.:.mesina.:.

(FYI- To read this whole section use the scroll bar on the side of this box. Thanks!) ------------It doesn't interest me what planets are squaring your moon. I want to know if you have touched the center of your own sorrow, if you have been opened by life's betrayals or have become shrivelled & closed from fear of further pain!I want to know if you can sit with pain, mine or your own, without moving to hide it or fade it, or fix it.I want to know if you can be with joy, mine or your own, if you can dance with wildness & let the ecstasy fill you to the tips of your fingers & toes without cautioning us to be careful, to be realistic, to remember the limitations of being human.It doesn't interest me if the story you are telling me is true. I want to know if you can disappoint another to be true to yourself, if you can bear the accusation of betrayal & not betray your own soul, If you can be faithless and therefore trustworthy.I want to know if you can see beauty even when it's not pretty, every day, and if you can source your own life from its presence.I want to know if you can live with failure, yours & mine, & still stand on the edge of the lake & shout to the silver of the full moon, "Yes!"It doesn't interest me to know where you live or how much money you have. I want to know if you can get up, after a night of grief & despair, weary & bruised to the bone, & do what needs to be done to feed the children.It doesn't interest me who you know or how you came to be here. I want to know if you will stand in the center of the fire with me and not shrink back.It doesn't interest me where or what or with whom you have studied. I want to know what sustains you, from the inside, when all else falls away.I want to know if you can be alone with yourself & if you truly like the company you keep in the empty moments.THE INVITATION by Oriah Mountain Dreamer (published May 1999). Copyright &&035;169; 1999 by Mountain Dreaming Productions