Project Your Pal, Love
"My life amounts
to nothing more than one drop in a limitless ocean.
Yet what is any ocean
but a multitude of drops?"
-David Mitchell,
Clouds Atlas
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In the following paragraphs,
nothing you read will be new to you.
Nothing discussed will be a concept or an idea that hasn’t already been thoroughly explored by mankind. Everything I have written has been plagiarized
from the life I’ve experienced and yet like
any "unique idea", this plagiarism of the senses has been reorganized, redesigned, and
combined to give you a distinct viewpoint of what has always been and what
will always be. Marcel Proust once
remarked, “The real voyage of discovery is not in seeking new landscapes, but
in having new eyes*.” So on this literary journey ahead, continue with an open mind and a teachable spirit and you might finish having acquired new eyesight to what exists all around in your seemingly ordinary, everyday landscapes.
One early evening in Los Angeles, I was riding down
Hollywood Boulevard with friends, marveling at the sidewalks covered in endless stars with the
names of entertainment legends written inside. They seemed
almost to never end as our car dodged traffic down the busy street. A part of me wanted to see my handprints in a
star. A part of me wanted to see my name
written somewhere on the walk of fame.
Yet what is a name? A name is deep down just an organized and stylized arrangement of sounds or lines that represent your being. If that is all that we live for, then that is all we will ever be. We will be but a name. Maybe if we worked hard enough, and with some luck, over the course of our lives, we could be remembered in text or in motion picture footage, but we would nevertheless be contained to flat, lifeless screens or pages forever. What if there was a way we could live forever? What if we could be more than just a name? What if it took losing it all, to find out what life was bout? Would you accept that challenge?
What really struck me was that the names that zoomed by just outside of my window represented those who had made it and fully succeeded in their careers. These stars symbolized dreams coming true toward "eternal fame." But I wondered if these individuals would say the same. I couldn’t help but remember the quote by Ralph Waldo Emerson, “To be great, is to be misunderstood,” as the grounded stars kept whizzing by. The sidewalk stars seemed to be yearning to fly. They seemed to long to dance amongst the galaxies that they stared up at. They looked oh so lonely embedded motionless and separate from each other on the ground. Is this what it looks like to have gained the whole world and yet have lost your soul? Can life be more?
Yet what is a name? A name is deep down just an organized and stylized arrangement of sounds or lines that represent your being. If that is all that we live for, then that is all we will ever be. We will be but a name. Maybe if we worked hard enough, and with some luck, over the course of our lives, we could be remembered in text or in motion picture footage, but we would nevertheless be contained to flat, lifeless screens or pages forever. What if there was a way we could live forever? What if we could be more than just a name? What if it took losing it all, to find out what life was bout? Would you accept that challenge?
What really struck me was that the names that zoomed by just outside of my window represented those who had made it and fully succeeded in their careers. These stars symbolized dreams coming true toward "eternal fame." But I wondered if these individuals would say the same. I couldn’t help but remember the quote by Ralph Waldo Emerson, “To be great, is to be misunderstood,” as the grounded stars kept whizzing by. The sidewalk stars seemed to be yearning to fly. They seemed to long to dance amongst the galaxies that they stared up at. They looked oh so lonely embedded motionless and separate from each other on the ground. Is this what it looks like to have gained the whole world and yet have lost your soul? Can life be more?
Have we gone astray attempting to pretend that the
mortal can become immortal from this side of death? Have we traded our
love of lights, sounds and outward beauty for something far less tangible? Are we missing the point? For these stars, they had made it. They had succeeded in their careers at
advancing to the greatest depths of recognition.
Yet today they were but names on a sidewalk. Many of the names, I hadn’t even ever heard
of. No doubt they had made a lasting
footprint with their life in the history of mankind with their careers yet those of
the distant past I personally felt no connection to. I hadn’t seen them in a movie, heard
their songs, or laughed at their comedic performances. To me, they were just organized indentations in the
sidewalk. To me, they were just a
combination of letters to be pronounced.
