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Tales from the Red
Couch
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Tales From the Red
Couch
Stories of Love and Transformation
By Hillary Gauvreau
Acknowledgement:
I want to thank
Phil, the man that I love like no other, for encouraging me and having
patience with my writing process. He has generously read (and re-read) my
many revisions, offering honest opinions, a male perspective and expert
editing. His support is invaluable to me, not only with this project, but
in my life.
Introduction
What's it all about, Alfie?
Is it just for the moment we live?
What's it all about when you sort it out, Alfie?
Are we meant to take more than we give
Or are we meant to be kind?
…
I
believe in love, Alfie.
Without true love we just exist, Alfie.
Until you find the love you've missed you're nothing, Alfie.
When you walk let your heart lead the way
And you'll find love any day, Alfie.
- Burt Bacharach
Every year I schedule an appointment
with my favorite tarot reader, Christiana. (http://www.tarotbychristiana.com)
She is a dynamo with long, curly, wild, red hair, and resembles the
stereotypical fortuneteller. She couldn’t be farther from that image
however. Brilliant, and well trained in the art and science of tarot, she is
practical and a true intuitive. Her readings confirm what I know and warn me
of blind spots that could hamper my progress along my way. A few years ago
I made an appointment to inquire if my current flame was fated to be “the
one” or something weird. I waited excitedly for the answer as Christiana
laid out her worn tarot cards.
The subject came and went pretty
quickly. “Have fun and don’t lend him any money.” was the sum total of her
guidance. My romantic idealism, inspired by screen visuals of The
Notebook, wilted.
“So, how’s the writing going?” she
asked matter of factly as she rifled through the cards.
“Writing?”
“You need to start writing a book.
There is a window of opportunity here.” she said.
“Write about what?” I fleetingly
entertained the notion. As a professional energy healer, my natural
assumption was to write something serious and instructional about healing.
Many excellent healers, including Barbara Brennan, have written definitive
books on the subject and I had nothing new to add. What would I write
about? Christiana looked me in the eye, like a parent guiding a wayward
child.
“Write about what you know.”
Those words struck me. What DID I
know? I knew I couldn’t attempt to write about something that didn’t excite
me. My friend Mark, who has always been kind enough to slog through my
rough drafts and find something nice to say, would tell me that if I wasn’t
excited about my writing, then no one else would be. What do I know that
gets me revved up and passionate?
One day I was sitting with a friend
as she shared her dating troubles. The man she was completely
head-over-heels in love with, suddenly got cold feet. He used the
time-tested breakup excuse: he didn’t have time for a relationship. I found
myself animatedly espousing my theories about love and relationship,
experiences, and conclusions. On and on I went until my friend started to
glaze over. My internal witness observed and took note. The next time it
happened, I knew I had found my topic. I love everything about
“relationships” and can talk, explore, analyze and strategize with great
enthusiasm. While some people sit and review the plays in sports, I do the
same with dates, breakups and romantic intentions. This was a subject I
could take on with enthusiasm.
My belief is that finding a mate can
take the same kind of effort and intention as finding a job; do the
research, have a plan and then go out and interview. When I was newly single
and filled with high hopes, I embarked on my dating intensive. Match.com and
eHarmony seemed like good places to start, especially after seeing the
commercials where dewy-eyed romantics attested to how they met and fell in
love because of the expertly crafted personality profiling. Perfect! How
hard could this be? I labored over that first profile, finding a screen
name, trying to be upbeat, funny, sexy and alluring. It was a challenge and
a process of illumination in itself, but before long my profile was posted.
I waited expectantly for the first wave of prospects.
In reality, there are lots of
potential matches to choose from, but fewer “keepers” that offer the
complete package of chemistry (the holy grail of dating), and compatibility
(schedules, locations, goals and baggage). After meetings, mistakes, and
eye-opening experiences, I fell for my first “on-line” man. He lived about
forty minutes away from me and had a comfortable, cozy red couch. It was
refuge, passion pit, forum and future book title, all in one.
That romance did not last, which was
heartbreakingly painful, yet perfect. I thought I was ready for a
relationship, but in retrospect I had a lot of valuable lessons ahead of me.
My profile was revamped, meetings were made, dates kept and amazingly my
heart kept beating in spite of the breaking. I noticed that each encounter
offered me some new bit of information about myself. I collected new
awareness of myself as it was reflected by my lovers. When my heart opened
to another, it also opened my mind and spirit to the bits and pieces that
moved me to expand and transform. Every relationship, even brief encounters,
offered me something that helped me to “grow” myself. Sometimes I was aware
of what was happening and chose the experience, but often it was only in
retrospect that the gift became clear. Lovers knocked, pried or flung open
the door to my deep interior awareness, exposing wounds, longings, potential
and whatever else was lurking inside awaiting my attention.
Real love, according to M. Scott
Peck, is a permanently self-enlarging experience. I believe we humans have
one unifying purpose here on this planet: to open our hearts to love. To
open our hearts even when it seems to go against all logic, even when our
hearts have been broken into tiny bits, even when it seems like the riskiest
option we can imagine. When we have the courage to embrace an open heart we
get stronger, enabling us to willingly open our resilient hearts again and
again. Love is a teacher. Lovers are the form the teacher takes, stringing a
thread that goes through life, connecting the deepest secret places in
oursleves. There is an ancient Chinese belief that
an invisible red thread connects each person’s
soul to the lovers they are destined to meet, regardless of time, place, or
circumstance. The thread may stretch or tangle, but never break.
Poet Gunilla Norris, wrote “Perhaps this thin red thread will suffice, for
it starts your journey.”
Writing gives me great pleasure and
I could spend all my time crafting words. Time is a commodity in short
supply however, so after writing in fits and starts, the project entered
hibernation on my hard drive. Months later, a brand new idea came through
me: Publish The Red Couch, in installments on my web site. Eureka!
Call it guidance or creativity, what ever it was, it excited me and breathed
new life into that old red couch.
My intention is to share stories
that will inspire you to experience your relationships in a new way; a way
that will lead you on your journey to deeper self-awareness and
transformation. The stories and people are fictional, but based in real life
experiences. Each story has a lesson, and the invitation to you, dear
reader, is to start being conscious of how you can grow and transform with
love. Your thoughts, stories and comments are always welcome at
hillary@healingcem.com
and will be posted only with your permission. Thank you for taking your time
to read Tales from the Red Couch.
ã 2009 All right reserved. No
portions may be distributed or reproduced without express written permission
of the author.
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