Don't Be a Jackass

In my recent revelation about how life should be (see Life Is About Choices), I am discovering that this idea I had to live life out of love is a pretty good one.

It's mostly about choosing love as a motivator over gratification. This is not rocket science. If you break it down this simply, what jackass is going to step up with their hand raised and say "I choose gratification please…"? Ok, granted a few jackasses WOULD do that, but mostly people have a little bit of pride.

There are those, when faced with Christianity being thrust upon them, say "I don't want to be told how to live my life". To them I say they are having Religion forced on them. Run. Quickly. Far Away. One of the best lines in modern cinema is from Kevin Smith's Dogma: "No one religion has it right".

Growing up in Christianity a lot of us are told that if we give our hearts to Jesus, life will be all cotton candy and puppies. Others of us are told that Christianity as a lifestyle is hard and painful and we should just suffer through it. What is the truth?

The truth all comes back to living life out of love vs. living life out of gratification.

For many years I was uncomfortable with the idea of being held accountable by others. This idea felt to me like being told what to do and having someone follow you around to make sure you did it. I have never been good with being told what to do, as my mother will attest.

Now that I am choosing to live my life out of love I am discovering that it is a comfortable medium. Life itself is not easy. Anyone who believes that it is easy is delusional. Living life at all entails making difficult choices. How we equip ourselves to make those choices has a lot to do with the ease of living with the consequences of the choices we make.

I'm not preaching. I am a non-denominational Christian. I will not tell you or anyone how to live your life, what to drink or not drink, what to eat or not eat, what to wear or not wear. Those things have very little to do with living my life out of love. They are trivial in the grand scheme of things.

I WILL tell you that I love you and your individual life and beliefs are the important things when it comes to making decisions.

If you want to make decisions out of gratification, go for it. Sometimes those ARE the easy choices. But often, the decisions made out of love are the easy choices.
Life is not easy, therefore choices are not easy. Just don't be a jackass.

Blessed

I am truly Blessed.
I have a wonderful group of friends who are all VERY talented individuals. Musicians, writers, photographers, teachers, artists, you name it, I've got a good friend that does it fantastically.

I have a fantastic boyfriend. When you are not looking is when you find them, if anyone wants my advice. Smart, good looking, cute ass and a great sense of humor. OH YEAH... and he flies across the country to see me. Can't Beat That with a Stick.

I have an amazing family. Very diverse, but still very accepting. Spending a weekend with the older generation can be a little intimidating at the outset, but turned out to be very educational and spiritual growth inducing.

Life is About Choices

We make choices every day based on our feelings, our needs, our desires and our convictions.

We choose to feed ourselves, bathe, interact with society and love.

Everything is a choice. Love is a choice. If you choose to love, you choose to honour that with everything you have and everything you are.

You cannot choose love and then fall prey to desires or "needs" that contradict that. If you choose those things you are chosing AGAINST love.

Life is not both. You cannot have your cake and eat it too. You can cater to the desires of the flesh and the desires of your ego, but you cannot cater to these and cater to love at the same time.

If you choose to love, protect it. Don't let yourself get caught up in the other stuff. As important as it may seem now, there is nothing more important than love.

Thus endeth the soapbox for the day.