Unprepared Transformation

After a longish day cleaning out my parents' house, I was in the local grocery store. Dashing to get through my list so I could get home and wash off the grime and exhaustion, I was caught up short by the gaze. I mean frozen (or warmed) in my tracks. There it was in the ground beef section, beaming between a mom and her infant, rendering them oblivious of all but their oneness. It was stunning.

Then it was over as if it had not been. Mom turned to ponder the sirloin vs. the chuck and the infant, after a brief pause to see if Mom's focus would return, let his eyes wander. They shifted smoothly, but they had been somewhere very, very else.

I was unprepared for how transformed I, a mere observer, was by their gaze. Its radiated light bestowed a sense of wholeness and belonging upon me as well. When I too moved on, the grime and fatigue of the day were weightless. –Nancy Harding

Michael's Musings- The Winds of Spring

There is a huge storm churning the waves in south-west Ireland where I am living and writing these words, and it seems like Spring is blowing winter out to sea to make room for new beginnings.

Spring and Easter are special times to remind ourselves about Love, Loss, and Forgiveness; If we forget or neglect these facets of our lives, we will be chained to impossible dreams of others, going nowhere alone and forever carrying burdens that cause us endless suffering.

I knew little of love in earlier years. I was told that God loved me. Perhaps he or she did, but I certainly didn’t. As I look back, I see myself surrounded by good people who often spoke about love but practiced self-neglect. I learned obediently from them, and love never became a part of me until much later in life. Like those in my proximity, I also attempted to ignore most of my losses and my screams, and seldom if ever experienced loss as a catalyst for living a more loving life.

Furthermore, without self-love, forgiveness was an impersonal religious ritual that passed me by, never releasing me from shame and guilt and self-neglect. But in later years in the hospice and in my workshops I was fortunate to learn before it was too late.

Soon the storm will pass, and in the opening moments of spring we will film a workshop on Love, Loss, and Forgiveness as part of the Love, Loss, and Forgiveness Project. We trust that the films that emerge from the lives of courageous people who will offer us glimpses of their stories will encourage large numbers of people from everywhere embrace Love, Loss, and Forgiveness in their own lives. We will re-member our three natures—Mortal, Soul, and Spirit—and in remembering, enable ourselves to live lives fueled by love rather than wasting our mortality going through the motions of living paralyzed by fear and hatred.

Pause for a moment and gaze out to sea. Can you hear the promise of Spring from the far side of the wind?

Listen.

--Michael Murphy March 10th 2008: Castletownbere, West Cork

(Photo: J. Carlson copyright 2007)

What does "LOVE" mean?

A group of professional people posed this question to a group of 4 to 8 year-olds, 'What does 'love' mean? The answers they got were broader and deeper than anyone could have imagined.


'When my grandmother got arthritis, she couldn't bend over and paint her toenails anymore. So my grandfather does it for her all the time, even when his hands got arthritis too. That's love.'
Rebecca- age 8

'When someone loves you, the way they say your name is different. You just know that your name is safe in their mouth.'
Billy - age 4

'Love is when a girl puts on perfume and a boy puts on shaving cologne and they go out and smell each other.'
Karl - age 5

'Love is when you go out to eat and give somebody most of your French fries without making them give you any of theirs.'
Chrissy - age 6

'Love is what makes you smile when you're tired.'
Terri - age 4

'Love is when my mommy makes coffee for my daddy and she takes a sip before giving it to him, to make sure the taste is OK.'
Danny - age 7

'Love is when you kiss all the time. Then when you get tired of kissing, you still want to be together and you talk more. My Mommy and Daddy are like that. They look gross when they kiss'
Emily - age 8

'Love is what's in the room with you at Christmas if you stop opening presents and listen.'
Bobby - age 7 (Wow!)

