perhaps i may just dig myself in deeper...
you said in your original post..."I don't know if my heart is big enough to hold it all...the 'positive' and 'negative'...the 'perpetrators' and victims'...the 'accepted' and 'rejected'...the 'light' and the 'shadow'. How does one embrace all of it...say YES to it all...give thanks for it all? And yet I must do this."
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your last line... "and yet i must do this"... and i say... "says who"...???
not to make you feel in any way inferior... but i really do not believe that the human heart is capable of doing what you say you must do... from my experience my heart nearly exploded... and i am talking "literally"... just from experiencing a close proximity of what ever you wish to call it... light/love/or spiritual experience... all i know is that it was the most beautiful sensation of love... light... spirit... whatever... but it's absolute purity was awesomely powerful...
that is why i say only god is capable of doing what you say you must do... because god is love... pure love... 1000% love... undefiled love... love untouched... unblemished by the human hands... and if... and when... one were to come within the realm of the light/love/spirit of god one will find no victim can exist... no negative... no shadow... for none of these things can exist in the light of such pure love... impossible... only the purest of hearts could ever come close to surviving the touch of such undefiled... absolute... pure love... for one would have to be on a spiritual plateau equal to that of someone such as jesus...
it was the most awesome experience of my life... one i will never forget... yet i literally thought my heart would burst... just from briefly being in the presence of such pure love... i think that is why the body must die before we are able to return to our mothers heart...
the idea as i see it... is not to do gods job... but to humbly be the best servant we can possibly be... to give as much as we are able to give... in whatever capacity we are able to serve... to simply serve through love...
i've tried not to be so wordy... but somethings are near impossible to relate in words...
life is a cherished gift... and can only be lived in the timelessness of gods time which is in the eternity of "now"... in each breath... each heartbeat... one heartbeat at a time... but to tell the truth... how often do we notice the breath we take... or how often are we ever aware of our own heartbeat... so... in light of the above... perhaps awareness is the only way we can ever come within the realm of our heart... which proves to be far more precious than being the unaware captives of our 'ego'...
"it's a wonderful day in the neighborhood"...
lol...
;-)