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Last January, I began the year breaking up with fear by writing it a letter,  My Break Up Letter with Fear.  This January, I am beginning the year reuniting with love in My Love Letter to Love.  But, before I compose my letter to Love, I will give you some background.

I began writing this post a couple of weeks ago, and I began it with this question:  Is the world ending?  It was intended as a joke, but since the events of dead birds falling from the sky and dead fish and crabs washing up on shore, I wonder, maybe it is.  If so, I am glad I am finding the love deeply and patiently stored within my heart.

However, there was a time I would not be glad of such a thing, which is why I began the post with asking that question. When I felt love in my heart, I thought not that the world was ending, but that mine was.  I believed I would die if I expressed my love to those I love.  Sound silly, right?  Seriously. It’s true.

The thinking was this:  I feel love, but if I express it then it means I am dying.  Okay, so this is good because if I do die I will have at least expressed my love, but this isn’t how my mind worked. It worked in the opposite.  If I am dying, which was a thought that frightened me like no other, that fear kept the love away, so instead the love I was feeling was repressed and not given.  This meant if I didn’t express it, I was safe, and I wasn’t dying.  Control issues, wouldn’t you say?

But I can’t run from love anymore- or let me say, I can run, but I don’t want to.  Funny thing is, I didn’t think I was running from love.  I didn’t even know love was moving toward me, but recently it is absorbing itself into my existence.  I’m beginning to see my entire journey is about a continual heart-opening meditation on love, one breath at a time.  I’m beginning to see this poem from Rumi I meditate on is happening inside of me:

Oh, Love. Oh, pure, deep Love.  Be here. Be now. Be all.
Worlds dissolve into your stainless, endless radiance.
Make me your servant. Your breath. Your core. 


I’m thinking Love loves this, and in order to declare Love further, here goes my letter:

Dear Love,


I love you.  This should be all I need to say, right?  I know you don’t need anymore than this. In fact you don’t even need this. You sit there and smile proudly at me no matter if I love you or not.  But I need this.  I need to tell you some things.  

My Husband

I’ve been running from you instead of running toward you.  At times I have run so far I believe the voices in my head that say I don’t care and even hate.  When my family gets too close, and I feel you in my heart I think of a funny joke or some sarcastic thing to say.  When you urge me to reach for my husband’s hand, instead I think of all the reasons he doesn’t deserve my hand.  Did he shower today?  Remember when I thought he was cheating on me?  And my kids.  You nudge me to touch their hair like my aunt does with her daughters, but no one did this to me so I feel stupid, and instead I keep my hands to myself and push you away.

My Alyssa

My Lilli

Strangers.  You whisper to me we are the same.  But they only look different and some speak in foreign languages and that irritates me.  Some dress in frumpy clothes and I judge them.  Just as well.  Don’t need them anyway.  


Oh Love, how I’ve resisted you. Feared and abhorred you. Denied and cheated you. Yet, always curious of you. Is it really all about you, Love?  Come on, you are weak and sad, a frail, little creature, you never defend yourself or get mad.  You are kind of a chump- so just sit back and relax. I will take over from here, and I usually do, pulling sarcasm out of my cap.  Oh, but it does not matter…


Oh my, Love. You are always there, aren’t you? Nudging, whispering, suggesting, offering.  You want me to be close and I continue to be far, far away from you.  But I can’t seem to help it even though I say that prayer: Oh, Love. Oh, pure, deep love- make me your servant.  Your breath. Your core.  Yes, Love make me your everything please. I beg you. I cannot take the separation any more. I need you.  But then, people appear- and I go away again.  Away from you. Away from them. Away from me. I’m scared.


When will I learn to be in your embrace?  When will I learn?  Sometimes I feel I force you into me as if you are waiting somewhere outside of me. And then when I know you are inside, I throw you away, as if I could.  Oh, Love how complex we are.  Oh, Love how pure and simple you are.  When will we learn
When will we learn?


I want to say something more profound to you.  Something to make you love me.  Oh, I get it- this is what I do with other people.  Love me. Love me. Love me.  The entire world screams love me. It is our most silent prayer, and heard everywhere.  You are truly all we want.  And you are everywhere.  Sometimes I feel you. Can I be you? Would you care?  

My Father

I do feel you more.  My small family seems to know you like never before.  My father- every time we hang up the phone: ‘I love you,’ he says, ‘just in case.’  These three words, for a long time, were not spoken. My dad, he’s a kind man.  But we’ve been awkward around you. What do we do? What do we say? We feel you between us, but I think we’ve been scared. 

My Mother

My mom. Once so feisty. Now so frail.  I protect myself from her. I really struggle to release you to her, but I must. Everyone deserves you no matter what they have done, or continue to do.  Dammit, Love I just want to love. Why is it so hard?  I know everything would be so much better if I just completely opened up to you.  What would I lose?  What can I keep? What if I die?  Love through it all, you say. Love through it all.  I’ll try.  I’ll try.  


And here is my final salute to you~



Love- ready or not. Take me over. I’m yours. I can no longer be