LETTERS FROM LOVE — With Special Guest Taylor Somerville!

Inhale, exhale

Howdy Lovelets! 

It was in a political science class at New York University 35 years ago that I first heard this line from the 17th century philosopher Thomas Hobbes:

“Fear and I were born twins.”

I gasped in recognition when I heard it: I don’t think I’d ever related to anything more than I did to that simple statement.

I don’t know if I was born in a literal of state of fear (I don’t really remember; it was a busy day) but I do know that anxiety found me very quickly upon my arrival here in Earth School. It didn’t take me long to recognize that the world is a dangerous place filled with unpredictable people — and once I realized that, I panicked. Then I immediately commenced my lifelong habit of trying to control everything on the outside, so I would feel better on the inside — which has yielded, to put it mildly, MIXED RESULTS.

I am a middle-aged woman now, but I still have the nervous system of a frightened child. But I have found tools that can help me to settle down from within, and bring me a better life. Writing these daily letters from Unconditional Love is my strongest tool for inner peace — but prayer and meditation are also key to my well-being, as are community, sleep, exercise, water, and The Great British Baking Show.

This week I want to introduce you to someone who has played a huge role in teaching me how to quiet my own nervous system. Taylor Somerville is a breath coach whom I discovered during lockdown, and whose steady and clear guided meditations have now become a daily part of my life.

I can’t always hear the voice of Love when I am spinning out — but I have often reached for the voice of Taylor. After just a few minutes of one of his guided breath meditations, I can find the same level of release that I used to find after taking a Xanax — but without the addictive qualities, or the need for a doctor who is loose and easy with the prescription pad!

This week, my loves, I invite you to pause and breathe. Taylor has created a special breath meditation, just for us — just for this community. He offers it this week as his gift of love. I hope this practice makes you feel as serene and clear-headed as it always makes me feel.

Onward, Beloveds! 

Love,

Your Lizzy

Dear Love, what would you have me know today about finding a sense of calm?  

Oh my dearest little jitterbug, what a sweet question! Where indeed can a body find a sense of calm? In this world? In this economy? Surrounded by these monkeys-dressed-in-human-garb? Sometimes it seems impossible, doesn’t it?

I can start by telling you that you aren’t going to find it out there. Your calm is not located in the outside world, nor does anyone else besides you hold the keys to it.

I mean, yes, you can find temporary fixes to a nervous body by reaching for things outside of yourself to settle you down, and heaven knows you have tried them all over the decades: prescription and non-prescription drugs, alcohol, food, mass media and social media, somebody else’s body or attention upon you, perfectionism, success, shopping, adventure . . . oh, my dear little twerky bean, the world has so much to offer you that will alter your nervous system. Yes indeed it does — and all you have to do to get it is pay through the nose, or beg, or hunt, or manipulate, or compromise and exhaust yourself.

But is that really what calm is? Really? Something you pay for, or barter for?

Why would we have designed you that way? Why would we have made it so difficult for you, such that finding a sense of ease in the world would require you to work so hard in the material realm? And why would we have made it so that your sense of calm is so fragile and fleeting that all it would take to disturb your serenity is for you to lose any of those temporary fixes that you have clutched at in order to settle yourself down?

Why would we have made you so DEPENDENT, when we love you so much?

Well, my dear, we didn’t. It’s all been a big misunderstanding. Your calm is not dependent at all upon what happens outside of you. You know this intellectually, my love, and you’ve certainly read enough spiritual texts to believe it to be the truth, but it’s time for you to know it in your body. And that’s what we are working on here.

My love, your sense of dis-ease and disturbance has always come from within you, but so does the remedy. Doesn’t that make sense? The same brain that can produce cortisol and adrenaline can also produce oxytocin and serotonin. If the trouble is within, then so is the fix. Doesn’t that sound like how nature works? It is how nature works.

And this should be incredibly good news for you, given that the world has become more unstable than ever. How dreadful it would be if you had to rely upon people, places, or things in the outside in order to feel okay on the inside. (How long are you planning to wait for that, by the way? For everything in the outside world to be put in order, such that you can relax? How’s that going so far?)

Why would we do that to you, when we love you so much?

My child, it is no accident that I have been telling you more strongly than ever that it is time to go within. Every day in our communion, I have been telling you that all the relief and connection you need are to be found within the autonomous nervous system that we have provided for you. That your moods and fears and indeed your HOPE does not need to be tied to anyone else, or anything else, ever again.

We have a plan for you. It involves things you already know how to do. It’s just a matter of your doing it with more love and commitment than ever. Meditate, my dear one — but I want you to sit for more time each day, and sometimes twice a day. Get married to meditation. All the answers you will ever need will be found in the space of meditation — including my voice. And remember — listening to my voice is the same thing as meditating. If you’re sitting quietly conversing with me, that is meditation. If you are writing letters from me, that is meditation. And if you are reading and responding to letters that I have written to others, that is also meditation.

So ask me to come and visit you, while you are sitting still and quiet. I will talk you through it. We will be together. I will tell you everything you need to know.

Your breath is my breath, sweetheart. We share the same breath. I am your breath. Which means that approximately 12 to 20 times a minute, I come to visit you, to replenish you, and to tell you how much I love you.

Your heart is my heart, child. We share the same heart. Now go there and roam. Your heart is our home. I’ll meet you there.

Have a quiet day. I love you —

Love, LOVE

Prompt

When you have a moment to yourself, close your eyes and deepen your breathing. You can give Taylor’s breath meditation a try, or any other form of meditation you like. And once your breath has stilled and your heart has quieted, ask this simple question:

Dear Love, what would you have me know about finding a sense of calm?

I like to decorate my love letter journals with collages. It’s always exciting to start a new book!