Celebrate the Love

“With one sleep left until Valentine's Day, the excitement is palatable in my household. Our little customs and traditions that have taken hold over the years during this time hold sway; and though we know the wise adage that love is for all time, not just one day, having a chance to celebrate it within a wider consciousness can give us pause to show thanks for the love we receive - but more importantly - for the love we give.”
— Mickie Kent

A lot is said about Valentine's Day. Some use the day to highlight how we succumb to stereotypes, some hate it because the cliché is true. We need to appreciate each other every other day of the year. Some say it's stupid that we have to prove our love on a day so-called because of its bloody history - where some Christian centuries ago decided to marry gay soldiers and got his head chopped off. But it illustrates that, as does everything in life, the day has its fair share of supporters and its naysayers.

To me, Valentine's Day reminds me of a childhood riddle I was taught: Everyone has it but no one can lose it. I reveal what the answer to that is at the end of this post, but in essence, as we settle down to our candlelit dinners - or as singletons or conscientious objectors to Valentine's Day - today millions of people will ignore or celebrate one form of love and one only: romantic love, the love that speaks the language of erotic desire. However, when celebrated with just the right balance of cheesiness and sincerity, Valentine's Day is a custom I'd like to see celebrated not just by couples, but as a chance to reaffirm our love for our Self, our loved ones, our neighbours, and indeed, our wider community. In achieving this we'll go some way towards making love a commodity we can't lose - like the answer to that riddle further down below.

Of course, when I mean love, I really mean with a capital "L", which surpasses the meaning of Valentine's Day for many celebrating. But just exactly should the day mean to us? In past years, I've touched upon the subject for singles, for twin flames and for those in between, but although many may bemoan the overt consumerism of the day - where a bunch of red roses costs quadruple the amount it does any other time of the year - far less would agree that love isn't worth shouting from the rooftops of their heart.

This doesn't mean we have to go overboard, and act like a freaky grinning Cheshire cat out of Alice's Wonderland with everyone we see. Love can be large, and yet understated. It can be found in the little things we do, or the things we don't do. The largess of love means that small can be big. When we refuse to lie, or cheat another, for example, that reveals the presence of love just as much as a bouquet of roses, gaudily bunched and cut off from their living stems, turning the sentiment "I love you" into a status symbol.

This isn't about being miserly, or counting the cost. We don't count the cost of someone in cold hard currency if that person is priceless to us. Showing largess in love should be about being classy; and for me, there was no one classier than my father. I remember when I was a young child, about four or five, he planted a red and white rose bush in his allotment garden for the sole purpose of presenting my mother with its roses for Valentine's Day every year. She always said it was the time and attention and love he gave to the plant throughout the seasons that really showed the love behind the flower.

It taught me that paying out with money is easy, but paying out with your time, thought and effort is love. Thus, in my adult life, I've tried to nurture my own rosebush in a way, in the people around me. As I do at Christmas, every Valentine's Day I post charity cards made from renewable resources through every letterbox in my street, signed with all my love. I know that this isn't everyone's cup of tea, and my neighbours know that it will cause no offence if they ask me to stop sending them the greetings - but do you know what? Not one person in my street has asked me to stop.

Indeed, they look forward to it. I get hugs from our elderly residents when I am out and about; our local postman, who helps me get the cards to some of our seniors living alone on his own time, will wave to me every time he sees me. He sometimes knocks on our door to have a chat even if we don't have post that day, to give me news about his wife and daughter - who have started their own Valentine's Day drive in their neighbourhood. But is it so strange really? Shouldn't Valentine's Day be about the community spirit? And so be celebrated in the same way?

And when we talk about community, I mean in a wider sense, not simply in those we see as "like-minded" and close to our way of living. Community means embracing all aspects of our environment, and even if we may not understand those different to us, to understand that they are a part of us regardless.

Nevertheless, it never ceases to amaze me when a few individuals will use any opportunity to show their intolerance towards others. For instance, a large share of my readership hails from America - and the connection I have made with my Atlantic cousins is awesome to say the least. Yet, out of the hundreds of mails I receive from across the big pond, there will be five or so that complain to me about my advocacy of same-sex issues, and my insistence on breaking the mould and standing up against the dogma of twin flame orthodoxy and its rhetoric, by suggesting that it's not exclusive to the physical male/female domain.

Twin flame love is about soul love; it deals with the metaphysical. It isn't restricted to physical gender or even brain gender, and we all have what we term as "male" and "female" qualities in all of us to lesser or larger degrees. Twin flame love is about balancing ours with another; walking the tightrope of life together, finely attuned to each other's energies to stop the other from falling as they go. It shouldn't be that difficult to see the form this takes will be just as diverse as the myriad of ways there are to say I love you.

Such monogamous, trusting, long-term efforts aren't the exclusive domain of people who label themselves as heterosexuals. Although often it might feel like men are going against their very nature by just trying to be monogamous, really - male or female - it's about searching for the one that will stop your fall, and have your back no matter what. More pragmatically, same-sex couples are just as capable of fostering a loving, nurturing family environment in which to bring up a healthier, stronger next generation, just as within a physical twin flame male-female dynamic.

