Accepting Love

Accepting Love

 

Accepting love. That's what I’ve been thinking a lot about recently. Sometimes, I feel I am not expecting love.  I don’t mean to seem pathetic. It’s just that I don’t always feel like I'm affecting love. I don't always give and receive love in the same quantities.  It’s not that I’m rejecting love, it’s just that I often avoid the weight of its responsibilities.

Sometimes, I feel like a Maypole. There is a rainbow of people tethering their love to me. They spin around me like a beautiful ceremony of affection, relying on me to keep them safe and untangled. 

I like to keep the ribbons tied to me few. If there are too many strings, their colors get muddled. I feel their pull too ferociously and I may lose my footing.  

 

Let me tell you a story.

Recently, I “announced” that I was joining Gemsprite Crystals as their on-staff writer.  I put announced in air quotes because what I mean is I posted it to my social stories. 

(Sometimes, I feel the terminology we use to surround social media is the same we use when describing breaking news or new presidential policies.)

But anyway, I announced it.  I announced it because I wanted to draw traffic to the Gemsprite Crystals website. I announced it because I wanted people to read the words that I took so long to sculpt. I announced it so people would see that I am doing what I set out to do.  I announced it to seem like what I actually am.

Isn’t that funny how we do that? It is probably some derivative of imposter syndrome. I am a writer. I have been working steadily as a writer for a while. And yet, when I post to my social media accounts announcing a new opportunity, my intention is to seem like a writer. Perhaps because I don't fully believe it myself. 

Here is what happened.

After I "announced" my new position, a group of wonderful friends took the time to lift me up. They shared my news with their friends (people who don’t know me) so strangers could lift me up. They cheered for me. They were happy for me and wanted me to feel special.

Accepting love.

Its a strange feeling. These people whom I love and respect went out of their way to make sure I felt their love and pride and celebration. They wanted me to know they were proud of me. They wanted their friends to help share my good fortune. This was not just a celebration for me but a celebration for those who loved me.

Accepting love. 

 And I feel awkward. And I feel indebted.  I keep thinking about how I can celebrate them back or return the favor. How they’re better friends than me. I think, “What is their motivation for sharing this?”. Now, I don’t want you to think less of me but I also think, “If the roles were reversed would I be as good of a friend?”

 

This got me to thinking a lot about the ways we recognize love. I know most of us are familiar with the Five Love Languages (If you’re not, I’ve linked the book for you here. It is a 10/10 recommended read). It’s all about how we give and receive love differently, and how to recognize the ways in which our friends, family or partners show us love.

I think sometimes I don’t show my love very easily. I feel like I am always slightly removed in my friendships. I am afraid to pursue friendships and I am terrified to overestimate levels of endearment.

I am afraid to seem desperate and needy. I find myself often feeling I would rather be lonely than rejected.  

My Maypole has been left sparse because I didn't trust that I, the post, was strong enough to support the ribbons that trust me with their tethers. 

Today, I am going to work on accepting love from myself. I am a writer and I will work on saying that truth confidently and without the ache for approval.

Today, I am going to work on expecting love. I am going to try and notice the people who love me and be unsurprised when that love is displayed.

I am going to work on not rejecting love. I will try and trust the voices that present me with affection.

And most importantly I am going to affect love! I am going to work hard to make sure those I love, and those who love me feel the effects of that love. 

So reader, today I am going to Love. No exceptions.

- Kaitie Kaiser

Below, I’ve included some crystals along with descriptions of how they might help you in this new journey of self-love. 

Accepting Love:

     To properly accept the love that the world is giving us, we need to first accept that we are loveable. I don’t like when people use the phrase “You deserve to be loved.” I find it trite, but it also puts a sense of waiting in our hearts.  Yes, the sentiment is true but we don’t always get what we deserve. At least not in the way we picture it. The only love you have any control over is the love you give. Quoting the old adage, “you can’t serve from an empty pot”. To properly accept love from the world you must first accept it from yourself.

Easier said than done, I know. Lavender Rose Quartz is here to help us in our dark moments. 

 Lavender Rose Quartz gets its dark hue from an excess of manganese and titanium, which also enhances the healing attributes of this rare stone. It pushes you to accept all aspects of the world around you and rise above the drama with an abundance of self-love. If you accept yourself wholly, nobody and nothing can stand in your way. 

Expecting Love:

When someone tells me to be brave and speak my truth, I often feel like they are asking me to tell someone off. Being a passive person confrontation doesn’t flow freely from my body. But I rarely think of speaking my truth in a positive way. 

 Sometimes we need to speak our truths to ourselves. We need to be honest about who we are surround ourselves with. We need to be honest of what we are giving to the world and what we expect in return. We need to surround ourselves with people that we expect to love us. 

 For those of us who find it difficult to project from our hearts, Lapis Lazuli is the stone to keep close.

 Lapis Lazuli is made of three crystals all possessing attributes which, when combined, offer intuitive mastery: Calcite (to clear away distractions), lazurite (to bring in intuitive guidance), and pyrite (to help understand the messages brought to you). Connecting your throat chakra with your third-eye, lapis lazuli helps you to understand yourself and to use that understanding to speak your truth, honestly and clearly.

Rejecting Love:

I want to feel the love of those who wish to shine their love on me. But sometimes we are so focused on protecting ourselves that we end up rejecting love all together. I am going to work on being open to love and pain with equal measure. 

To do this, I will be holding tightly to Unakite.

  Working with unakite will promote the confidence you have in yourself which, in turn, will allow you to be more intimate with others; you’ll finally feel comfortable enough to open up and share your deepest thoughts with friends without fear of judgement. It also promotes healthy pregnancies.

 

Affecting Love: 

By affecting love I mean giving love. I mean taking the love that you feel and sharing it with those around you. Sometimes love doesn’t flow from my body. Sometimes I feel introverted and I want to be left alone. Sometimes I am afraid of my love being returned. This week I will be holding tightly to my Rose Quartz. 

 Rose quartz is very often mistaken for a “crystal of love,” when, in fact, it is a crystal of UNIVERSAL love. Its energy is soft and gentle, vibrating at a frequency which transmits loving energy between family and friends. Blessed by Venus, these pink crystals are stones of beauty and have been attributed to helping soothe irritated skin.

Back to blog