This year...

This year:

I am going to have a passionate, all embracing, fully possessive relationship.

Love and care from many fans and friends in my life.

All the riches my heart desires.

A strong connection with source that will be with me to love and guide me always.

Motivating work that inspires me.

Survival

Strange how for survival we sometimes kiss the enemy.

Reflections on papa, and work

Today A sent me a note about a job opening. I like the company he mentioned. But despite this I wished he had added a note in there saying something that touched me emotionally. P says its too early for that.

Later I realized I was loading up the experience of repeated brainwashing from my dad, something he still does to this day. I got a reminder of this when I called him today. Hints rather than clear communication is something he relies on heavily. When I clearly call his hints out and state what I do and do not want he gets pissed and either starts guilting me or degrade this cultural context.

I feel frustrated that my experience of him invading my space has still not changed. And that pain is still so fresh. I guess it will keep coming into my experience if I keep focusing on it. Let me then focus on understanding and clear communication as something I expect and receive from all my relationships.

But back to the job. If that isn't fully the experience I want then what do I really want. The answer is probably the ability to play a bigger game. The network, social skills, and personal story telling that will allow me to get to that level. That's what I will get J to coach me on tomorrow.

worlds connecting...

For a moment two worlds came together and intersected in time. Thank you for the inner shine and beauty you bought to our connection. I will forever think of you fondly.

Thank you for a brief encounter

Thank you. Thank you for dipping into my spirit and sharing my most feminine self. Thank you for loving my presence and my form. My light and my love. Thank you for letting me love you and you me. The bounds we crossed, the courage you showed, the desire we felt will remain honored and sacred. May life grant us both that which nurtures us, grows us, and keeps us on a path of progress, growth, and happiness. The spirit that is me lovingly embraces the spirit that is you.

On developing love!

Oh what a weekend--3 parties. Lots of great contacts and learning both on the professional and personal front. Professionally learning which folks are great resources for learning and connecting. Several folks for follow up chats and interviewing for the other blog.

Personally--at first party bad feeling vibration to someone's actions which I quickly cut short. Understood the guy was using pick up artist moves and look towards him with compassion and belief in his being better. Or not, but it doesn't affect me as its not about me and I choose not the focus on it. At another party someone I really liked trying to hook me up with someone else. Felt really weird about it and realized thru someone else's feedback that I appeared annoyed. At this point even that feedback feels great because now I know exactly what areas of rapport I have to focus my efforts on learning in terms of outside action with inside inner change. Love someone and enjoy them, not be annoyed by who they are. Love will grow deeper as time goes by but sensing its lack isn't what will get me there. Thank you source for this expansion and learning. I feel the manifestation is coming!

Now I will focus on my professional goals. Blog about those ideas of marketing and strategy that I feel strongly within me. Give a written voice to those ideas I believe so strongly within me. I know and feel them coming.

My most important goals in relationships

1. I am loving and being loved
2. I am growing and learning to be better connected emotionally
3. I add value to the other's life and happiness
4. I am understanding of my needs and his needs
5. I am being fair to myself and him
6. I am meeting my needs first and then determining best combination of both of our needs
   

How being with some people is the same as being alone

M didn't commiserate or sooth when I told him something was annoying me. Why bother with guys like that! Its like being alone with flirts thrown in, which if you have a healthy global sense of flirting is like being alone--with flirts thrown in.

Money and fun with bondage in Pakistan

A friend sent me a beautiful heartwarming tale of entrepreneurial success and pushing of boundaries in Karachi, the city I am from. Be sure to watch the embedded video if you get time

http://www.nytimes.com/2009/04/28/world/asia/28fetish.html?_r=1&emc=eta1

The harder path

As I have heard people's judgments about how my behaviors in relationships are neediness I have alternated from pain, anxiety, to redissecting the pain and now finally to this new awareness that judgments come from the judger's personal filters. They also come from the judger's need to disengage and feel self-righteous his or her decisions. That being said understanding how others view my expression of needs is instructive. It has taught me that its not just the way of communication that is in the making of healthy individuals in healthy relationships, it is also the desire to work things out. All the small details. How to communicate. How to love. And lots of self-sacrifice.

Judging another and letting go is the easy path. Trying to make things work even if in the end you decide you cannot. Now that is hard.