Indeed, some point to the biological origins of homosexuality as evidence that same-sex couples can successfully rear families, or compensate for their lack of children by promoting the reproductive fitness of brothers or sisters. With extra "helpers in the nest" people were able to live longer, have children and provide for those children. Moreover, an unbalanced male-female dynamic has been the cause of many fractured families. For example, some are even suggesting that rather than celebrating romance on Valentine's Day, we should instead blame it for driving up teenage pregnancy rates and creating more single parent households.

On this very subject, I've had so many from mails from same-sex couples, who believe they have found their special partner and forged a loving union, thanking me for the inclusive nature of my posts. They write to say they can now read about a subject close to their hearts, which doesn't discriminate against them in theory. And I'm happy to say more twin flame writers are now following suit. However, surely this should be obvious to everyone coming from a divine perspective? It shouldn't need an amateur like me to point it out.

Because if it wasn't for that common bond of universality, what would distinguish this type of all-embracing love from lifestyles, disciplines and beliefs such as Buddhism, Christianity, Islam, Judaism and the like, which regard same-sex love as degenerate and punishable - still often by death in some parts of the world? Do we really want to be a part of that in the 21st Century? Are we still in such a clear-cut "man's world"? Again in America, where they take their sports very seriously, having a professional contender speak up about his sexuality has caused angry outbursts for reasons I can't quite comprehend, but try to understand.

Celebrating our differences: American sportscaster
on sportsman Michael Sam coming out as gay.

We try to understand in the hope that we may be shown understanding. I keep an open mind, so that my mind may open up to me. Similarly, what we can't accept in others stems from the anger of what we deny ourselves, and I do wonder if this "fear" of same-sex love is really just an ineptitude at embracing the opportunities we have been indoctrinated to shun? For it's verily true that those with stilted beliefs - just as they refuse to accept others for who they are - allow themselves no opportunity for acceptance by their own Self, either.

It's a tragic story. And it's been said that no story, however magical, will wake the dead. But I believe there is one story to do just that. Love's story, and all the routes that flow from it, can waken the past dead - those members of our communities we have shunned, marginalised and persecuted because of their differences can be woken in memory to see how far we have come to reconcile those injustices, and show penitence for what was done in our name.

I still can't get over how down the human ages we've blacklisted communities who have contributed to our history, who have invested in its progresses, fought side by side with their communities, whilst all the while having to hide or apologise for who they are, simply because of their skin colour, or what they believe in, or who they love.

Google Doodle celebrates the Winter Olympics, while putting Russia's discriminatory gay rights laws under the spotlight.

But lest we run the risk of doing the same, I want to emphasise that I welcome everyone to read my posts - even the naysayers, because that's what we are here for. Unless we do so, there will be many more tragic stories in our human history of people outcast for their differences. It's our duty - we who know no better, but want to be better - to pick up our pens for a worthier cause.

And the cause isn't one about making our private lives public; it's about making it a non-issue. It's about making a connection between the difference of others, rather than a reason to disconnect. The only way to achieve this idea is to first get equal acceptance socially - at least under the law. It's not about aiming to legislate everyone's own beliefs - the arena for that is in our own homes. But society as a whole needs to be fairer in its public duty to each individual who contributes to its well-being. We can choose who we have in our homes, but we mustn't choose who it's acceptable to have in our communities based on superficial differences.

Valentine's Day at Mickie Kent • Love For More Than One Day • Being Single On Valentine's Day • Find Yourself Before Finding Love • You Have a Right to Real Love • How To Be a Healthy Valentine

Subsequently, as we continue to write this story, and celebrate the love, then Valentine's Day and every day can be a chance to take the injustices of the past and use them to buttress a better future - built together, for one and for all, in the understanding that we do not give merely to receive, we give so that others may receive. In doing so, we shall not only come to understand the impermanence of material things, but begin to put faith in the spiritual permanence of all living things.

I try to always be consciously grateful that in my life there is nothing I need which isn't at arm's length. My twin flame, on the other hand, says this is just me being very low maintenance. But I believe it's about keeping my desires at heart's length. I want for nothing, because I want nothing. In such situations what can people take away from you?

Likewise, when you accept your "failings", no one can use them against you. When you can see happiness in just being, then your whole being becomes that which you are. We love life. Love restores us. And happiness becomes like the answer to the riddle I gave at the start of this post - your shadow, because it's always with you.

To extend the analogy, we must treat love like our shadow, too. Our prime purpose should be to accumulate love in darker times; to let it be the only thing we carry, and which we willingly surrender in the light. Whatever our personal beliefs, or the science or mathematics behind it all, at the end of the day this is how we should love. For this is what remains to carry us on. This is why, as I celebrate Christmas for its spirit of goodwill towards all, so, too, I choose to celebrate Valentine's Day in the same spirit.

And like my father's rosebush - which still grows and flowers to this day - I choose, therefore, to celebrate my Valentine's Day rooted in the love nurtured throughout the year. Moreover, it serves as a reminder that love isn't just about who we make love to, there are many types of love which have no connection to the act of sex - true friendship, familial relations, love for the world in general, love for ourselves and the life we live.

When we are mindful of this, and how large our loving community has the potential to grow, we allow ourselves to give thanks for the moment we have now, while investing in the moments to come.

And if that isn't love with a capital "L", then I don't know what is.

Yours in love,