Intimacy: The Fruit of Cultivating and Maintaining Loneliness

The word "intimacy" is similar to the word Love. It scares some people probably because of prejudices based on limited experiences of the heart.

I can see how it is a scary word, but to me it just means something like "ultimate compassion".

I could also have titled this post:

“Empathy: the Fruit of Cultivating and Maintaining Emptiness"
or
“Enlightenment: the Fruit of Cultivating and Maintaining Kenosis”

Have you ever known a truly empathetic person? Someone with such an understanding of what is going on with you that he or she seems to readily comprehend your deepest feelings, thoughts, or motives. That is an intimate understanding of your heart.

Have you ever known, or heard of someone, who seems to have intimate knowledge of a person or subject or circumstance without having any logical way possible of having attained such knowledge? And, in wonder and awe you ask…how do you know that?….he or she says I don’t know, it just came to me. He/she doesn’t seem to have anything to back it up with but they know it nonetheless.

Or someone who seems to be able to read your mind, and you ask incredulously...how did you know I was just thinking that? and he or she says “I didn’t do anything, I was just talking”

To me these sort of things are not certainly not necessarily miracles or magic, but are indeed similar to how God/Love/Spirit works through us ... in ways we do not, and probably will not, ever understand or maybe not even know that is happening. (that is kinda scary to me)

Look at Jesus. Jesus so emptied himself, and was so filled with the perfect will of God it was available to him to use at his own discretion – so he could heal, and do wondrous things when he deemed necessary to spread/extend His heavenly purpose which, of course, was indeed His Father's perfect will.

Most of us, at best, will only be vehicles of God’s will and not have it to use at our discretion. Cultivating emptiness does seem to be a way to emulate Jesus and a beginning to the fruits of deeper compassion/empathy/intimacy/Love.

Just some thoughts…more later
Peace and Love

Keren