Three tips to more effectively dealing with criticism

Forgive the critic right away, even those who have bad intentions.

Not forgiving them hurts your own ability to feel good and focus on that which you want.

Think about the potential for truth

If you can find any use it as feedback to change your behavior positivity. Monitor your progress. They have given you a gift. Thank them and the universe for it.

Don’t dwell on the giver of criticism, his or her impression of you, or the possibility of future criticism

Dwelling simply makes one depressed. Instead think of the beauty in them and specifically the beauty in their criticism. Regardless of anything else a human being's ability to persist in using tactless methods to change behavior is just as amazing as their ability to change behavior tactfully by using kind words at the right moment.

Counteracting negativity

I’ve realized today that the ways of thinking I was born into were inherently defeatist. They are characterized by a strong focus on ego beliefs. While experiencing this contrast now as a 24 yr old builds up valuable vibrational escrow for the life I plan to live and the person I plan to be, it can be nonetheless painful. In such situations choosing to live my own teachings of positivity becomes a stretch goal but is still valuable.

Focusing on the now in the moment instead of the negative mental loops in our mind can serve as a wonderful tool in counteracting negative people. I promise to myself to try my utmost in focusing on beauty and love in every situation.

Meeting with the ex.

Today I met my ex-BF J. Our conversation was superficial. Perhaps it was the 4.5 months since our break-up. Perhaps it was the presence of my current (but soon to be ex-BF, a mutual decision I did not tell J about). Perhaps it was a joint desire to not get into detailed unresolved feelings from our relationship. Or perhaps it was us repeating interaction dynamics from our relationship. Once it was over I felt the pain. The pain of not sharing how I truly felt. And the pain of freshly feeling what it is like to let go of another and the dreams we have about them.

I wish him well. I also wish I could speak to him about our breakup openly. But perhaps the emotional release I expect from something like this is what I must provide myself. Life will tell…

Polygamy in Islam

My current boyfriend is passionately pro-polygamy and wants me to agree to him engaging in it post marriage. In recent months this topic has led to lots of emotional and mental salsa—one step forward, one step back. It goes like this: I share that monogamy is non-negotiable factor for me and that something otherwise take me away from the vision of life that I want to create for myself. At times when he sees my pain at the thought of having to leave him for his polygamous views, he says he has given the idea up. But at other times he returns to his original viewpoint and tries to convince me of the many ways in which polygamy will add to his life and mine.

Key to his viewpoint is the belief that polygamy is permitted in Islam. He says that as a progressive Muslim I must accept polygamy as valid. To him progressive Muslims should accept polygamy for we say we live by the following principal:

“We recognize the full diversity of Islamic traditions and the free participation therein as a sincere expression of faith.”

To me this argument is a gross misjudgment of what it means to be a progressive Muslim for another principle of progressive Islam is:

“We recognize critical reasoning and dynamic engagement with Islamic scripture and prevailing Islamic practices as an expression of devotion to, and esteem for, Islam and humanity.”

But even before we consider a cerebral argument regarding which values one adopts by affiliating with a religion or a progressive stream within a religion we should consider our inner emotional and mental clarity. We should ask ourselves: What values and decisions make me feel good? Make me feel empowered, loved, and justly dealt with? If values, words, thoughts, or behaviors feel oppressive or preventative of our free will we are keeping ourselves away from self-realization by giving them credence.

Use of silence and limited action in cocreation

For the past 3 or 4 of my asking my boyfriend to do the dishes and tidy his room. I didn’t like the feeling I got when trying to coerce him to do this. I tried doing the dishes myself for a few days hoping he will take over the next day but that never happened. I tried a calm discussion and how his not taking care of these things made me feel but this only led to him agreeing to take care of things but instead doing two other unasked for favors and later trying to renegotiate the room cleaning and dishwashing.

When I woke up this morning to a dirty room and a strong feeling of annoyance mixed with anger I started to analyze why his inaction was making me feel this way. I realized more than his inaction it was from feeling that his behavior called for angry rude behavior on my part. I also realized the nagging and the anger made me feel really sad and disconnected from source.

So I am trying an alternate course of action. I woke up this morning and wrote down the note below and made him sign it:

“I [my boyfriend’s name] promise to wash the dishes and tidy the bedroom before sunset. When I do so my girlfriend will begin speaking to me again. I understand that if I do not she will not do so.”