'If you want to learn to love better, you should start with a friend who you hate,'
Nikka - age 6
(we need a few million more Nikka's on this planet)

'Love is when you tell a guy you like his shirt, then he wears it everyday.'
Noelle - age 7

'Love is like a little old woman and a little old man who are still friends even after they know each other so well.'
Tommy - age 6

'During my piano recital, I was on a stage and I was scared. I looked at all the people watching me and saw my daddy waving and smiling.
He was the only one doing that. I wasn't scared anymore.'
Cindy - age 8

'My mommy loves me more than anybody. You don't see anyone else kissing me to sleep at night.'
C lare - age 6

'Love is when Mommy gives Daddy the best piece of chicken.'
Elaine-age 5

'Love is when Mommy sees Daddy smelly and sweaty and still says he is handsomer than Robert Redford.'
C hris - age 7

'Love is when your puppy licks your face even after you left him alone all day'
Mary Ann - age 4

'I know my older sister loves me because she gives me all her old clothes and has to go out and buy new ones.'
Lauren - age 4

'When you love somebody, your eyelashes go up and down and little stars come out of you.' (what an image)
Karen - age 7

'Love is when Mommy sees Daddy on the toilet and she doesn't think it's gross.'
Mark - age 6

'You really shouldn't say 'I love you' unless you mean it. But if you mean it, you should say it a lot. People forget.'
Jessica - age 8

And the final one...

Author and lecturer Leo Buscaglia once talked about a contest he was asked to judge. The purpose of the contest was to find the most caring child.

The winner was a four year old child whose next door neighbour was an elderly gentleman who had recently lost his wife.

Upon seeing the man cry, the little boy went into the old gentleman's yard, climbed onto his lap, and just sat there.

When his Mother asked what he had said to the neighbour, the little boy said, 'Nothing, I just helped him cry'

What does love mean to you?

Michael's Musings - Leadership

February: Is the month of my birthday. Even though I will be seventy-seven (usually on the last day of the month, but not this year), I have not retired. I have advanced. I am still pregnant with possibilities, and I have tried to adopt a new way of imagining my Spirit, because we are in urgent need of a new and vital form of Spirit that will lead us out of the dreadful dangers we are in. You and I must rise up and become the leaders we need. Let’s do it together. Happy birthday!
Leadership in the face of Dragons, Warriors, and Other Dangers

How could we forget those ancient myths that stand at the beginning of all races, the myths about dragons that at the last moment are transformed into princesses? Perhaps all the dragons in our lives are princesses who are only waiting to see us act, just once, with beauty and courage. Perhaps everything that frightens us is, in its deepest essence, something helpless that wants our love. –Rilke

Rage and fire and dragons may be transformed by the loving feminine into a masculine Spirit that protects and makes safe rather than one that conquers and kills. Young boys are often snatched too early from the maternal (and sometimes paternal) Soul that would have taught them softness. Instead, thrust into the arena of competition that judges them winners or losers, and admires marines and other terror-mongers that breathe fire and death, they learn to become warriors who are feted as heroes. What causes us to make monsters out of men? All too often, marines and other warriors return home so very much alone, and discover that their brutalized Souls have forsaken them causing love to pass them by. Many are suffering from Post Traumatic Soul Derangement, and, like Narcissus, some kill themselves while others take pills and potions in a desperate attempt to fill the void. Others act with beauty and courage, and only in the face of beauty and courage will love reappear.

For our survival, we need a new paradigm for the masculine Spirit. We need a Spirit—a leader—that acts with beauty and courage and makes us safe for love. The age-old winner-warrior may promise security and appear to be powerful, but this Spirit creates legions of losers and coffins full of the dead who will haunt us.

