The Blessing Dance: Third Level Love?
The Blessing Dance: Third Level Love?
Lets look at the first two steps of the Blessing Dance, the daily re-commitment to love in a couple. If you can understand this, and can then see how the "Morning Ritual" of an individual relates to the Blessing Dance for a couple. The "Morning Ritual" is like a marriage to your own heart and spirit. Once that cup is full, you have something to offer another healthy human being.
I wanted to throw out a model I heard recently, partially just to clarify it in my own mind.
"First Level Relationship" would be each person there for what they can get for themselves.
"Second Level Relationship" is transactional: I'll do for you if you do for me.
"Third Level Relationship" is just giving, with NO concern for getting in return.
This sounds right to me, but the next question is: how do you SAFELY get to "Third Level"? Open yourself like that with the wrong person, and you can literally give yourself away to a predator, sociopath or gaslighter. A taker. So you have to set it up so that your actions reflect your first priority: SURVIVAL. That means that you have to gain the wisdom to FIRST take care of yourself (first level), then be able to negotiate healthy relationships (second level) and finally with that wisdom, attract, create, and hold a "Third Level" relationship where each person does their job, but also gives to the other purely for the joy of it…and never regret that because you have found and nurtured a partner who does the same thing.
If there is anything more painful to watch than a giver in relationship with a taker, I'm not sure what it is.
So if we can understand the process of moving from the "selfish" relationship SAFELY to your "selfless" relationship, it might well be useful to understand what a natural, healthy human adult would be WITHIN THEMSELVES, where serving themselves is serving their lover, and their family, and their community because it gives them JOY to do so.
This is hard. And if you have been abused, oppressed, or neglected, especially on the intersecting axis of race and gender, this is HARD. You are suffering PTSD. We have to move through that toxic sludge, heal those frayed nerves, turn off those alarms SAFELY. They exist for a reason: to keep you alive. But they also stop you from fully experiencing life.
So if we were to suggest that the Blessing Dance is the natural connection of two healthy people, we might ask how common such a connection is, and consider ANYTHING less than that connection is a sign of damage, of imperfect familial or social conditioning. Just as a theory, just for the sake of this series of notes. What if that were true?
So the first step is the bow--mutual respect between two omnivores. Loving, deadly hunter/gatherers who can see each others' strength and beauty, and decide to hunt together. Two wolves eating from the same dish.
The second step is to place right hands over each others' heart, your left hand over their right, gazing into their eyes DEEPLY, breathing slowly in synch. Ten breaths. This is building DEEP rapport. What each of you want is to be seen as a sacred spirit. And your unbroken attention for these ten seconds is a metaphor for the unbroken flowing attention during sex, or life in general, as the various moods and tasks bounce around in your daily lives.
The third step is the song itself, singing softly together: "You are my beloved. I open my heart to you." I'll post a video with the tune itself. This statement is, in essence, re-committing to your marriage EVERY DAY. Some people talk about renewing their vows after ten or twenty years. What if you did this EVERY DAY? If you aren't ready to commit deeply, if there is any part of you unsure that you are deserving of such love, your eyes will shift, and your mind wander. YOU WON'T BE ABLE TO KEEP THE CONNECTION.
And this means that you know what you need to work on, together. Because what you want is a full acknowledgement of each other's strength and beauty, of your connection, the degree to which you see that you are one soul in two lives, and your commitment to do WHATEVER IT TAKES to create the love, passion, intimacy and support you BOTH deserve.
Don't you want that? To have that, you'll need to be able to handle that energy 100%. Find it within yourself. Do THAT and you will be able to recognize it in others. You will FEEL their attention break. If you connect with your deepest spirit, there is nothing but a ferocious love, and you will KNOW they are not bringing the same. But THEY will feel it from you, too. You can work together or alone to find that beauty and power within you. Frankly, the basic "Pair Bond" mating drive can be THE most evolutionary force in human beings. Only survival itself is more powerful, and that "third rail" of human consciousness can be risky to play with, whereas sex and love is far more pleasurable for most of us, but can be a daily, driving pulse of life if you connect it to survival on the personal, genetic, and social levels.
In otherwords, connecting the Belly Brain with the Heart Center.
If I were to ask what the "white belt" techniques within the Firedance system are, they are
Five Minute Miracle
Morning Ritual
Heartbeat Meditation
Three Gates
Three Centers
That might be it. Because All the basics are there…I think. I need to consider this more deeply. But you are helping me understand what is needed to stair-step up from the basement. And that's where you are if you are one of those born into abuse, neglect, or oppression. Make no mistake: your inner demons were not part of your HARDWARE. They are SOFTWARE, installed in the womb or after birth. Usually prior to puberty, usually something damaging those basic levels: survival, sex, or social power.
Going more deeply into a loving relationship can be one of the best ways to heal. And there is SO much reward for that vulnerability, IF you have chosen a proper partner, OR are 100% committed to protecting that child inside you.
Love between two people is often easier to see and understand than love within ourselves. But as we all have male and female aspects, in infinite variety and balance, understanding how this manifests between two people, straight of gay or whatever, can help you understand the depth of fierce love and forgiveness, protectiveness and openness, that you need within yourself as an individual to be free to grow.
And that freedom within an individual makes it possible to attract and hold another healthy human being. Those are your choices: two healthy people, or two wounded souls in balance connected with beauty and honest love.
Those are your choices. THEY BOTH WORK. The "Blessing Dance" is just one map to what that territory looks like. And I hope you'll ask yourself if you have that connection in your lives, however you came to it…and have it BOTH on the level of the individual and the pairing.
If you have questions that connect to this, please ask them. Or come to our Saturday Zoom meetings to discuss and share.
Namaste
Steven Barnes
