Infinity & You
Have you seen the infinity symbol before, how if you trace it, it flows in and out of its beautiful loop? It is a profound symbol and I discovered a unique application of it for myself recently.
It started with feeling disconnected with myself and vulnerable after I had my feelings hurt, which is unfortunately a very uncomfortable spot to be. I wondered how do I learn to live with an open heart, even vulnerable on a regular basis without feeling totally lost when I feel hurt or disappointed?
That question sat with me for a few days before I began to understand the answer. Something that I swear I’ve been working on learning my whole life.
The understanding lay in that infinity symbol. I realized that it was my natural state to be walking around with an open heart, which was represented by traveling out to one end of the infinity loop. Then on the return, coming back to myself, which was represented by looping back to the other end. This end closest to me represented coming home to myself.
I needed to learn to extend myself in love, then return to care for myself, no matter how I was received. Then when ready, repeat.
The return to myself however has taken some practice. How do we return to ourselves when hurt, offer solace and comfort? In fact to master this we have to care for ourselves to the point where we are ready to return again out to the world to walk around with an open heart again.
One could argue you just shield and protect yourself. Well yes there can be circumstances or relationships that prove to be lacking in safety, and our job is to remove ourselves rather than return for a repeat performance of pain.
However, what I’m talking about here is proactive protection. We don’t want to prevent the authenticity and beauty of approaching life with our loving, open heart before we even find out what is possible. That’s the trick. And I can promise you while it’s scary; there are great rewards for living authentically with an open heart. That’s where you have the potential for great love, great connection, great understanding with others. Risk always exists in there somewhere.
So learning to care for ourselves and understanding our inner needs is a magical ingredient to living life in the infinity loop. Expand and return. Sometimes things go well and the return to ourselves - is just to come home to celebrate how good you feel for taking the risk, or opening to new possibilities.
Next time I’ll share a few tips on how I care for myself — and I’d love to hear yours too.
Cheers to the infinity loop! Thanks for the lesson.
In case you need some specific ideas, here’s a quick resource on better boundaries with yourself from Sharon Martin.