In the umbra of a disastrous and untrustworthy US Presidential leadership wholly lacking in beauty and courage, we crave a new leadership that will inspire us to rise up and channel our energy into a powerhouse of love. We need a hopeful and inspirational alternative to the hunter-gatherer leaders or the heroic warrior leaders who are violent Spirits from the dark side of history that still repeats itself as we fight each other and consume ourselves to death. We need not wait for the coming of a new political Spirit. We may adopt this new paradigm of masculine Spirit that will love our feminine Soul, and then our Mortal nature will feel safe and well prepared to live the loving life. Then and only then will the world be transformed. --Michael Murphy

Letting Go: Not Like Everyone Else

Not Like Everyone Else

Long ago I figured it out. That’s just the way I am.
For example: I have never been able to understand
what's so great about sliced bread,
search everywhere for the other variety.
And there is no desire lurking inside me
for a large-screen TV.

Still, it seems a bit strange that now, mostly,
what I feel is this sense of peace.
Dylan Thomas would never have approved (at least,
not if we believe what he says in the villanelle).
Toward the end Dad was sleeping all the time—
even when someone shook him,
called persistently in his ear.
How much additional transition is there,
I ask myself, between one "good night"
and the next?

Let him go, gently.

He was ten weeks shy of 94 years
and, until a month ago,
could have engaged you
in an intelligent conversation. Can’t see
how we have any right to be upset.

Had either of them departed quickly,
never suffered their prolonged frailty,
a younger son might still be inclined to dwell
upon parental insufficiency. Instead,
over time, youth and age exchanged
places. (In the end, now-sightless eyes
still twinkling, Dad even introduced me
to everyone as his father.) And I forged
a bond with each that otherwise
might still be counted among the missing.

Let him go, gently.

Perhaps, I decide, it’s not so strange
that now what I feel, mostly,
is this sense of peace.

Steve Bloom
January 2007

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Michael's Musings - On Being Pregnant

In 1964, Robert Coles interviewed a poor black woman who spoke of the desperation of her life, and the difficulty of finding happiness:

“To me, having a baby inside me is the only time I’m really alive.”

She was right and she always will be, for life is all about being pregnant. It is all about being alive and feeling alive with love inside, for that is what the inner child gives us. Yes, a woman feels alive during pregnancy, but if the life she feels is that of a child other than her own, the feeling will pass after birth and not return until the next pregnancy.

It is only when we feel pregnant with love for ourselves that we feel really alive and know why Mona Lisa smiles.

Women need to be pregnant, and men need to be pregnant. There is no other way of being in touch once again with our whole nature. There is no other way of re-membering.

For men, making a killing during the hunting season or in the battlefield or in the stock market doesn’t do it. Acquiring mounds of minerals and magnifying our net worth, or scoring bulls eyes with hoards of women, or being immersed in any other addiction does not fill the emptiness that only being pregnant and re-membering can fill. Having a son, and being filled with pride is no substitute for being pregnant with our own inner child and filled with love, for only when we are filled with love are we prepared to become lovers of our sons and peacemakers instead of warriors.

Tony Blair quoted Thornton Wilder* at the Memorial Service to the British people who died in the Twin Towers: “But soon we shall die and all memory of those five will have left the earth, and we ourselves shall be loved for a while and forgotten. But the love will have been enough; all those impulses of love return to the love that made them. Even memory is not necessary for love. There is a land of the living and a land of the dead and the bridge is love, the only survival, the only meaning.”

Let us all be aware and celebrate our life-long pregnancy, for love is the only survival, the only meaning. --Michael Murphy

*The Bridge of San Luis Rey, Thornton Wilder

Michael's Musings -HAPPY NEW YEAR

This is the Year of Love, Loss, and Forgiveness

The year in which we begin to replace the prevailing atmosphere of hatred and fear with one of love and creativity. If we are to live our lives lovingly, we must start with ourselves and then spread the movement outwards and upwards. First, we must re-member. We must recover and treasure the three members of our nature, for only when these three parts are in balance are we capable of giving and receiving unconditional love

