What challenges have you faced in life which could not be overcome with love as the catalyst? True love is impermeable, inextinguishable, inexplicable, and yet innate in all of us.
Like the sun which always shines, gives hope, provides light and life to all of us. Sometimes it can be obscured, forsaken, and even denied. And yet know it deep in your hearts that it is always present, always attainable, always available and always the starting point.
We most often think of love as something to be given or perhaps received from others, though perhaps the most important representation to get comfortable with first, is loving yourself.
You yourself, as much as anybody in the entire universe, deserve your love and affection.
~Buddha
Acknowledge that you are a person worthy of real love and you need do nothing to prove that, your existence is enough.
Empower your self-worth by connecting first with self-compassion, learn to love yourself again, and feel the warmth in your heart start to return. As it radiates out this naturally transforms into compassion for others and begins to show up in your words, thoughts, and actions. This kindness you wish to promote, to share, and equally to experience, will then direct your energy and intentions.
Model the behaviour.
Be the example.
The nature of the truSELF is to be an instrument of divine LOVE.
~Radhanath Swami
When we contemplate spirituality and its many teachings, we find one unassailable truth. At its essence, its truest purpose is to awaken that Love within each of us. The collective reverberations of this unity consciousness transcend all boundaries and remind each of us, with absolute certainty, that we are all one.
“Love is a complicated thing…” (any number of trite greetings cards/old movies/sitcoms…)
Perhaps the reason we tend to get all bent out of shape about using the word Love is that we simply have one all-encompassing word whereas in Ancient Greece (EROS, PHILIA, LUDUS, AGAPE, PRAGMA, PHILAUTIA) and in Sanskrit there were many words for the different forms of Love for example:
1: MAITRI or “generous compassion”
2: BHAKTI roughly meaning “devotion beyond interpersonal love” and the practice of Bhakti Yoga is derived from this – the cultivation of self through the love of… (insert your own pronoun)
3: ATMA-PREMA most pertinent to the intent of this article, it represents self-love meaning the essential self at the centre of all of us.
Likewise, in Spirituality they often talk of 3 distinct versions of Love:
1: Absolute Love (Impersonal, ever-present and in all things, supreme consciousness, “the source”)
2: Individual Love (Personal, directed at something or someone, finite and as such tainted by eventual suffering)
3: Love as “Sadhana” (the practice of love – kindness, compassion, unity, and forgiveness)
If you are not certain which word or representation resonates best simply pause and breathe for a moment, be sure to connect deep within and listen for the answer. Trust your intuition and align with your heart.
When you are silent, quieten the mind, open the heart, and connect at your soul level, it is amazing how loud that inner knowing can become. When you hear it and feel it, you will be compelled to share it and subsequently be imbued with it.
Love does not derive from the mind, it is not something to seek, nor is it necessary to invite it in as some would have us believe. Love flows to us constantly, for us, within us, and through us. There is an infinite abundance available to everyone, for all time.
When we concentrate more on what unites us and rather than what separates us, we denounce the power of our ego and external conditioning and we surrender to the awareness that this truest representation of love which flows through me is the same as the love which flows through you and so on.
Go let it out…
