Being Soft Used to Be for Suckers


Our lives are calling us to action, but we can not create lasting change without the feminine, nurturing aspects of ourselves. For too long we have overlooked the benefit of our feminine power. We have misunderstood its importance, its strength. So, I am spending time exploring the idea of softening. This idea is not for suckers, the way it was once imagined to be.

When I was younger, if you were soft, people would walk all over you. Or so it seemed. However, what I have come to realize now is the illusion: Being soft is not for suckers. It takes real strength to live softly.

The illusion to dispel is within the opposition: hard, cold.. so for this let's consider the word "fight." To shift our thinking about softening, we must reconsider what fighting looks like. When we are younger, fighting is physical. Then, we develop words, and fighting can become more involved. There comes a time when we all will fight in our truth and for our truth. But as we become more wise, we realize the fight in the more subtle realms to be much more effectual in the long run, an opportunity at lasting change.

Softening is where true strength is revealed. It is a matter of being held, not trampled. It is a matter of recognizing your innate strength versus being scared of that strength because you have forgotten who you are.

We can experience being held, softening and even the fight, in a new way as we remember who we really are. Let's look at some of this thinking. Let's come closer to what being soft is really about.

Here are some ideas:

1. As you stand, sit, lay, notice that you are being held by something: gravity, a chair, bed or the ground.... Notice that there are things that you do not have to do, that happen involuntarily. As you exist in the world, however you exist, you are being held to some degree. We don't have to fight that. As we exist, we are. We can soften into that and feel the grace of being.

2. Faith is trusting that what you can not see will hold you. If you can identify with ideas of faith, you know that there are a lot of things that you do not see, but that does not mean they are not there. Having faith allows us to soften, knowing that the things we are asking for are, if we believe, already here, seen or not seen.

3. Why are we loved? Why do we love? Love does not happen when we push or force things. Love happens when we soften into our natural way of being. We love when we know on a subtle, soft level that no matter how horrible we think we are, we are still being held. There is nothing we can do about this. But we can relax into it. The more you relax into being loved, the more you will love. You don't have to force or fight that. Why wouldn't you love? You are love.

4. Softening is sweet, not weak. We need all the flavors, all the colors to make a complete rainbow, to make a good meal, to have a full life. To be sweet, like to be bitter or pungent, is an important rasa, or taste. That is why saying someone is soft and therefore weak is an illusion; when was the last time you said a piece of ripened, juicy, or sweet fruit was weak?

The biggest most subtle fight is within our mind and hearts. We can't punch our way through this. We can't even talk our way through it. This is not for suckers. We have to be willing to soften in order to access the parts of ourselves that have hardened through our egoic, protective stances. Otherwise, we become defensive, stuck, ... and miss the opportunity for change that counts. Pay attention to your defenses; they may be keeping you at bay, too.

When I was young, and soft was still weak to me, I thought I needed to do certain things to protect myself. Yes, we do still have to protect ourselves, but now we can recognize the subtly of this before it becomes dense with fists or guns.

Think about it this way: Everything starts with a feeling and becomes a word that becomes a thing. If I in those subtle moments catch the feeling, listen to the word, and soften into the ways that I can make the next right decision, I am fighting a good fight. I am softening to catch, with faith, the ways that I am loved and am love, and riding a more subtle, soft wave of change that starts within me.

Softening,

Courtney Rohan

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