What if we were born 300 or 400 years from now? Would we even care about the famous names and stars of today who we exalt in our heads? Perhaps it’s not that we wouldn’t care about them, but that they wouldn't be "alive" to us. We could marvel at their career accomplishments while we read, watched or listened to them but we couldn’t call them up on the phone and have a conversation. They wouldn't be physically living or breathing. We wouldn’t be able, no matter how hard we tried, to feel or know them anymore than we could a historical figure from the past through only revised records whom we've never met in life. The fog of time blurs the lines of reality and so much is lost.
Looking deep into the future it’s not hard to realize that trophies rust, awards are forgotten, records are broken and titles fade. It seems that even the brightest stars can dim and flicker out in the larger picture of the universe. That doesn't mean don't chase your dreams, pursue what you are longing for or even work relentlessly toward the hope of having your name one day written on the walk of fame. It is merely meant as a reminder, that it doesn't matter what your goals are or where life takes you, you can always live for more wherever you are. Life is what you make it. Maybe seeing isn't believing, but believing is seeing. Maybe you don't have to be a star to shine.
No matter how successful you become, your career or financial achievements are of lesser importance in comparison to the impact that you have left in the lives of others around you. Perhaps we will all realize one day that the big things of life, are really the small things that too often get lost and passed by in our daily routines. Perhaps instead of aiming to do big things with our own ordinary lives we should instead choose to do big things in the lives of those around us that we too often pass off as ordinary. You change the world each day you're alive through the choices you make. “Our lives are not our own. We are bound to others, past and present, and by each crime and every kindness, we birth our future,” wrote David Mitchell in his novel Cloud Atlas.
So why live for just ourselves if our lives aren't our own? Why are we so depressed as a species? Is it surprising when we always focus on our wants, needs and individual lives? Not at all, in fact I believe that one of the best ways to help yourself with any issue that you may be struggling with is to help out others with theirs. You are not alone in your struggles. The very spot in your life where you struggle the most and are the weakest, is the exact same spot in your life that has the most potential for growth and strength.
Perhaps every tragedy and bump in the road humbles us to give us the necessary wisdom and strength to help someone else out who's stuck and struggling in almost the exact situation. With each breath of life, we remain in this life together. Maybe everything in your life has lead you to this very moment. To a choice. To a crossroad. There is a world out there waiting for your help. There is a world out there waiting for your arrival. There is a world out there longing for you to become a superhero.
What if we were born 300 or 400 years from now? Would we even care about the famous names and stars of today who we exalt in our heads? Perhaps it’s not that we wouldn’t care about them, but that they wouldn't be "alive" to us. We could marvel at their career accomplishments while we read, watched or listened to them but we couldn’t call them up on the phone and have a conversation. They wouldn't be physically living or breathing. We wouldn’t be able, no matter how hard we tried, to feel or know them anymore than we could a historical figure from the past through only revised records whom we've never met in life. The fog of time blurs the lines of reality and so much is lost.
Looking deep into the future it’s not hard to realize that trophies rust, awards are forgotten, records are broken and titles fade. It seems that even the brightest stars can dim and flicker out in the larger picture of the universe. That doesn't mean don't chase your dreams, pursue what you are longing for or even work relentlessly toward the hope of having your name one day written on the walk of fame. It is merely meant as a reminder, that it doesn't matter what your goals are or where life takes you, you can always live for more wherever you are. Life is what you make it. Maybe seeing isn't believing, but believing is seeing. Maybe you don't have to be a star to shine.
No matter how successful you become, your career or financial achievements are of lesser importance in comparison to the impact that you have left in the lives of others around you. Perhaps we will all realize one day that the big things of life, are really the small things that too often get lost and passed by in our daily routines. Perhaps instead of aiming to do big things with our own ordinary lives we should instead choose to do big things in the lives of those around us that we too often pass off as ordinary. You change the world each day you're alive through the choices you make. “Our lives are not our own. We are bound to others, past and present, and by each crime and every kindness, we birth our future,” wrote David Mitchell in his novel Cloud Atlas.
So why live for just ourselves if our lives aren't our own? Why are we so depressed as a species? Is it surprising when we always focus on our wants, needs and individual lives? Not at all, in fact I believe that one of the best ways to help yourself with any issue that you may be struggling with is to help out others with theirs. You are not alone in your struggles. The very spot in your life where you struggle the most and are the weakest, is the exact same spot in your life that has the most potential for growth and strength.
