'The heart, it seems, yearns for connection.
A great grief arises when connection to others seems to come at the cost of connection to ourselves. I notice how dead I become inside, even if only subtly, when I try to conform to other people’s idea of who and how I should be and forgo my own feelings - my connection to myself. When the natural generosity, compassion, and caring of the heart becomes distorted or usurped, then all sense of aliveness, generosity, creativity, and true self expression seems to go and I am left feeling empty and drained. It takes a great deal of energy to shape oneself to fit someone else's needs and expectations, to conform to their demands, to be co-dependent. And no matter how tempting it is in the hope of gaining love, or of being kept safe, it always costs. Just as it always costs to demand conformity to our needs by others - to be in heirarchy when the heart is yearning for partnership. You can see that cost in the faces of so many couples. You can see the suppressed anger or the deadness that resides there. Though the heart may long for connection and love, it also, it appears, longs to be free.'