Heart Wide Open

I've decided that there is no other way to live. You either live with an open heart or you live with a closed heart. Period. There are advantages and disadvantages to both. You have to decide for yourself. An open heart allows you to feel, to connect and to be in touch with all that is around you. A closed heart may appear to protect you from life's challenges but what it actually does is simply separate you from the support that is everywhere. It is the illusion of protection.

I notice that the sun doesn't protect itself, it always plays full out. It doesn't blame the clouds if they make it hard for a beautiful sunrise. Neither does it rejoice on mornings like this one where it was really easy to create breathtaking beauty. It just does its thing in harmony with everything around it - working with what it has. More importantly, it never (not once) changes itself in order to conform with something external. Never. Sure, there are days where we can't even see the sun for all the clouds but the important thing is that the sun NEVER changes. Closing down is the illusion of protection because in the end it really affords no more protection than full-out exposure. And I think that full-out exposure might be a more fulfilling, certainly more exciting, way to live your life.