Perhaps every tragedy and bump in the road humbles us to give us the necessary wisdom and strength to help someone else out who's stuck and struggling in almost the exact situation. With each breath of life, we remain in this life together. Maybe everything in your life has lead you to this very moment. To a choice. To a crossroad. There is a world out there waiting for your help. There is a world out there waiting for your arrival. There is a world out there longing for you to become a superhero.
Call
me crazy, but I don’t want to die. I don't want to ever disappear from existence in this world. And I don't think that we have to. Call
me crazy but I want people hundred years from now to know, feel and see part of me just
as much as those do around me now. Would
you think I was insane if I told you that I believe there is a way to do just that? What if it meant taking the hard road? What if it meant not obtaining instant
gratification? What if it meant fighting to attach yourself an idea? "Ideas do not bleed. They do not feel pain. Ideas do not die. Ideas are bulletproof**."
Ideas have always been and will always be. So I thought to myself, what if there was some way that we could become an idea? What if we lived our lives and made choices to attach ourselves to something that will never perish and that will supersede death? What if we lived our lives for an ideal that will always be felt and seen throughout the world with any type of person, in any culture and at any time? What if we could live to actually become and be seen as Love in the lives of others?
First, what exactly is Love?
Love is so difficult. It goes against our very nature. Love strips away other's pride down to the raw bone. This exposure painfully sears and hurts and often produces a reciprocal reaction. Love, to others, can feel like a sudden opening of blinds on a sunny day for someone far too comfortable in a darkened room. Love exposes mankind's true nature which we all deep down deny.
Love doesn't guarantee earthly glory. It doesn't promise your choice will be noticed by any soul. It doesn't promise your sacrifice will one day birth an etched star in the ground. In fact, it promises nothing. But yet Love is always the right choice. Love will not only expose and burn but it will wholly cleanse. Love creates change. It reverses course. It gives sight. It's a whisper of hope. It's a spark. It's where bridges form. It's the connection between reality and eternity. It is perfection. And yet nothing about Love is easy. Love can be fatal. Love exists each day in ordinary moments lived out
through ordinary people turned extraordinary simply by a choice of self sacrifice
expressed as Love.
I believe that when you see Love, you can see billions of moments of lives inside of it. You may not know their names. You may not know what they look like or what they exactly did. But you know part of them far better than anyone else, for to you they are alive, in the 'ocean' of Love. You can feel them in that sea of infinite depth connected by all of the moments of Love, where eternity appeared in the life. Love has but one true identity, but can be seen in the opportunity that each of us are given that free will births in the context of history in multitudes of disguises.
I believe that when you see Love, you can see billions of moments of lives inside of it. You may not know their names. You may not know what they look like or what they exactly did. But you know part of them far better than anyone else, for to you they are alive, in the 'ocean' of Love. You can feel them in that sea of infinite depth connected by all of the moments of Love, where eternity appeared in the life. Love has but one true identity, but can be seen in the opportunity that each of us are given that free will births in the context of history in multitudes of disguises.
There is no better identity of Love than to describe it as the very essence of who God is (1 John 4:8). God is Love. And Love is God. And there is no greater Love than Christ's atoning sacrifice for our sins on the cross (John 15:13). To be hated, shunned and mocked by enemies but yet to reach out your hands and be nailed to a cross and be killed for those very same foes, is true Love. There is no greater example, a perfect sacrifice unmatched in all of time. One that takes the breath away.
But while this depth of Love itself is unfathomable, how can you become this type of unimaginable Love to others and to be in union with it? How can you play a small part in the bigger picture of the universe? How can you attach yourself to an idea? That’s an intriguing idea but no doubt abstract and far-fetched. Or at least that's what I first I believed. But with lots of dedication and brainstorming, for me and you, with Project ‘Your Pal, Love’ I believe it is quite more than possible.
If
you’re honest, chances are you aren’t completely satisfied and happy with who you
are. Am I mind reader? Do I know you better than others? Not in the slightest, it’s just that deep down we are all the same. Strip away our experiences both learned from nature and nurture and we are but the same. Human. Uniquely different, each like a snowflake, and yet our genetic makeup is only different by at most .1%.
