The Path of Surrender to Love

The path of surrender to Love 

might offer the gentler dismantling process, 

and will take longer [than the path of the renunciate], 

but with the same end result.

The analogy of gently cooking an onion, 

letting the onion soften in the alchemical

heating process, and gently pulling the layers away 

as they melt away from the center of the onion, 

til all dissolves, and only "essence of onion" 

remains (in the finest of stews!).

The other method is to peel away the layers

of the raw onion, releasing pungency (pain) 

into the atmosphere and becoming visibly smaller

as the layers are removed-- a less gentle process all around, 

but one which always remains for the renunciate to pick up.

The lover moves through transformation 

with grace and generosity in her heart,

because the joys and ecstasies of Love 

sustain her through the painful passages.

Surrendering the current form to make room 

for the Beloved is an ancient and much-revered tradition.

One would think that this path would always 

have been preferable to the path of the renunciate.  

But the renunciate path has always dominated 

in the world, it seems--the path of Lover always eclipsed 

and almost considered trite.  It is anything but trite, 

and is a path of great potential, but, it must be traveled with

another, and in a world of rugged individualists, 

this does not play out in a popular way.  

It requires being a team player while at the same time requires

an innate sense of leadership and rugged independence.  

The contrast of surrender of the self towards another, 

combined with active sovereignty within the self

and the high degree of integrity and self-possession required 

in the lovers' pair pose a daunting profile.

There is a great complexity 

in the alchemical process--it has ever been so.  

And yet, too, there is great simplicity in Love also, 

with a regular, rhythmic heartbeat to follow, 

and the heightening of all the inner senses.

So it seems [O, Lover] you have chosen the path of the few, 

the path of the deeply humbled, the inwardly surrendered, 

the meek of heart, the gentle of mind.

May your soul, spirit, and ego, equally, honor the path of Love 

and tread its ways carefully towards the Beloved, 

who in turn treads carefully towards you, 

as hastily as humility and meekness will allow.

(writing from January, 2008)