A kiss takes no courage

A kiss takes no courage. Lips that meet are not courageous, as delicious as the experience can be; it is a only gateway, but what a gateway. Not even sex takes courage. These are just infintessimal moments of convergence. Courage is what it takes to recognize that moment as an experience of the highest union and seek with every cell to perpetuate it into infinity. It is standing still during the baring of the soul in the presence of another that takes the real courage.

It's not enough to be a great cook, or to be handsome or beautiful. It's not enough to be a top notch executive, or a fantastic worker. It's not enough to care about someone's clothes, or their comfort. It's not enough to be friends, to be a great lover, or to claim commitment. It's not enough to do everything right. None of it sustains love in the long run.

Courage sustains love. Courage beyond anything you have ever experienced. You can be great at everything, you can want to love, you can want to be committed, but sustaining love takes more courage than merely wanting something. You can also want ice cream or a gadget; you can want a person, but when it comes to love, wanting is not enough; the act must be taken to the realm of perfect presence, the place where you are actually open enough to be with that person.

Love isn't easy, it's a huge responsibility. Those we touch, we touch forever, the things we do can never be retrieved, they are done. Once we have touched each other the fingerprints can never be removed. Sometimes those fingerprints leave pain that echoes for lifetimes. The courage it takes to be completely naked before another soul is enormous - the naked that reaches beyond clothes, the naked that touches the very essence of your being. Share that without cringing; share that without covering up something; share that without flinching and you begin to understand courage.

For that infintessimal moment you have stood in the very essence of yourself, shown yourself, yet you stand 100% receptive so that you can take in the essence of someone else in the same moment.

I won't say sex is overrated, it's too much fun for that, but real courage comes when you move beyond the physical realm, to breathe in the essence of another with unfailing gentleness while allowing your own essence to be breathed in by another with the same unfailing gentleness.

It is not enough to touch bodies, it has to move in the realm of the soul. A kiss takes no courage, it is the soul-baring depth it can take you, no, it's your willingness to go there that takes courage.

Blessings.
- Darshan

© 2008 Darshan F Jessop