Years ago, a very dear friend shared a poem she’d written for her sister. “It reminds me of you,” she said, commenting on my tendency to be tenacious, to seldom give up and to keep growing, even in the midst of trauma and turmoil.

Her poem lead to the title of my book, “The Dandelion Spirit.” — It’s the true life fairytale of falling into love with a man I thought was Prince Charming only to awaken on the road to hell, dancing with the Prince of Darkness. By the end of that journey, I had given up on me, given up on my life and even given up on my life with my daughters. It took a big miracle (it included a blue and white police car) and then many, many every day miracles for me to grow out of that darkness to live the life of my dreams today. This beautiful life where I am totally in love with me, myself and I and everyone in my world. And btw, being in love with me, myself and I means loving that woman who got so lost on the road to hell, she deserted her daughters and wanted to end her own life every day.

But, back to dandelions…

I love dandelions. I think they get a bad rap.

Accused of being weeds. Torn out of the gound by their roots. Poisoned. Mowed over. Cemented over. And still, they grow. Up through the cracks. In wild places. In backyards. No matter what we do to them, dandelions persevere. Because, for the dandelion, there is only one thing to do. To fly free with the wind and plant themselves wherever they land.

Like Love.

No matter how hard we try to deny its presence, or ignore its call for us to let down our guard, step out from behind our walls, Love perseveres. In the darkness. In the light. At the edges of our sorrow, and in the depths of our grief, Love is always there, as radiant as sunshine hiding behind grey clouds.

And though we may yell and scream at it for stealing away the ones we love or for piercing our hearts in what feels like all the wrong places, Love never screams back. It simply keeps on flowing and calling us to fly free of the hurts and pains of life’s journey so that we can dance in the sunlight of our own radiance and be our own unique expression of Love.

May we all be like the dandelion and fly free on the wind’s of Love to dance on moonbeams and sunstreaks streaming in through the open windows of our heart.

Namaste.