Week 8… Communication

May 29, 2012 by The Alternate Economy

What is Love Communication?

In building to the final week of our challenge, I have come to realize that there is one thing that ties all of our healthy emotional expressions together. It is true that our challenge is Daring you to Live in Love, but I would say that every week so far has asked you to investigate Love in a very complete way. It would seem that doing week 8 about Love might be a little redundant and slightly unnecessary. There is one topic that I believe is far more important to creating True Love in your life.

Communication.

Without it we cannot have Love, in any of its forms. Love exists when we share it. A Joyful moment is made all the more Joyful upon the retelling. Our Passions find their true shape when we discuss them with others. In Generosity we communicate our Gratitude and in Compassion we share our Love with a soft touch. Be it a facial expression signifying Hope, or a thoughtful comment Received graciously, Love is found most deeply when we are allowed to communicate it to others.

The key is honesty. Honesty in every thing we do and everything we say. Honesty to ourselves and to others. I have made mistakes. Ask me and I will tell you about them. I will tell you how they have shaped me and forged the man I am today. And in the end you will Love me for it. Because I shared with you a piece of myself most tender. I exposed a weakness and expressed how human I am. I am Love. But you will never know if I do not tell you. How could I even be sure until after I have said it aloud?

You are Love. Now tell me about it!

Core Essay on Communication

This Weeks Challenge

This weeks challenge will be all about engaging our Loved ones in conversation. Open, honest and yes, sometimes terrifying conversation. The largest and hardest lesson that I have had to endure in this life, is coming to terms with the fact that the only reason any of my previous relationships failed was due to a lack of communication. Sometimes they were my secrets. Sometimes they were my resentments that went unvoiced. Other times it was theirs. But in all six of my failed relationships, the only cause was a breakdown in communication.

The funny thing is that the event that would cause the lies and resentments was always something that could easily be resolved. The event itself was never the cause for the ending of my relationships. What ruined my relationships was the time spent alone, fighting with our feelings of remorse. If either one of us had just said how we felt, I know it could have been resolved in every case.

So here we are. Daring to Live in Love. Let us learn from our mistakes and move forward with honest communication in our hearts. Let us listen with compassion and generosity and hope. Let us talk of joy and passion and the gifts we have received. Let us spread gratitude and Love by allowing them to flow freely through our facial expressions and reactions to circumstances beyond our control. Let us become Love in a way that cannot be denied for our very smile betrays our souls intent!

The following examples are suggestions only. Feel free to incorporate as many of them into your daily life as you are able to, or create your own examples of Communication.

Send Entries to awards@alternate-economy.com

The following challenge is split into three categories. Please complete each category and send an email with an essay describing how your week of Living in Love through Communication has changed you. This essay can be anywhere from 500 to 1000 words and will become a post on this blog.

Impeccable Honesty

As the title suggests, this week will be all about holding yourself to a standard of impeccable honesty. This means being honest with your peers, your colleagues and your loved ones. But it mostly means being honest with yourself. No rationalizing why you should accept certain conditions. No denying of your true feelings. And no excusing your behaviour. It is time to look in the mirror and be truly honest about who you see.

From this point forward, if you truly hope to live in Love, you must be willing to be open, honest and forthcoming about how you feel. When placed in a situation that causes you to feel something, then you must express that feeling. No matter what it is it cannot be wrong. It is a feeling. How could your feelings ever be wrong? They can be misinformed. They can be misguided. But by sharing your feelings with someone else, you are more free to become in tune with the cause of that feeling. And more free to turn that feeling into one of Love. By approaching our feelings with honesty and sharing them with the other parties involved, we will always come to see that our feelings, although perhaps clouded with emotion at first, will ultimately lead us closer to Love. For this week, write to me about how you feel today, in this world, right now. Tell me about how you see yourself today and how you would like to see yourself tomorrow. And tell me how your feelings have inspired you to grow and Love all the more.

Active Listening

It is one thing to tell someone how you feel. It is another entirely to listen and understand how someone else feels. If you plan on being honest with everyone about your feelings, you had better be prepared to hear about some other people’s feelings as well. And to understand that if someone is feeling a negative feeling, it does not mean that the situation will end negatively. If they are upset with you, it does not mean they no longer Love you. Just as when you are upset with them it does not mean that you no longer Love them.

True listening comes from non-judgment but also from a willingness to admit ones contributions to a situation. Your contributions can go many ways, however. You can contribute in ignorance, before you are aware of the others feelings. And you can contribute in selfishness, even after you know the other’s feelings. But you can also contribute in awareness, by truly listening to what it is that is upsetting your Loved one. You can make the changes required and communicate how you are willing to work with your Loved one to solve the problem. You accept that their feelings are real, because they are feeling them. And you can do your best to help your Loved one know that you respect their feelings and wish to help see them through the hard times.

This week, make sure to really listen to what is being said. Be aware of your Loved ones and realize that if you feel down sometimes, so do they. It is amazing how feelings will pop up in the subtlest of ways. A little joke here, a wide eyed look there. People reach out to you all the time. How often do you hear it?

True Bliss

True Bliss arrives not when we engage in a Joyful moment. It does not come from adventure, or from romance or from freedom. True Bliss arrives when we sit around the campfire and tell our Loved ones about the adventure. Tell them about the romance. Tell them about that moment of freedom. True Bliss is not found in the moment. It is found in the retelling of the memory. It is found by seeing the look in others eyes when you surprise them with the end. It is found in the uncontrollable burst of laughter from your audience. It is found in the bond formed by the story. If someone else was there when it happened, then the Bliss is only multiplied upon the retelling. The squeeze of the hand at the right second. The way they butt in and interrupt to tell their perspective of the event.

Love is meant to be shared. All the time. With everyone we meet.

In order to engage in True Bliss, you are not required to participate in any spectacular events. You are not required to go out and create a new experience. All you need to do this week to create True Bliss, is call up an old friend and reminisce.

Send Entries to awards@alternate-economy.com

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