A while back I had started a blog called “Love Priestess”.  It was a name I came up with shortly after I was outed because I felt my particular message, my calling in the world was better served from the perspective of a Priestess of Love.  Back then my partners and I were actively engaged in what we called a Love Movement.  Even though all of us have gone our separate ways, I believe with my whole heart that we each are pursuing that movement in our own particular ways.  Yet, my way has always been a bit unclear to me.  Love Priestess fit at the time, but I haven’t been grasping the full potential of what it can be and more importantly who I can be.

I am blessed in so many ways.  In particular I have a knack for romantic and intimate interpersonal relationships.  They have always come easy to me.  I’ve never been in a position where I’m “looking for love” or “waiting for the One”.  I have blessed that those opportunities have always shown up on my doorstep rather magnificently.  And each experience, each lover, each blessed being in my experience has been beneficial to my life.  Even the ones who have hurt me.  Each person I’ve encountered, each person I’ve shared myself with, including these partners who created this Love Movement together, has had an impact on my life.  And if anything my life has been characterized by the relative ease I’ve had in embracing transformational shifts in relationship dynamics.  A really fancy way of saying I flowed so easily with relationships that I always counted it as my most abundant blessing.

But something changed about 3 or 4 years ago that kept me from fully embracing the abundance that was being offered even in this relatively easy part of my personal life.  I used to attribute it to any number of factors and triggers from being hurt by a messy break-up or “growing up” or gaining weight or whatever seemed to excuse my feelings of sadness and disconnectedness. I was no longer welcoming of that abundance of joy, pleasure and shared oneness.   And even though I’ve blamed everything and everyone (especially myself for that), I couldn’t really get down to what was at the root of it all.

As some of you know I’m in the process of studying for the bar exam in my state.  I have my law degree and I want my license.  Yesterday, while on the phone with my husband I realized what I want to do to once I have my license and how I want to craft my life and my career.  It’s actually not that far off from Love Movement as we might think.  I have always wanted to change the world, but I finally have a way of making it happen…and forging a new path for law, policy, relationships, conflict, and acceptance of self.  I haven’t fully fleshed out the idea yet, but I know in my heart that it’s what I’m meant to do.

But to do it, I’m going to have to consent to be in the spotlight.

That terrifies me.  I have this image in my head that in order to accomplish what I want to accomplish, what every cell in my body is demanding of me, I am going to have to allow the spotlight to shine on me.  Each time the spotlight has swung in my direction over the years I’ve run away, escaped and hidden in the shadows.  The shadows, the darkness is a safe place for me.  I shine brighter in the shadows.  But eventually if I want to create the transformation I want…and if I want to be able to do it my way, I am going to have to finally consent to remaining in the spotlight.

And the spotlight is where my abundance lives.  It is where the abundance that I once enjoyed in multiple relationships went to reside.  It’s been drawing me there.  The richness and fullness of my emotional, physical and mental life is waiting for me.  I only have to overcome my fear enough to enter that circle.  I have to be brave enough to let the light cascade down my body, exposing my soul and my life, my love and my vulnerability…because ultimately those are my strengths and that is how I can lead, can transform, can create.  While I will always be comfortable working with the shadows, I cannot and must not dwell there.

Instead, my work, indeed the world I want to live in requires me to step fully into the light and to be seen and heard, to learn from others and lend my aid to those still lurking in the background, held back by their fear, guilt and shame.

This is my Love Movement.