{by Shokti Lovestar}
The story of gay liberation is a story of love – that could ultimately lead to a REVOLUTION in human relationships and society – as freedom to love, freedom from fear and freedom of self expression becomes the right for all people on planet Earth.
For over four decades in the UK, gay relationships have had space and permission to grow and flourish. The first changes in the legal system dealt with sexual activity, and were based on a desire to halt blackmail and corruption as much as any principle of liberty and equality. In the UK, the 1967 Act that decriminalised sexual contact between two men in private was the starting point for an out and proud movement of gay liberation. Gay Pride marches, political campaigns and gradually increasing social acceptance of gay people have led to an improving situation for people of all sexualities, with equal marriage the latest manifestation of this. With the introduction of civil partnerships a few years ago, legislation entered the area of recognition of our love for each other, moving on from laws around our sexual activity, which had remained archaic and unequal for a long time after 1967. The movement spreading through western democracies to allow civil marriage on equal terms to heterosexuals is another stage towards love taking a place at the centre of human life, and is flushing out into the open the remaining prejudice, fear and ignorance around sexuality that exists in our societies.
The place of queer people in society is changing, but it has been a very long time coming. Centuries ago Michelangelo penned this verse:
“And if the vulgar and malignant crowd
misunderstand the love with which we’re blessed,
its worth is not affected in the least
our faith and honest love can still feel proud.”
Oscar Wilde wrote in a letter in 1898: “To have altered my life would have been to have admitted that Uranian love is ignoble. I hold it to be noble – more noble than other forms.” The ancient Greeks of course had a similar attitude. Plato testified to same sex love as the door to revelation.
Edward Carpenter (1844-1929), philosopher, socialist and our first British ‘gay activist’ saw a crucial role for gay men in society, though he recognised that attitudes towards sex would have to undergo a profound change for this to manifest.
“If the day is coming when Love is to take its rightful place as the binding and directing force of society, and society is to be transmuted in consequence to a higher form, then undoubtedly… the Uranians will have have an important part to play in the transformation.”
The Uranians may have been adopted as a term for gay men because Uranus is the ruling planet of Aquarius, the astrological age we are gradually moving into. Aquarius is Ganymede, the shepherd boy beloved of Zeus, king of the gods. Same sex love is a feature of the new age, knowledge of this has been written in the stars for many centuries. Aquarius is also the sign of humanitarianism, liberty, communication and idealism. Edward Carpenter, and in the USA Walt Whitman, were convinced that love between men would be the catalyst for turning human society away from conflict and capitalist greed towards a more egalitarian, peaceful and love-centred civilisation.
A line is appearing in the sand between people who give permission to all people to be themselves and those who would control the activities of others, their reasoning for doing so based on a sense of superiority, and religiously justified righteousness. When enough people have crossed the line into liberty and equality human life will change dramatically.
Gay people do not seek rights for ourselves which we would not permit to others. We do not try to tell the non-queer how to lead their lives.We simply feel it is time we were able to live freely without fear, able to openly celebrate our lives and our relationships. Equal marriage is not an important issue to all queers but it serves a powerful purpose in an ongoing revolution of love that will benefit all people.
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LOVE is nutrition for the soul, as food is for the body. LOVE opens the door to the dance of life, it brings full technicolour to the experience of being alive. Love connects us to other people and to the planet – if we let it; it reveals the interdependence of all life and can lift us into the arms of the divine.
The rationalistic outlook that predominates in our modern western society sees love as a by-product of our existence, but spiritual teachers since ancient times all indicate love is the source essence that gives rise to all things, and recommend it as the basis of interaction with friends, neighbours and enemies. When we fall in love we get a taste of the mystical reality that we are part of – we see the bright side of life, the enchantment and majesty of the planet we live on and the amazing beauty of human beings. Life can be a struggle, a flat and monotonous duty until love comes along and sets the fireworks off.
Love lifts us into a richer, warmer, brighter version of life, but it also challenges us to raise the vibration of all parts of ourselves to that level. A love affair is a journey of growth and self-discovery, and not simply a romantic escape from the world. The shadow parts hidden within us will be exposed in the light of love. They come out of the shade for healing, enabling us to change and grow, to lift all parts of ourselves into a state of love.
Our cultural conditioning encourages us to seek a love partner for life, and then to be broken when the love fails and the partner turns out to be less than perfect. If instead we realised that each love affair is going to take us into a deeper place of knowing ourselves, if we accept that the journey of togetherness may not last forever, but that our lives can be a continuing expansion into love anyway, we might find more peace in ourselves. We find peace also by accepting that neither our partners nor ourselves are perfect beings. If we learn to be comfortable in our own ambiguity of light and shadow we become immensely attractive… and lovable. The peace and light in our soul is more attractive even than our physical body, and while the body ages and withers, in our souls we can can continue to grow in beauty our whole lives. While we resist parts of our own nature we carry tension in our energy bodies – others will sense this resistance in us and are likely to keep a distance.
Honesty and communication are the keys to keeping the channels of the heart open and empowering love to deepen and grow.
Love is a spiritual practice too. Choosing to live from an open heart removes fear from our lives. Developing compassion and an open heart towards all beings removes the barriers between us. Recognising that we are all ONE at source and that love gets us in touch with that fact, are ways to lift the vibrations in our souls and feel part of the play of light happening in the universe. We are that light playing. Love opens our eyes to see.
In human beings, the spirit of consciousness has reached the point where we can choose to love, grow and evolve – or not. We can choose to nurture an open mind and heart or we can remain stuck in the game of competition, domination and drudgery that has emerged over recent centuries. Choosing to love, to take the risks it brings, the challenges it involves, is what moves us on in life, and makes life a full multidimensional extravaganza.
With food in our body and money in our pocket we can survive, but we need love to thrive. Loving ourselves, our friends, our family, our tribe, our planet – and loving a special other, allowing ourselves to become one with that person, revealing all our intimate places and being met in them – this is the core of life. Not bank balances, glowing cv’s and having the latest technology. Those things pass, but love brings us into touch with what is eternal and infinite, it gives us the taste of bliss that mystics tell us is the nature of the divine, reminding us that we are also eternal spirit as well as temporal body, reveals how much we communicate through touch and feeling as well as words and concepts (ie helps us to live from the soul) and brings us the richness of feeling and joy that overwhelm the questioning mind and brings us home to ourselves.
As love is given the space to flow freely between people of the same gender, without social taboos on how that may be expressed and fulfilled, on an equal footing with heterosexuals, humanity may learn from the example of the queer that…..
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All human personalities are an interplay of feminine and masculine energies – stereotyping gender roles and placing taboos on transgression of those rules cripples personal development and society’s evolution.
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Sex is great, is a celebration, and can lead to well being, happiness, and health. On the shadow side, sex can be dangerous… can damage us emotionally, physically and mentally, but openness about it is likely to lead to the happiest outcomes.
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Life is most rewarding when lived as a celebration of our existence
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Friendship, diversity and tolerance are best principles that help us enjoy life
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Overcoming prejudice, fear and judgement of others is the way forwards for a united humanity
This is the beginning of the Age of Aquarius, the new world of the Mayans, the second coming of the Christ Consciousness (manifesting through us all as love for all beings).
It is time for the love revolution.
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