We all wear our insecurities wherever we go. They are the masks that we put on when we step out the front door. They are the fake smiles and arrogant, overconfident attitudes. It’s the makeup that we cake our faces with, the bodies we trim down and the muscles that we build up. It's seen in the shallow, money and sex-driven music that we bob our heads to. It's the constant status updates, smiling selfies and social media newsfeed overloads. It’s the sporty cars that we drive and it’s the need inside to put down others. We are all trying to convince ourselves to love who we are, exactly how we are. Too often it feels like we are putting on an act in the Broadway show of our life, trying to convince our audience that behind the curtain everything is as it seems under the bright lights scene by scene.
I want to propose a radical idea that each one of us is just as insecure as the next, yet we express so in different ways. Some of us constantly need someone to love us because we find it so hard to do it ourselves. Some of us need to be praised and commended as better than others to feel as though we have worth. While still others find their value entirely from the body that they are enclosed in, or in the money that they flaunt throughout their lifestyle. We try to escape our underlying reality of who we know we are by finding a habit for false comfort, whether that vice be drinking, porn, abuse, addiction, smoking, etc.
Maybe we are just distracting ourselves from the root of the issue, the issue of our need to learn how to love ourselves. And for me even though I still have mountains to climb, I have come so far in learning how to love myself through the empowering strength of Love itself. To me it is no surprise that we aren't completely satisfied with who we are. Why? Because we are broken. We are corrupt at our core. We are hurting. We are yearning for more. We have a void in our soul not yet filled. Life leaves us at times confused and often feeling empty. Life is a beautiful mystery. Never should one trust another who claims to have life figured it out. We aren't home and we have yet to break clean upon the shores of salvation.
I
started Project ‘Your Pal, Love’ for myself to attempt the
impossible. A project with an underlying
mission for myself to learn how to love exactly who I am. I am not the tallest nor strongest in the world. I am not the loudest nor the life of any party. I am not the bravest nor the most courageous. I am not the most athletic or most talented in any particular skill. I am gay and have faced internal battles that no man should ever have to fight in their darkest of nightmares. But while all of these are true, I wanted to learn how to love myself exactly as I am, while still pursuing God's will for progress toward sanctification.
Nothing in life has meaning. And yet at the very same time, everything does. It all just depends on you. This project started out simple. It started with making hearts. A universal symbol of love. A superhero symbol that I hope one day others would join me in using. I wanted to use a symbol that could be easily recognized by the world and one that represented what the core of this project is all about, the heart. "Symbols are given power by people. Alone a symbol is meaningless but with enough people, they can change the world**." And while at this moment, my symbol just may have just infinite, personal meaning to me, I know that with the power of enough people, it could transform this world from the inside, out.
I had no idea where this project would lead me. I had no idea if anyone else would ever see this project the same as me and give meaning to this heart symbol. I didn’t know if it would work for myself but I had to try to fight my depression somehow. So often, I can easily find what I don’t like about myself whether that be a physical, mental, sexual, spiritual, or a personality attribute yet I can find it so difficult and nearly impossible to find what I love about myself. And so I started out on a journey to fight to learn how to see the world anew, beginning with a simple project. A project for myself. A project for you. A project for the world.
Nothing in life has meaning. And yet at the very same time, everything does. It all just depends on you. This project started out simple. It started with making hearts. A universal symbol of love. A superhero symbol that I hope one day others would join me in using. I wanted to use a symbol that could be easily recognized by the world and one that represented what the core of this project is all about, the heart. "Symbols are given power by people. Alone a symbol is meaningless but with enough people, they can change the world**." And while at this moment, my symbol just may have just infinite, personal meaning to me, I know that with the power of enough people, it could transform this world from the inside, out.
I had no idea where this project would lead me. I had no idea if anyone else would ever see this project the same as me and give meaning to this heart symbol. I didn’t know if it would work for myself but I had to try to fight my depression somehow. So often, I can easily find what I don’t like about myself whether that be a physical, mental, sexual, spiritual, or a personality attribute yet I can find it so difficult and nearly impossible to find what I love about myself. And so I started out on a journey to fight to learn how to see the world anew, beginning with a simple project. A project for myself. A project for you. A project for the world.
