Love Isn't Always What You Think It Is

When one hears the word 'love,' the mind usually automatically moves to romantic love, love born of desire, intimacy. I think of love for family, natural or chosen: my children, my sisters, my mother, dear friends. All of these variations of love are valid and true, yet for me and perhaps a lot of you, some are defined as much by their lack as they are by their presence. Our histories shape our perspectives and definitions of even this most basic of human needs, and as has been in my case, can cast love as a brittle, fragile possession.

This, I am learning, is a mistaken perception.

My reality is that I’m an eternal soul living a human experience. And as an eternal soul living a human experience, my soul is the core element of things, not my body. The body is necessary to live this human experience, absolutely. But it is not who I am, or what I am. My body is a representation of soul energy that has been reduced in vibration to form matter; I have manifested this body to help fulfill my assignment here on this plane of existence. It is important because it requires care and attention, but ultimately it is formed of the same energy as my soul, and so therefore is part of the great collective of energy that forms and connects all things.

And that great collective energy is Love.

Love is the foundational force that informs awareness, consciousness, creativity, Higher Intelligence, the physical and spiritual Universe. Love surrounds us and permeates us, uplifting us at every level of the mind, and connecting us to the greater Whole we know in our souls exists all around us. More than a mere emotion, it is a field of energy that communicates with us, holds no anger when we make mistakes, requires no allegiance, does not wield a threat of eternal devastation. It works with us and through us, recognizing that our presence in this lifetime, on this plane of existence, is to learn, and to heal. It is truly omnipresent, omniscient, omnipotent.

All it requires is that we listen.

Given the nature of our humanity – which to my mind, is to heal our inner wounds and ascend to a more evolved state of being – listening to a ‘still, small voice,’ as Elijah characterized it in I Kings, is not something we do easily. We are inundated on this plane with competing messages, with the weight of past choices, with the gravitational pull of culture and environment and upbringing, all of which are interwoven to form a kind of spiritual obstacle course. I believe some of it is by design, presenting similar circumstances to us over and over until the lesson we need to learn from those experiences is heeded. I have witnessed that more than a few times in my own life, and it has only been when I released myself to Love that I have begun to make progress on those lessons. I am nowhere close to being fully healed, do not misunderstand. But I am a work in progress, and that gives me comfort.

We are social creatures at the core, and I believe at the soul level interpersonal connections are necessary for us. We are not created to be alone, and we are incapable of fulfilling our lives’ missions in solitude. We require fellowship and support – love – to be whole. I have long believed nothing is more revealing about our Selves than the crucible of relationships. In that vessel, the dross of our being is truly burned away, and we are faced with the reality of our choices: our past environment, our history, our entrenched thinking.

And our fears.

Grappling with fear is where we find the most complexity in learning from love. If Spirit is manifested/represented through love, then Ego is manifested/represented through fear. Therein, I believe, lies the great push/pull that informs our incarnation on this plane. As I actively work to emotionally and spiritually heal, I realize that I have long been aware of the great dichotomy between love and fear. It’s a truism of spiritual search, I suppose, sort of a Metaphysics 101 thing. I’ve probably heard it, read it, and said it literally hundreds of thousands of times over the course of my life. It’s always been one of those things that rang true with me, even as I wondered at its simplicity. Love and fear. The great illustration of Light and Darkness.

I began a dedicated spiritual practice on Oct. 27, 2021, after a series of automobile accidents forced me to confront my own vulnerability and my thinking. Since that day I have meditated and journaled every morning without fail. I have worked to reexamine my upbringing and how incidents from my childhood influenced my thinking, my sense of self, and my choices. And I began to discover and unravel the thinking behind a lot of those life choices, examining why they did or didn’t work out the way I’d planned. I spend a lot of time reading and listening to experts, some of the spiritual sages of the modern world, and consciously opening my Self to taking in the wisdom I need to hear and implement to continue my personal healing. The throughline through all of that spiritual work is opening the Self to the power and guidance that comes from Love. Not the lower case ‘love’ we think of when we envision or imagine desire, but the BIG L Love that is an energy field, a source of power greater than ourselves. I have been touched and guided by this energy in ways great and small, and I’m still in the beginning stages of crafting a practice that supports my desire to accept that all the things that happen in my life happen for me, not to me, and they are opportunities to learn from Love.

I find repeating mantras particularly rewarding, and I’ll leave you with three from one of my favorite teachers, Gabrielle Bernstein.

To start the day: “I focus my attention on the love that is all around me, and I expect miracles.”

When we find our minds drifting back towards fear and any of its attendant emotions: “Thank you, Higher Intelligence, for guiding me to perceive this worry/doubt/projection/fear through the teacher of love.”

And lastly: “I am ready to learn through Love. I step back and let Higher Intelligence guide the way.”

Try this work for yourself, and see if your mindset changes. Try, for even the shortest amount of time, to live as though whatever happens around you is for your benefit. If you notice a synchronicity, no matter how small, recognize it and bless it and be thankful for it. If something doesn't work out as you planned, surrender your disappointment to Love, and know that Love's path for you is always better for you than your own. See how you feel at the end of mindful playtime.

I wish you all peace and strength, and may this work be of benefit.