Thursday, January 17, 2013

The Gaze of Love

I received another e-mail from the author of the Imagine a Woman poem I shared a little while ago. She talked about the feeling of being constantly judged, of feeling like others look at you and pigeon hole you based on your appearance. Being a short and round middle aged person who has physical difficulties, I understand that feeling. I stopped dying my prematurely graying hair about 5 years ago when my 10th grandchild was born. I am 5'1" and currently at about 230 lbs. I have never been "pretty", but I've always been me.

This new poem touched me, because I see so many struggling with the judgment of our society. My kidlette is beautiful. She doesn't have the skeletal figure of a fashion model, she has curves and sass and is so full of life that she lifts my spirits. Unfortunately, she's in high school. That time of life where you are either accepted by the "right" group or you're a loser. She knows who she is and refuses to be pushed into a mold that doesn't fit. I am so incredibly proud of her.

 I have found a place where I do not feel judged. I have a loving coven, filled with sisters and brothers where I do not feel I have to pretend, ever. I do not feel that I am less because I am short, overweight, disabled, or still learning. Knowing that we have a meeting coming up is enough to lift my spirits no matter what else is going on. I wish every person could have an experience like this. I wish every soul had a judgment free zone in thier lives. That is what this poem is about.

             The Gaze of Love: A Body-Loving Invitation to all Women

 Today, and everyday, let's turn toward other women's bodies, and our own, with mercy and unconditional acceptance, letting go of the competition and scrutiny-based sizing up of each other, letting go of the subtle put-downs and diminishments when we're threatened by each other, allowing healing attention to flow one to another until the gaze of love heals us. 

 A gaze of love, calling wise women with their beautiful silver hair and life-lines out of hiding; inviting our smart, gifted daughters to reject the tyranny of thinness and to cease from harming themselves; welcoming the full, rounded bodies of our friends, bodies that refuse to be battered into shape by diets and admonishments. 

 A gaze of love so powerful, so encompassing, embracing the whole community of women, all sizes, shapes, colors, ages, and languages, with the widest welcome, the deepest affirmation, the highest calling, the loudest YES. 

 A gaze of love, inspiring us to bite into LIFE and the fullness of its possibility, to express LIFE through us in color and shape, sound and movement, to honor LIFE by turning our body-loving energy toward projects of justice, relationships of comfort, strategies of wellness, and words of affirmation. 

 Knowing we're all in this together. One breath. One body. One life. And so it is.

Let's take the time to reach out to someone, to share the "Gaze of Love" that comes from the Mother of All. If everyone who reads this reaches out to just one person, I believe this would spread like wildfire. Don't we all just want to be loved and accepted just as we are? With all our warts and bumps and bruises. The bottom line of every major religion is to treat other people the way you want to be treated.