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When I say “Love and Light” what’s the first image that comes to your mind? Is it some New Age dude with a hair bun? Or some glowing, soft-spoken, white-haired lady who answers every question with another question? You know, the kind of people with words like “atonement” and “higher vibration” running in and out of their vocabulary like a drunken sports fan being chased across a football field? (Somebody stop him!)
Let’s be clear–peace, love and Donnie Osmond aren’t just for the soft-spoken. Don’t make the mistake I made for 25 years stiff-arming my higher self out of fear that the Universe was going to ask me to shave my head, sell all my shit and head off to the Himalayas.
Those who know, don’t say, and those who say, don’t know.
Now, for God’s sake, I don’t want to come across as religious. That would be a tragic misunderstanding. Labels are so limiting and anyone who knows anything about my life knows I am horrible at living inside conventions. But let’s say you put a gun to my head (please don’t) and force me to describe where I land spiritually, I would say my spirituality is found somewhere inside that mystical “thang” that happens during an amazing guitar solo at a concert where 20,000 people all communicate the same feeling wordlessly and my fondest memories of sharing a cigarette at 3 AM with a friend who needs to talk. (Back in the 90s, of course. When cigarettes were what all the cool kids were doing.)
To me spirituality is universal, yet personal. And my philosophy in a nutshell is really quite simple: Those who know, don’t say, and those who say, don’t know. Now, can you please point the gun somewhere else and let me change into a clean pair of shorts?
Don’t forget, unless you have a few scars, what good are you?
Here’s the point. I’m looking for my people. The badasses, the battle tested, the authentic people who get that life has made us all the way we are for a reason. When you live in light you know the most gangster thing you can do is give a shit about another human being.
I find love and light in those unique people who open their hearts to strangers. Those people with purple hair and tattoos that happily give change to the homeless. Those nurturing people raising children that aren’t their own . . . just because. Those overworked souls who live simply to give hope to drug addicts, whose mere presence whispers, “It’s cool. You’re going to be all right.” Those disheveled people driving beat up cars to volunteer at the soup kitchens or suicide hotlines. The Lyft driver who gave food and encouragement to one of her passengers because she saw something of herself inside his situation.
Those are the rare souls with guts and integrity who know we are all in this together.
Because the light that I see in this world isn’t manicured. The light I see has missing teeth and says “fuck.” A lot. My peace and harmony has a scar running down its face from a knife fight. Because that’s the badass that’s tough enough to weather the real storm. The real fighting spirit. The love and light I want in my corner when the existential shit hits the omnipresent fan.
Life is a heavy-weight, mixed martial arts title match . . . with no training.
The question isn’t whether you want to step in the Octagon. You are already in the Octagon. The question is who do you trust to bring truth to your corner? The person with a couple fights under their belt or the person with a manual?
To everyone with a past, thinking you’re not kind enough, not smart enough, not good enough, I want you to know your past is what makes you special. And if you don’t think light filters through you because you’re not a polished, poster child of some 1950s archetypal personification of religion, think again.
Because I want you to know, I see you. You are the love. You are the light . . . with grit, my friend.
And my deepest hope is that we meet someday soon.
Keep doing your thing!