Mary - The Best Possible Wedding Gift: Waking Up Together

THE BEST POSSIBLE
WEDDING GIFT

Waking Up Together

MARY & AUSTIN HENNESSEY

The Ultimate Guide for Successful Relationship

Copyright 2004 Austin & Mary Hennessey.

All rights reserved. No part of this publication may be reproduced, stored in a
retrieval system, or transmitted, in any form or by any means, electronic,
mechanical, photocopying, recording, or otherwise, without the written prior
permission of the author.

Note for Librarians: a cataloguing record for this book that includes Dewey Decimal
Classification and US Library of Congress numbers is available from the Library
and Archives of Canada. The complete cataloguing record can be obtained from
their online database at:
www.collectionscanada.ca/amicus/indexe.html
ISBN 14120-3777-8

The examples of couples cited in this book are real; the names and circumstances
have been changed to protect their anonymity and confidentiality.

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Contents

This book is dedicated with boundless love and gratitude to our daughter Jacinta whose unwavering love and fierce loyalty are only enhanced by her generosity of spirit.

From the moment you knocked on the door of our hearts, we knew you were a gift from heaven.

This book is a culmination of forty years of shared living, loving and learning. There are many visionaries and teachers who have had a profound influence on our thinking. Some of these special individuals helped stretch our thinking, woke us up, to such a degree that they irreversibly changed our perceptions of ourselves, the nature of the human experience, and the universe we live in. By helping us and others to appreciate the limitless boundaries of human and spiritual transformation (especially with regard to love), these seers have helped to pave the way before us. Their names are mentioned in the preface. To them we owe our heartfelt gratitude.

We wish to thank our parents, our first teachers of love. They set us on the path and have since gone to other dimensions to further explore the mysteries of love.

We especially appreciate our daughter Jacinta and son-in-law Daniel whose immense support and sense of humor have lifted our spirits through the tough times and who have wholeheartedly shared in our joys. Their belief in, and enthusiasm for this project inspired us to stay on focus.

Mary expresses her love and gratitude to her soul sister, Brigid, for the journey of love and healing they have shared together and for her unwavering support for our work.

To Mia Lupton at Millennia Graphics, we thank her for a magnificent job with the cover and layout. Her esthetic sense interpreted our fledgling ideas beautifully, and through it all she was both patient and gracious.

No book would ever see the light of day without a skilled editor. Our heartfelt thanks go to our editor Ann Westlake for being gentle and incisive, encouraging and timely.

We are deeply grateful to Bruce Batchelor for his insight in establishing Trafford Publishing. His courage and ingenuity are a gift to writers. We are indebted to Angela Aidoo, publishing consultant, for her gentle persistence and for the many ways she has facilitated our initiation into the world of publishing. To all the staff at Trafford, thank you for transforming this manuscript into book form.

We will be forever grateful to our many friends who have steadfastly believed in us and supported our work. They include: Pascal and Cathie Menezes, Dave and Louise Inchauspe, Dave and Liz Krise, Karin and Daniel Lannigan, Nancy Frasu, Chris Saladen and Gary Edighoffer, Don and Donna Rockstrom, Chavanna King, Michael and Mary Maughan, Larry and Katherine Sandrin, Lynda Mackie, Richard and Nancy Mackie, Jo-Anne Evans, Rob Barrett and Diana McFarlane, Les & Annabelle Trask, and Gordon Bryenton. Mark Mays and Al Turtle deserve our sincere gratitude for sharing their clarity and wisdom.

To all those who attend our lectures, we extend our sincere appreciation. They consistently afford us the opportunity to share the vital message of authentic living.

To the many couples who have shared their lives and loves with us, we treasure their dreams and aspirations for a deeper experience of heartfelt relationship. We thank them for trusting the ideas expressed in this book and for proving their effectiveness. We are extremely grateful for their enthusiasm and feedback.

In conclusion, we thank you for letting us share with you the life-changing message of awakened relationships. May each of us awaken from our spiritual sleep and become conscious of our precious relationship with each other and with Life.

Come, my beloved, and let s agree, you and I, that the societal conventions of guarded hearts, tight-reined emotions, swallowed words, and the need to be right, or perfect, can be waived between our hearts.

I want to experience this freedom with at least one other person-and that person is you. Can you agree to suspend the hardness and rigidity of society s expectations and come play with me in the garden of love s fullness?

What would you bring to that garden, my love? Bring your playful self; the part of you that likes to frolic, laugh and have fun; that part of you that can drop convention as naturally as you dropped yesterday s clothes. Leave your mask of expectation and pretense behind and show yourself to me in all your splendor. And I will do the same for you.

Together, let us explore other worlds, where intimate togetherness consumes us, where time is suspended so we can do everything we ve ever dreamed we would. Satiated with love s unrestricted bounty, we embrace each other purely as love s gift. Come with me and let s drink from love s delectable well of openness, truth and unmitigated trust. For here we are free of pretense, striving, resistance, hiding and bewilderment.

Come now and laugh in wondrous joy and marvel at love s expansiveness. So much more to see and experience; rejoice, my beloved, and know that here you are safe and secure from the ravages of love s afflictions. Your heart needs no armor, no moats or walls, for you are protected by your own strength and loveliness. In this chamber of shared love we can discover the strength of vulnerability, the pure forgiveness of yesterday s follies and the open embrace of love s promises.