This is a picture of unconditional love. There is nothing at all between Alma and Ellen except love, and the love is expressed in The Gaze. The three parts of their Trinitarian nature are so apparent. We clearly see their Mortal selves, just as they are. We see their Souls: their feminine, witnessing nature that does not judge and does not expect, but simply gazes with love. We see the masculine nature of their Spirits: exuding energy and trust, creating a place of safety in which the Mortal in both Ellen and Alma can be in love. This is the picture of the Mortal, the Soul, and the Spirit together in harmony and love. This is what we are capable of, and this is what we must re-member, and this year 2008 will be our year of re-membrance. 2008 is such a wonderful year in which to re-member! The 2 reminds us of Soul and Spirit as do the 00, and the 8 seems to be a perfect symbol of Soul and Spirit interwoven with the Mortal! So let’s re-member together!

Letting Go: Then and Now

When I was 16 my father passed away. I was 55 when my Mom died. These two seminal life passages were so very different for me. What was the difference between Then and Now?

Loosing my Dad at such an early age left me filled with questions...how different would my life be, would my self-confidence and esteem issues be what they are? At 16, my response to his death was on such a deep level, I did not have the emotional depth to really understand it. My relationship with my mom became contentious. She was left a window at 45 with 3 children to finish raising. I was her youngest child, a teenage daughter who was defiant, with more than a little anger, lost and lashing out.. Mothers and daughters...it's a complex relationship under the best of circumstance.

In my adult life, her home was my haven, the place I returned to time after time. Her basement held boxes from each of the many moves in my life. I always knew I had a home with her. So when it became clear she could no longer live by herself, I moved her into my house. For the last 4 years of her life, she lived with me.

It created hardships, but brought far more joy. I slowed my life down for her. Parkinson's and dementia was slowly taking away her physical self, but her spirit never faltered.

Unexpectedly, Mom feel gravely ill. Per her directives, we began hospice care at home. What a remarkable gift this was from her. My sister stayed with me for the 3 weeks prior to Mom's passing. I had never spent that much time with my sister and it created an even stronger bond between us. 24/7 just us, no husband or kids, no work, just Mom, my sister and me. It gave us time together in a way that would never have happened had Mom not wanted hospice.

To be with the person who gave you life at the moment they pass to the next realm is remarkably life changing. As my sister and I each held a hand, Mom slipped away surrounded by her photos, her music and her two daughters. It was sad, but so beautiful to experience.

It is only now, one year later that I realize the different experiences I have had with my parents' deaths. The teenager is still struggling to understand what happened while the adult woman is honored to have been allowed to wittness such an intimate time in one's life. Through the experience of my mother's death I am now able to ask the questions and begin to let go of that angry, scared child who lost trust and felt deserted by her father. My mother gave me that gift by allowing me to help her die. It is the greatest gift of all and one I am eternally grateful for.

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Imagine Loving Yourself!

We are urged to love our neighbors as ourselves, and that is a disaster for the neighbors. In fact, most of us hardly know our neighbors and probably don’t like them never mind love them. No big surprise, because we are also unfamiliar with ourselves, and loving ourselves is something that we have been lead to believe is weak or self-indulgent or narcissistic, regardless of the fact that Narcissus killed himself because he discovered that he was unable to love himself. What if we really loved ourselves and then acted in the same manner towards those around us! Why should the love of another be the primary aspiration of our lives, and why not start with ourselves?

Imagine! Waking up and saying “Good morning! How glad I am to see you!” Imagine being our own best friend: someone we can trust, and someone to whom we can take our concerns and our worries without fear of judgement. Imagine being comfortable with solitude yet relishing connectedness!

Loving ourselves is giving voice to our feminine Soul nature, and the feminine within men is often unfamiliar. If we love ourselves or love other men, then we imagine we must be gay regardless of the fact that sexual preference has little or nothing to do with love. If we love ourselves, we might believe that we prefer masturbation to a sexual relationship with another, regardless of the fact that masturbation and sexual relationships may have nothing to do with love, and may be more akin to scratching an itch than to being an expression of caring. If we love a woman other than our wife that love may be seen as off limits. It must mean that we want sex, and we may have the erection to prove it, regardless of the fact that we can love ourselves and others without needing the sex to demonstrate it. So men are often lonely and out of touch with their feminine nature and may only permit themselves sportstalk, back slapping and a variety of addictions in association with other men, and chaperoned exchanges with women.

