Sharing the Light Among Friends

Sharing the Light Among Friends

I received a lovely, encouraging text from a dear friend the other day. It was not only heartwarming, but her words also communicated to me a larger message that our existence has unity and is purposeful. And it reminded me that love and friendship can sometimes bring energy and encouragement just at the right time to overcome difficulties. During moments when doubt and other challenges inevitably set in, friends in the School are lifelines, helping me to persevere on the path to awakening. Awakening is the most difficult and rewarding of all endeavors with which I have been involved, and at the same time this pursuit requires the help from other friends.

My friend sent the following message:

“I woke up this morning with a strong sense of how difficult it would be at this stage in my life to exist alone without a school. Without friends like you. I see this by observing the energies people put out and the subjects they occupy their minds with. The energy I emit creates the environment I live in. And the energies others emit can also affect me if I am asleep … this experience is just making me more and more grateful for the gift of awakening. It’s like being given a gift you didn’t at first realize was so precious and with the passing of time find that you can’t imagine putting a value on it let alone live without it.”

This sharing of loving kindness from my friend not only connects us with each other but also reveals a shared experience of our higher possibilities. I am not entirely sure which is true: is love a product of higher states or do higher states evoke love? Do friends inspire us to be present or does presence attract friends? What certainly is true for me is that friends in the Work can nurture the highest in each other. To kindle the light of presence in ourselves and share it with others or to receive light from them is a rewarding way of being together.

Just as one candle lights another and can light thousands of other candles, so one heart illuminates another heart and can illuminate thousands of other hearts. — Leo Tolstoy

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Fortune-Telling on Christmastide, Mykola Pymonenko, 1888