[The trademark heart is a very specific heart with no curved lines,
which when rearranged can make a Y, P,
and L.
The "Your Pal, Love" heart felt as if it was meant to be.]
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What
is Project ‘Your Pal, Love’? Well, its mission is to
inspire the world to carry out anonymous acts of kindness for others under the alias
‘Your Pal, Love’, attaching to Love's beauty and living forever in its eternity.
For example, let’s say your
neighbor is going away on vacation for a week and you know that they always
work extremely hard on their lawn. You could cut their lawn,
pull out some weeds, and who knows even water their dying plants. But instead of letting them know that you did
that act of kindness, you could just leave a note "Don't be a lawn ranger, pass on the kindness to another! Hope you enjoyed your trip! From Your Pal,
Love."
Let’s say you are walking through
a local park and you see a homeless person huddled covered in blankets in the
bitter cold. You could take off your
sweatshirt (you have four other sweatshirts back at your place) and leave it
by them to find when they wake up with a note "Hope this helps to keep warm. Your Pal, Love."
Why? Become an idea? Attach to Love? These are but abstract thoughts and dreams, yet "Your Pal, Love" makes this very abstract idea come to fruition. To that neighbor or to that homeless person, you became love. They don't know who did it. They don't necessarily know why someone did it. They only know that someone anonymously going by the name of ‘Love’ left them a sweatshirt or mowed their lawn. To them, you actually became "their pal, Love." You attached yourself for that very moment to an idea that will exist for all of eternity. And if enough of us all become "your pal, love" we will all be but an idea to those who our anonymous acts reached. We will become undistinguishable. Hiding behind a perfect mystery. There will be no limits or bounds on the impact each selfless act can make in the chain reactions set off by time itself. Simply live a life of Love, and forever a part of you will be seen in Love.
Why? Become an idea? Attach to Love? These are but abstract thoughts and dreams, yet "Your Pal, Love" makes this very abstract idea come to fruition. To that neighbor or to that homeless person, you became love. They don't know who did it. They don't necessarily know why someone did it. They only know that someone anonymously going by the name of ‘Love’ left them a sweatshirt or mowed their lawn. To them, you actually became "their pal, Love." You attached yourself for that very moment to an idea that will exist for all of eternity. And if enough of us all become "your pal, love" we will all be but an idea to those who our anonymous acts reached. We will become undistinguishable. Hiding behind a perfect mystery. There will be no limits or bounds on the impact each selfless act can make in the chain reactions set off by time itself. Simply live a life of Love, and forever a part of you will be seen in Love.
How does this help with learning how to love who I am? How does this change what I am insecure about or how I look at myself? How can this help you look in the mirror and smile with contentment? Each distinct moment you do an act of kindness under the alias ‘Your Pal, Love’ (or just an everyday act of kindness without the alias) write it down in a journal that only you
read. When you are feeling insecure or hopeless, page
through the journal. Look at all that
Love has been able to do through you. Look with wondrous eyes at what God has been able to accomplish using you. That is Him existing within you. That same Love that has broken the very bounds of death itself others can see when they see you. Love of infinite value.
I am often still insecure in who I am, or what I look like, but in Love I have found enough security to last me for eternity. I am confident in what I stand for. And in what I hope to show the world. I am not shy in Love. I am not scared in Love. It gives me strength when I am weak. It gives me hope when I am surrounded by the shadows of despair. It gives me confidence to do what is impossible. To become something more. To reach out to others in need. To humble myself to let God work through me. To learn to love myself for who I am. To become, in the end, my very own pal, Love.
I am often still insecure in who I am, or what I look like, but in Love I have found enough security to last me for eternity. I am confident in what I stand for. And in what I hope to show the world. I am not shy in Love. I am not scared in Love. It gives me strength when I am weak. It gives me hope when I am surrounded by the shadows of despair. It gives me confidence to do what is impossible. To become something more. To reach out to others in need. To humble myself to let God work through me. To learn to love myself for who I am. To become, in the end, my very own pal, Love.