For women, loving themselves is the best preparation for unconditionally loving others. Many women who have little love for themselves dedicate their lives to filling the feminine void in men, but filling the emptiness of another is impossible as broken marriages and other relationships tell us, and neither the woman nor the man is satisfied once the bloom of sex is dimmed.

So let’s imagine loving ourselves. We will need to practice forgiveness, letting go of the doubts, judgements, and limitless ways in which we torture ourselves for not being someone else. Let’s look in the mirror, and love what we see. Let’s meditate on loving ourselves, and when we are full, the love will spill over and nourish others.

If we want a Happy New Year, let’s give it a try.
What do you think?
Please comment!
With love, Michael

On Re-membering My Nature

Gazing at the sea and on out to the horizon, I notice where sky and sea come together, and imagine that this is the meeting place of the Spirit and Soul of nature. The Spirit of nature is astral, uplifting, inspirational. The Soul is moist, deep, life-giving and beautiful to behold.

A boat moves slowly across the horizon from left to right, and I gaze until it is out of sight. It is there for a moment, and then it is gone, for the boat is like my Mortal nature: fragile in the immensity of Soul and Spirit, and only visible for the briefest time before it dies to our sight.

For the time being, my feminine Soul-nature keeps my Mortal boat afloat, and my masculine Spirit-nature gives me the wind and the courage to sail on.

Wonder full.

~ Michael Murphy

Gazing at Dzogchen Beara

Dr. Murphy Gazing (Photo: J. Carlson copyright 2007)

Dzogchen Beara is the site of this Spings taping of the workshops that will lead to the learning films on Love, Loss and Forgiveness. These short, experiential films, are a cornerstone in the developing program to aid us all in learning more about our relationships to ourselves and love, loss and forgiveness.

Here is what Michael says about this special place:
"I rediscovered my Celtic roots on the Beara Peninsula in Ireland a handful of miles from where my father was born. Beara is a spectacular speck on the planet where the wild masculine Spirit of nature is so much in evidence in the clouds and the wind, and the earthy, moist feminine Soul of nature bids us welcome in this Irish place. It is the feminine that is so frighteningly absent in our modern masculine super-Spiritual industrial and scientific world, and this vital feminine is so palpable in rural Ireland. In Beara, my Mortal self discovered the Spirit and Soul of nature, which in turn allowed me to rediscover my own Spirit and Soul. I imagine this reunion as a Celtic Trinity that is stable and loving, in contrast to the masculinized Trinity worshiped by many religions that is unbalanced because of the exclusion of the feminine Soul. The Celtic Trinity is a shamrock-like connection of Mortal, Soul and Spirit that we have forgotten. This Celtic-inspired rediscovery of who we are and where we came from is the subject of "Secrets of Love, Loss & Forgiveness."

For those of you who don’t yet know it, Dzogchen Beara is a small Buddhist monastery with a view over the Atlantic that is beyond belief. Workshop participants are invited to attend the morning meditation, and the community offers us loving kindness, food, and the most amazing sanctuary in which Soul, Spirit, and Mortal can be in harmony. Dzogchen Beara is to me an incarnation of the place that is Beara."

Announcement: Michael's Musings

For those of you who know Michael, one of the refreshing things about him is his facile and creative mind. Here begins a new thread called "Michael's Musings."

From Eurekas at four in the morning, to uncensored thoughts on society and the psyche, Michael let's his thinking free in this new thread that is sure to stir our own thoughts and inspire us to comment. Enjoy!

