Loving Relationships: Get Thee to a Heavenly Workshop with Angel Harper

Shall I compare thee to a summer’s day?
Thou art more lovely and more temperate.
-William Shakespeare¹

She walks in beauty, like the night
Of cloudless climes and starry skies;
-Lord Byron²

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Love poems by The Bard and Lord Byron are worthy of a bonafide swoon. However, after a Loving Relationships workshop on February 19th, instead of imagining the smiles of the recipients, I’m wondering about the self-talk of the writers. Why? I’ve learned magnificent love affairs are predicated on both partners brimming with self-love.

Angel Harper facilitated the Loving Relationships workshop at Peace Awareness Labyrinth & Gardens. (Yes, that’s her real name. Her demeanor is heavenly.) Angel’s approach to loving relationships is simple. Follow the three basic tenets of the Movement of Spiritual Inner Awareness (MSIA.)

Take care of yourself so you can help take care of others.
Don’t hurt yourself and don’t hurt others.
Use everything for your upliftment, learning and growth.

Obvious? Maybe not. Like cancer, judgments can be a silent killer. Lack of sleep and poor food choices can poison a nourishing friendship. Shabby self-esteem can tear at the seams of a perfect-fit partnership. Angel was not quite that dramatic. She said wiser things like, “Relationships I had mirrored to me places I did not love.”

Once we get past the Tiffany rings and Cinderella wedding fantasies, aren’t we all seeking fulfilling love? If that’s the case, it makes sense to really, really apply the three tenets of MSIA to associations – intimate or casual. Practicing the principles could actually uncover the treasure of agape love. (The love of God for man and of man for God.) That’s not to say it’s a comfortable path. Traversing inner terrain can be treacherous. Who wants to claim shadowy self-righteousness or entitlement?

Nevertheless, Angel took her own inventory. Relationships turned into sleuth work. “I started listening more carefully,” she says. “I was getting impulses of guidance.”

Angel also took a contrary course of action and proceeded slowly with a romantic connection. (Wish my wild 20-year-old self had heeded that advice!) Whether a Gen Z or about to leave the planet though, it’s never too late to experience more loving in relationships.

Here’s a Loving Relationships Check List:

– Take your own inventory
– Look at the reflections you’re seeing in relationships…Embrace your shadow self with an extra dose of TLC.
– Listen for guidance.
– Go slowly.
– Stay vigilant to spiritual principles.

Whew! Are you a little overwhelmed? Thank goodness Angel tapped the whiteboard where she wrote humor in red. “Find humor no matter what. It’s a big key to loving relationships.”

Laughter definitely lightens the load. It allows the burdens of self-recrimination, hurts and humanness to fall away. Without practicing the 3 MSIA tenets though, life can get pretty darn serious very quickly. At least that’s my experience.

No joke though that Angel Harper knows how to bring Heaven’s Light into everyday life. The wisdom she imparts with a twinkle in her eyes is beyond words. So, stay tuned and make sure you catch her next workshop at Peace Awareness Labyrinth & Gardens slated for the fall.

In the meantime,

This above all – to thine own self be true,
And it must follow, as the night the day,
Thou canst not then be false to any man.
-William Shakespeare³

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