Love is a funny thing to describe. It's so easy to feel and yet slippery to talk about. It's like a bar of soap in the bathtub - you have it in your hand until you hold on too tight. Some people spend their lives looking for love outside themselves. They think they have to grasp it in order to have it. But love slips away like that wet bar of soap. Holding on to love is not wrong, but you need to learn to hold it lightly, caresslingly. Let it fly when it wants. When it's allowed to be free, love is what makes life alive, joyful, and new.
Trust always seems to come down to trusting in yourself. Others can't overcome fear for you; you have to do it on your own. It's hard because fear and doubt hold on tight. We are afraid of being rejected, of being hurt once more. So we keep a safe distance. We think seperating ourselves from others will protect us, but that doesn't work either. It leaves us feeling alone and unloved.
Trusting yourself begins by recognising that it's okay to be afraid. Having fear is not the problem, because everyone feels anxious and insecure sometimes. The problem is not being honest enough to admit your fear. Whenever I accept my own doubt and insecurity, I'm more open to other people. The deeper I go into myself, the stronger I become, because I realize that my real self is much bigger than any fear.
In accepting yourself completely, trust becomes complete. There is no longer any seperation between people, because there is no longer any seperation inside. In the space where fear used to live, love is allowed to grow.
It's easy to mistake being innocent for being simpleminded or naive. We all want to seem sophisticated; we all want to seem street-smart. To be innocent is to be "out of it."
Yet there is a deep truth in innocence. A baby looks in her mother's eyes, and all she sees is love. As innocence fades away, more complicated things take it's place. We think we need to outwit others and scheme to get what we want. We begin to spend a lot of energy protecting ourselves. Then life turns into a struggle. People have no choice but to be street-smart. how else can they survive.
When you get right down to it, survival means seeing things the way they really are and responding. It means being open. And that's what innocence is. It's simple and trusting like a child, not judgmental and committted to one narrow point of view. If you are locked into a pattern of thinking and responding, your creativity gets blocked. You miss the freshness and magic of the moment. Learn to be innocent again, and that freshness never fades.