Michael's Musings

Mirror Mirror on the Wall

We often turn ourselves into someone that we dislike intensely because a parent or other important person berated us so often (in rage and loathing and self-righteousness that they would deny) that we began to believe that we were the person they said we were.. In judgmental rage-infested bursts, they called us useless or dumb or wild or mean or a nobody, and they may even have assaulted us physically or sexually as well as emotionally, and we began to live their image of who we are in excruciating detail. When we looked in the mirror, we detested the creation that we saw.

What we see in the mirror if we will gaze, is the loss of innocence. A terrifying void is created by the absence of Soul and Spirit who fled from the abuse, and we attempt to avoid that reflection at all costs by refusing to look. It is the loss of self-esteem that we see in the mirror, and it drives us mad, for we know that we cannot live lovingly without our Soul and our Spirit. It drives us mad with hatred or it drives us mad with grief, and we become depressed or filled with anxiety or, like Narcissus, we may kill ourselves. Psychiatrists give us diagnoses of depression or panic or anxiety and prescribe pills, but no pill ever changes a reflection nor fills a void.

Take this pill,
It helps you not to shout.
It takes away the life
You’re better off without

~R.D.Laing

Letting Go: A Magical Experience

We got the call from my brother. Papa had just passed away at the nursing home. My mom and I went out the door.....I suddenly felt him everywhere at once, in the stars, the fragrant night air, the cricket's chorus, the trees, the earth......more potently present than where he had just been, in a body that was broken and painful and uncooperative.

As we moved towards the car, I found myself turning to the thick darkness and saying, "Dad, we're going to say goodbye to your body, but I know you are here....and we'll be right back!"

We arrived at the nursing home, and then we saw his face, and he looked like himself for the first time in a year, really. No more contortion of discomfort, smooth as a calm lake, and a gorgeous smile! So what was your transition like, Dad? Who escorted you through the portal? What does it feel like to expand in every direction with no limitations? How wonderful to be done with your body, and begin anew. I see/feel your smile inside my head/heart and am delighting in this magical experience. I know the waves will hit me harder down the road, but for now I relish in this palpable connection with this mystery, this miracle of death, and with the pleasure of celebrating amazing, brilliant, kind hearted, wonder-filled you with everyone, and with myself. Thank you!

Your loving daughter,
Laura


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Announcement: Share your Stories

One important aspect of The Love, Loss and Forgiveness Project is creating community, and one way to do that is for us all to share our stories.

We invite you, the readers of this blog, to this new Thread (a "Thread" is a weekly posting with a specific topic or focus) called "Letting Go," that will highlight postings written by you; stories about your personal experiences with fear, loss and grief and what you did, or tried to do, to re-member yourselves as you moved through the difficulties. If you so chose, your submissions may be made anonymously.

The stories should be under 450 words, longer submissions will be posted as a series over a number of weeks.

One of the fun and educational parts of a Blog is the comments feature, please click on the word "comment" after each post and use this opportunity to interact with the community in support of each other's story's. There is so much we can learn from one another.

As this new Blog develops, we invite your ideas for other topics as possible new Threads.

Letting Go: Farewell to my Father

A year ago today, at an intensive care unit in a New York City hospital, I placed my left hand on my Dad’s heart just as he died. The rush of energy that flowed through me at that moment is as unforgettable as the spirit of the man who fathered me into this world, a gentleman who always did his best to provide his family with support and love.

Today, on this anniversary of his passing, I lit a candle that will burn for 24 hours in his memory, illuminating the very last photograph I took of him alive. In quiet reflection I wonder how it is ever possible to let someone like him go completely—to accept fully his death—to let the parts of him that I still may harbor in myself move up and out of me, allowing for his souls own completion in whatever state of grace it finds itself in now. And letting go, must go both ways, for my soul too needs to find wholeness as a still living being on this planet.

Mother turned 85 years old this November, and me, 50. For our birthdays, we decided to skydive for the very first time. It was something she always wanted to do, but knowing it would scare my father to death, waited until he actually was gone to do it.