I’ve created over 1,300 hearts using nearly anything I could get my hands on (Check them some of them out: Instagram user: @yourpalsean, www.instagram.com/yourpalsean). It may have started out as just a fun little project but it has turned into a way hopefully to get the world’s attention. By making hearts, the fun of looking for new ways to do so kept my mind busy and off of my issues effectively. It burned off some of my seemingly endless amounts of creativity and helped me fight off depression.
Making hearts out of ordinary everyday objects is symbolic and representative of this project as a whole. Love can be found everywhere, even when at first you don’t recognize it or think it can be formed. Love is discovered in the everyday routine and common. Love needs only life to exist as it breathes alive from the willingness of a being to humble oneself. It spreads rapidly like a raging wildfire and can demolish entire fortresses of false pride in mere seconds. But while I see “Your Pal, Love” from a certain point of view, this project can, should and will have different meanings to each individual. We each have a different perspective in life and this project is as much yours as it is mine. The more we take the time to see life through the eyes of other’s we will realize that we are far more similar than we pretend not to be.
Love bonds us behind the surface and beyond our sight. It is the very pulse that keeps us alive and moving forward. The heart cannot be understated as of importance to Love. It may seem like quite an obsessive amount of hearts so far created for the project, but that is the very point. There exists no potential for too much Love in this world.
I want others to think I’m crazy. I want others to question me. I want others to ask me...why? I want to captivate the attention of others in a world of ever shortening attention spans and use their intrigue to share the vision of this project with them. For this is your project if you so choose.
Why make hearts? Outside of the fact that they are the most recognizable shape that represents Love in the world, I believe that the heart is what God is really after. Too often we play God and judge others. Too often we become prideful in our own good deeds. Sometimes it's harder to step aside and just let God do his job. To let Him transform us from the inside out and let Love branch out into the lives that surround us.
‘Your Pal, Love’ is really all about working on the condition of what your heart is after. If you think about it, all actions have an intent that is only between yourself and God. Choices that look good from the outside can be done for the wrong reason (Matthew 6:1-6), and decisions that seem wrong to others can be done for the right reason (John 12:1-8). What makes all the difference is at the root of the choice; the honest intent, concealed beneath in the heart.
To perform acts of kindness
anonymously, you are keeping your heart and pride in check. The acts of kindness that you perform are between
you and God. Sure, you get that great
feeling of doing the right thing, but there is something even more meaningful
and pure when you do good….for the sake of doing good (Matthew 6:6). Frank A. Clark once said, "Real generosity is doing something nice for
someone who’ll never find out."
I believe true superheroes are those who do good not to be celebrated or praised by others for their acts of courage, strength, bravery, sacrifice and love. God is longing for hearts that are after Himself. God is longing for
hearts that are after Love itself. For
this reason the focus of this project is both my heart and yours.
In lots of ways,
we as a human species have had a reckless, terrible past.
One that comes back in our deepest and darkest of nightmares. And yet it seems we are still fighting the same battles today just on different fronts. We have justified slavery by
God. We have suppressed and abused LGBT
individuals in the name of God. We have
lead crusades killing thousands in the name of Christ. We have used God's word to preach that women should remain submissive at all times to their husbands.
It may come across that I am 'attacking' Christianity but honestly I am just pointing out that even followers of Christ can be tricked, persuaded, and sidetracked from what Christ really stood for. Any religion can be perverted by mankind for it's own deep desires sometimes disguised as righteous intent sometimes almost seemingly subconsciously. I, however, am not in anyway passing judgment for God alone has the authority to judge. We need a common denominator to expose the truth and that's where Love comes in.
So where do we as humanity go from here? Are we finally going to learn? Are we finally going to evolve with our decisions? Or are we endlessly going to allow history to repeat itself never taking the time to look outside of our own point of views? Are we going to allow our differing perspectives and how they are perceived be the decider of what is right and wrong? Are we going to trust our 'gut' instinct, knowing that we have a broken, fallen and wicked nature within?