After signing I stopped speaking to him. Although he has still not completed both tasks in their entirety some changes have taken place, the negative reinforcement of no speaking has made him do a few dishes. But the most powerful thing is that I no longer feel cranky or disappointed. I feel hopeful. The decision to not talk as well as establish clear priorities by writing has taken action away from the equation of trying to create what I want--a tidy home. Not talking has made me realize the energy used in speaking and the energy used in expressing negative feelings makes the inner constriction of feeling grow. Letting that go has given me the space to vibrate in love and affection for my darling and recognizing the beautiful vibrance within him regardless of whether he follows through or not. It has also helped me realize that it is not the actions of others that makes us feel pain, it is our judging of them that gives us pain. This pain takes us away from our connectedness to source and all the beautiful things that lie within.

How does one express one's feelings?

What is a good way of expressing one's feelings? How does one say to another that something they said or did really bought out older pains or caused new one's? And if one doesn't do this how does one heal?

Loneliness

When the going gets tough and one feels emotions that are scary it is but natural to expect others to love you, tell you that you can make it, that you are amazing. But when the other is someone who feels you should be left alone to your own devices since they feel what you are going through can hurt them it becomes very easy to cross the line to anger and wanting them to feel how they are hurting you. Often times it becomes a futile process of banging heads against walls since not only is neither of you understanding the other, but neither of you is allowing enough mental space to the others state to even acknowledge the other’s feelings. The result is loneliness, unhappiness, and unlovingness. But perhaps like all things in life, it is part of the process of learning about yourself and others. And sometimes probably that is what it takes to help you decide the other is just not the one for you.

Law of allowing

In a moment of feeling great gratitude for my boyfriend I called him to tell him I love him. I had just watched “Sleepless in Seattle.” He on the other hand had watched Obama’s latest speech.

I am one of the most apolitical people I know. I simply do not trust that one political leader over another is capable of bringing the transformative change I deeply desire to see in society. Instead I am a believer in grassroots efforts that involve empowering the masses at an individual level rather then galvanizing them around a leader by appealing to their lower chakras. My passionate BF didn’t hear this when he was trying to convince me to persuade others to vote for Obama. He responded to my saying I am apolitical with you can’t even talk to one person for me?

Living this contrast reminded me strongly of my views on creation.

• creation is first and foremost an individual endeavor
• sometimes for some things it can be a joint effort between two partners
• no one is born to serve me and I am not born to serve another in their creation

The law of allowing is based on us being okay with another’s alternative creation. In our case this means him being okay with my desire to be apolitical and mine being okay with his political passion.

The people we attract

Recently when my partner had a strong emotional outburst over something seemingly innocuous I starting wondering about the kinds of relationships we attract in our lives. It seems to me that we attract partners who keep tapping parts of us that need to be awakened. Often this involves sparking a pain in us or them that we and they are unable to understand. Until we learn what it is and master the feelings, we cannot move forward as we will keep producing situations that make these feelings stronger and stronger.

Great Love’s vulnerabilities

Weekend post breakup with J’ was actually quite beautiful. With cuddles, gentleness, and love…of a friend who loves me.

As I lie in bed and think back to moments I shared with J’. I remember them so clearly. There was a certain kind of spirituality to those moments. The fulfillment in his eyes, the confidence with which he knew he was loved, the love he felt and freely gave me even if I was unshowered and scruffy and otherwise unattractive to another’s eye. His adoration and love in the way he held me, kissed me, and looked at me. I clearly remember the inner sensations, the peace, the strength, and the light I felt from him.

All that love, gave me so much courage. It healed emotional wounds, allowing me to become a more open loving person. It helped me become more at ease with my skin and what I had to offer the world. Surprisingly to me, it also gave courage of parts of me I denied. The intense yearning for control of my space, of people’s actions, of my environment and the fear all of this was based on. It all came charging out. And the fact that I didn’t censor these parts of myself, well that also came from love. My love. It was that love that allowed me to be vulnerable enough to fully feel and show him my anger, my yearnings, my insecurities, but mostly my vulnerabilities. Perhaps that is what great love does, it shows you who you really are. And perhaps the reason we really want it is the magical healing it brings.