I wanted to share an inspirational story of love that stemmed from what seemed like a hopeless situation. That love is possible if you just open up your eyes and give it a chance. When I heard this story of a journey towards love, I had to share it with my readers. Many of us have found ourselves in very hopeless situations and we lose all belief that anything good, especially love, can happen for us. This story demonstrates how seemingly hopeless situations CAN result in lasting love that defies all understanding. Enjoy!

A Journey Towards Love

When people look at my partner Alberto and me, they often say, “You guys are so lucky to have found each other. You have no idea how hard it is to find someone these days.”

We have now been together for fifteen years. We have gone through the trials of every relationship, including parenthood. What people don’t know, perhaps, is the story of how we met.

Ours was never a romantic love…not in the beginning anyways.

We met when each of us was on a personal journey of self-exploration, self-knowing and above all, self-love. We were determined to stay away from romantic entanglements because we knew how distracting they were and how far they can pull you away from your own inner quest.

When we met as pilgrims and began our 5000-km walk from Rome to Jerusalem, we were companions on this path of inner exploration. No one believed we weren’t romantically involved, which is why we always learned how to say the word ‘only friends’ in the language of every country we walked through!

There was no attraction then since our focus was very much on what the journey was revealing to us about ourselves; what every encounter was teaching us; what every argument between us was bringing to the surface to be healed. We looked at EVERYTHING that happened on that journey as an initiation: a shedding of the old, and an emergence into that part of ourselves that was grounded in love, compassion, wisdom.

We walked in this way for six months, until we arrived in Greece. By then, we had experienced so much, lived through so many intense moments. We had already been rejected more than once when asking for shelter. We had already separated and walked apart for forty days. We had already broken down and rebuilt ourselves a hundred times over. We were each standing more confidently in who we were as individuals and what we believed about ourselves and our world – even when we still disagreed on some things.

The romantic shift happened unexpectedly when the masks we were wearing finally fell; and they fell because we had each been insistently peeling back our personal layers of fears, judgments, and shame. When you commit to shedding those layers that no longer serve you, EVERY aspect is brought forth.

And now it was time to examine our understanding of what it means to be in a relationship.

• How do you remain loyal to who you are and your beliefs when you are with someone?
• How do you walk your own path, while still sharing it with the one you love?
• How do you continue sharing the path, while remaining anchored in your own journey?
• How do you continue the journey of self-love, when your disagreements threaten the fabric of your relationship?
• How do you continue believing in love, despite the hurt we inevitably caused each other?

These are the questions that our relationship allowed us to explore, and which we continue to explore to this very day.

This is the opportunity for personal growth that Love offers us. This is the infinite gift of relationship.

It’s been said before, but remains a great truth: we found Love when we stopped looking for it “out there”, and began seeking it and honoring it in ourselves.

Love of self, anchors our relationship.
Love for the other, gives it wings.

Mony Dojeiji is the international award-winning co-author of “Walking for Peace, an inner journey”, chronicling her 5000-km, 13-country, 13-month walk for peace from Rome to Jerusalem with now-husband Alberto Agraso. To learn more about their walk and their many publications, visit their website walkingforpeace.com, or look for them on Facebook and Twitter.