So where do we as humanity go from here? Are we finally going to learn? Are we finally going to evolve with our decisions? Or are we endlessly going to allow history to repeat itself never taking the time to look outside of our own point of views? Are we going to allow our differing perspectives and how they are perceived be the decider of what is right and wrong? Are we going to trust our 'gut' instinct, knowing that we have a broken, fallen and wicked nature within?
Remember the good old days of working on algebra problems? Let's just revisit them for a second. After finding what we thought was the correct solution for X, we then ‘checked’ our answer by plugging the
value(s) that we found back into the original equation to see if it all worked out. If it did, then we could rest assured that we made the right calculations but if it was didn't then our hand's palm made friends with our forehead as we endlessly searched back through our work for where we went wrong. I look at Love that same way. We can 'check' our opinions, decisions and actions with Love's. Is Love at work when African Americans are
enslaved, abused and discriminated against? No. Is Love at work when LGBT individuals have to
cry themselves to sleep and punish themselves for something they never
chose? No. Is Love at work when we kill and destroy the
families of thousands through wars and crusades in the name of Christ? No. If a decision is not aligned with Love, then simply it's not aligned with God.
It’s time that we see past the issues and look at the bigger story of life. It’s time that we take the time to check our choices and opinions with what Love would want and do. It’s time that we get on the right path, onto Love's road. Love is for all. No matter your gender, nationality, religion, culture, sexual orientation, height, weight, athleticism, intelligence or personality. Love favors no man. Love is the way, the truth and the life. Love saves. Love erases. Love wins. And Love never fails.
It’s time that we see past the issues and look at the bigger story of life. It’s time that we take the time to check our choices and opinions with what Love would want and do. It’s time that we get on the right path, onto Love's road. Love is for all. No matter your gender, nationality, religion, culture, sexual orientation, height, weight, athleticism, intelligence or personality. Love favors no man. Love is the way, the truth and the life. Love saves. Love erases. Love wins. And Love never fails.
While
so many in life are fighting to create a name for themselves to always be
remembered by, I want to be fighting to lose my name. I simply want it erased and to only be seen in the distant future in the ocean
of love. Whether it’s an email, letter,
card or note I sign everything "Your Pal, Sean." Why? I
want my name "Sean" to become synonymous with ‘Love’ to others. And I hope that others, maybe even yourself, see it the same
way. Whether you're "Your Pal, Monica" or "Your
Pal, Anisha" or "Your Pal, Jesse" we can all be seen and felt as "Your Pal, Love" when we all share the same alias. In my everyday life, I'm "Your Pal, Sean" but when no one knows I am also apart of becoming "Your Pal, Love". It’s like being
able to sign as our individual selves in our everyday lives yet also able to become a massive chain together of undercover superheroes across the globe when doing acts of kindness under our shared alias "Your Pal, Love."
I put my
trust, faith and hope in it, knowing that God is Love. Love can break all boundaries and transform the very hardest of hearts. Through faith in Christ's sacrifice and by picking up and carrying our cross, salvation can be found. I know that while I'm broken and at my core is sin, yet I have complete faith that I will one day break clean in the ocean of Love. Those who chose a life of Love will wash ashore of eternity. Love has shattered the finite-ness that death has tried to bring. The potential that after the last breath that another can begin. Love will never cease.
When I die, I wish to be cremated and cast into the ocean. Why? Symbolism. Because I don’t want to be remembered as a gravestone. I don’t want to be remembered as gone. For part of me is never going to die. We all live in the ideals that we lived for, forever. I want to be remembered in those moments where I was love to others. Those moments when I went out of my way to make a personal sacrifice for their betterment. Those moments where Love made me something more. Those moments where I got the privilege of embodying an ideal. Those moments where I didn't put myself first but saw a need and fulfilled it with God himself. With Love.
My flesh will disappear so I don't put my faith in it but in what is to come in the afterlife. How did I come about looking at and illustrating love existing as an endless and bountiful sea? This visual was brought about by Owl City’s "How I Became the Sea" and then later I was moved by Switchfoot's "Saltwater Heart" to sketch more of this illustration of washing upon eternity's shore. Waves are created with the energy that is drawn from the wind blowing against the ocean surface. As faith has been described like the wind as it is never seen but it's effects are felt, this same force can create an energy that pushes us forward into the afterlife. I believe that we can one day break clean crashing anew, from the ocean of Love and wash ashore of salvation for eternity.
