overcoming the pain one step at a time, one day at a time.

Today, as a heresy, I propose that whenever our soul is burning and our reasoning is uncertain we live not just one day at a time but even one minute at a time. Pain shapes us to be capable of withstanding stronger pain, which will lead us to superior learning. However, pain sometimes is so strong that we can't even see the light at the end of a day, so we should simply live our lives one minute at a time.

We live our lives only to learn and circumstances leave marks and scars on us which come with the price of learning.  At the end of the road, this learning is the only reward we will get. There's nothing else you should ask the Universe for: we'll find our destiny in our own journey. But when this journey is not clear at all, when destiny is completely uncertain, and pain completely tears your soul apart, the formula is simply to "live one minute at a time."

Are we human or are we dancers?

"The Killers" raise an interesting question in their song titled "Human": are we human or are we dancers? What do we do after our umbilical cord is cut? What do we do when we're in front of an open door? Are we human and do we have normal, proper, and expected responses? or are we dancers and take a risk and look for our own pace and even dare to make our own music?

Today my Heresy is based on the premise that life does not evolve around the destination we have set ourselves, but around completing our journey towards that destination, around the experiences we live, the doors we open, and the music in which we believe. Today my Heresy is an invitation to be less "humans" and more "dancers". I love imagining that the universe is playing the tune of a song that I do not get to hear, and yet drives me to dance. A song that slowly takes me to unexpected roads filled with challenges, questions, and learnings. At each station there is an obligatory stop to explore and dance for a while before continuing our journey carrying a suitcase full of questions and our soul enriched with experiences.

And you?, are you human or are you dancer?

P.S. I must admit that there's been a lot of controversy and different opinions about this song. Some interpret dancers as someone who must be part of a well orchestrated choreography and moves like everybody else. Human, on the contrary, is someone whose heart beats with its individuality. A dancer is a puppet and is encouraged to "cut off the strings". I have a different interpretation. Despite this, I present this heresy for your reflection and comments. 

Warmth in the soul

Today I want to dedicate this space to be grateful to those friends who keep our souls warm, those who live and vibrate with our stories as if they were their own, those who passionately listen and debate because they care about our lives, those who simply love us regardless of time, space, or conditions.

These friends live inside of us. To them there are no barriers. These friends make our lives have all the meaning of the smiles and the love you share without measure. My heresy today is simply a hug of gratitude to all those who bring their warmth to my soul, to the friends who accompany me, question me, and make me "stretch my rubber band"; to the friends who love me how I am, despite being who I am on occasions. Today my heresy is a deep hug to my true friends. They know who they are.

It is this simple: thank you for bringing your warmth to my heart!