For me leaping out of a plane 14000 feet about the earth, was in many ways an experience as close to dying as I ever had before. In fact, there was much about it that mirrored Dad’s experience of a year ago; the intense aloneness (even while in the company of others, it was something ultimately each of us had to do ourselves), the newness of sensation (our bodies were experiencing things they had never suffered before, for me it was falling at 120 mph for 7000 feet) and the disconnection (we both had left the grounded-ness of the earth, for me, it manifested mostly as floating through large billowing clouds).

In reality, I was just a few threads of parachute cord and nylon material away from truly experiencing my own demise as well.

In a few hours the memorial candle will go out.

For Mother and me and our family, these two intense, life-altering experiences are behind us now. We must each, for ourselves; continue to say YES to life, to live each moment like it was our last, to acknowledge with love our own true beings and to hold these fragile and magnificent mortals, gently, for the rest of our days.


jdcarlson2001@yahoo.com

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Greetings All

Welcome to the new Weblog for the Love, Loss and Forgiveness Project.

It is easy for anyone who has engaged with Michael Murphy at one of his workshops on Love, Loss and Forgiveness to know the importance of what he does.

In his work he deftly guides participants towards making healthier connections with themselves and challenges them to go even deeper still. He connects them with their basic humanity, encouraging them to marry their thinking to their bodies, souls and spirits.

In short, he leads us to the acknowledgment of our selves, then opens us up enough to fall in love with what we find there and teaches us to use our own resources-- tools acquired through living life and experiencing loss-- to build a renewed sense of self that ultimately supports our living healthier and fulfilled lives.

We hope you will become a frequent visitor to this site, as we provide a place to share ideas and stories about our individual journeys towards learning to love ourselves, and in the process, help to make the world a saner place.

Below you will find an introduction written by Dr. Murphy.

Introduction: Love Loss and Forgiveness Project

Dear Friends,

In these days of war against terrorism, politicians have used fear of death along with suspicion, rumors, lies, and deception to retain power, and the media fuels this dark purpose. Confidence in politicians and the political process has reached drought proportions, and religions also offer little hope, with self-righteous fundamentalists fighting one another in the name of a higher power. If there is to be change and hatred and greed are to be displaced, love is the only solution. Love will not flourish unless it is deeply rooted in each of our individual Mortal beings. We must learn to love ourselves, and then love will spread.

The Love, Loss, and Forgiveness Project begins with the impression that few of us love ourselves very much. We have been raised to put others first, especially our children, and there is little understanding that the greatest gift parents can give their children is that they love themselves and each other. Only then are children free to thrive in love.

One of the most important secrets of Love, Loss, and Forgiveness is that when we learn to love ourselves unconditionally, we are well prepared to love others, and hatred will have no place. Another secret is that when we are prepared to experience the pain and grief of everyday loss, we are also prepared to experience the creative possibilities that follow. When we are prepared to forgive, we will know how to lay down the heavy burdens found in our stories of betrayal, abuse and hurt. It is the weight of these stories that make the loving life so difficult to live. When we love ourselves, we say “hello,” and when we say hello to ourselves and others we are in a position to say “goodbye,” as it is inevitable that we will someday need to say goodbye to our Mortal selves, and to those we love.

As the The Love, Loss, and Forgiveness Project develops it will make available to you filmed materials (based on the workshops of the same name) and will be accompanied by interpretive guidebooks. There will also be a vibrant online community created for additional support with forums and other guided learning environments. These resources will help inspire and give you tools that will help you lead more loving lives as you create ongoing, home-based, peer learning opportunities that become woven into your everyday lives.

These materials and the methods will unfold on this blog and on the upcoming Website as the Love Loss and Forgiveness Project grows.

Join us on this exciting journey towards a deeper understanding of love, loss and forgiveness!

With Love,

Michael Murphy