When I die, I wish to be cremated and cast into the ocean. Why? Symbolism. Because I don’t want to be remembered as a gravestone. I don’t want to be remembered as gone. For part of me is never going to die. We all live in the ideals that we lived for, forever. I want to be remembered in those moments where I was love to others. Those moments when I went out of my way to make a personal sacrifice for their betterment. Those moments where Love made me something more. Those moments where I got the privilege of embodying an ideal. Those moments where I didn't put myself first but saw a need and fulfilled it with God himself. With Love.
My flesh will disappear so I don't put my faith in it but in what is to come in the afterlife. How did I come about looking at and illustrating love existing as an endless and bountiful sea? This visual was brought about by Owl City’s "How I Became the Sea" and then later I was moved by Switchfoot's "Saltwater Heart" to sketch more of this illustration of washing upon eternity's shore. Waves are created with the energy that is drawn from the wind blowing against the ocean surface. As faith has been described like the wind as it is never seen but it's effects are felt, this same force can create an energy that pushes us forward into the afterlife. I believe that we can one day break clean crashing anew, from the ocean of Love and wash ashore of salvation for eternity.
While not all of us can be seen as "stars" of society, worshipped by adorning fans, I firmly believe that hundreds of years from
now people can still know you and I after our short time on earth is up. Not physically. Not in a name. But forever we can be seen in the ocean of
Love that we can choose to live fighting to become.
Do big things in
your routine everyday life that too often numbs us to sleep. Put on that invisible superhero cape behind
you and unite behind the fullness of Love itself. Grab a set of new eyes to look at the
wonderful world around you. Embrace a symbol
and become an idea. Lend a hand to those
who need one and look for those who need a friend. Let your pride wash away and go out of your way to give until you can give
no more. Love is hard. Love until your heart hurts.
You are
beautiful just the way you have been created.
Let your insecurities of who you are slip through your fingers, and
grasp tightly to the infinite value that Love brings when it works through
you. Relish its beauty. Marvel at its perfection. "Feel like you’ve never felt. See how you’ve never seen. Seek how you've never been able to seek
before.**" Join the billions of
lives of the past who live in those moments of sacrifice for others.
What is life
without Love? And what is Love without
life? These simple questions beg to be
answered in the choices that you make each moment everyday. Time is but an outstretched arm inviting
choice. A choice to choose Love and
life.
A choice to become...
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I invite you to join me in becoming "Your Pal, Love"
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SEA.
“We’re on your shore again
I can feel the ocean
I can feel your open arms.”
I can feel the ocean
I can feel your open arms.”
-Switchfoot, Saltwater Heart
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PROJECT YOUR PAL, LOVE
Can you SEA it?
j
Now it's your turn, let's SEA what types of hearts you make!
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Use Hashtags:
#ProjectYourPalLove #YourPalLove #YPL
[1 John 4]
DISCLAIMER:
[It is important to remember that 'Project Your Pal, Love' is a philosophy not a religion, and ideology not theology. This Project was not created to be a substitute for a relationship with Christ or to support the notion that 'Love is the only truth.' It is rather to provide an abstract perspective of salvation that I hope sparks creativity in minds and brings others together in the realization that while we often stare and point out our differences, beyond the surface, we all have a same void in our life that only God can fill through Love.]
The cross is the true symbol of Love.
Never forget God's grace for mankind through the sacrifice of Christ,
the ultimate display of Love and the atonement of our sin and ugly human nature [1 John 4:10].
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*"A pair of wings, a different respiratory system, which
enabled us to travel through space, would in no way help us, for if we visited
Mars or Venus while keeping the same senses, they would clothe everything we
could see in the same aspect as the things of the Earth. The only true voyage,
the only bath in the Fountain of Youth, would be not to visit strange lands but
to possess other eyes, to see the universe through the eyes of another, of a
hundred others, to see the hundred universes that each of them sees, that each
of them is; and this we do, with great artists; with artists like these we do
really fly from star to star." –Marcel Proust, La Prisonniere
**V for Vendetta (2006).
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