For the love of...

Words SANDY STEVENS

Most of my life I have been held prisoner by a desire to prove myself… only, I wasn’t aware of it.

It was only recently that I made the connection between many events in my life and the vital link that connected the dots.

Once upon a time, in my desire to discover and prove myself, I first sought love, or, more correctly, I chose seeking the approval of one person who would love me simply for who I was. As time passed and the outcome wasn’t what I considered successful, I changed direction.

Love still figured highly, but this time it was expressed in my choice of career or love of work. Over many years, I held many and varied jobs. They extended from labouring to management positions. I loved them all – even though at times the degree of my love varied depending on those I encountered or the position I filled.

Each and every job taught me much about life and people, and, most of all, about myself. Eventually, as circumstances improved, I begun to genuinely appreciate the gift of life and the many opportunities that came my way.

By then, I had love and love of work down pat, but it seems it wasn’t quite enough. So my next step was to seek love of creativity. I launched myself into this endeavour with my usual enthusiasm and set to become a visual artist. I surprised myself – astonished more like it – by setting ambitious goals and achieving them in a short time.

Something profound however, had changed within me during these productive years. To my great surprise I discovered I was Soul, a spiritual being and could, if I let it, be guided by divine love. Still prompted by that old desire to prove myself, I had a few exhibitions, sold some artworks and, when asked if I was an artist, I responded with a resounding and heartfelt “Yes!”

As life went on, new challenges emerged, clearly aimed at refining my understanding of life and my purpose in it. New work opportunities presented themselves and the ‘artist’ persona seemed to slowly vanish. In the last few years, creativity came to the fore once again and I found myself compelled to write a book about some of my life’s most unusual adventures. It was a project finally brought to completion this year thanks to the self-imposed isolation forced by Co vid-19.

A question suddenly presented itself to me: was I an author because I published a book? That’s when I realised I was no more an author than I had been an artist 20 years ago. In both instances, I was urged and guided into these creative pursuits by inner guidance, merely a channel for something greater, for the love of life itself.

And in that process I completely lost the need to prove myself, finally free of one more chain holding back my progress on the road to spiritual freedom.

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