If I can love a little bit more every day, if each day I can be a little more kind and generous of spirit, I feel in alignment with my values and feel good about myself.

It takes a lot of time and effort to learn how to love.  Regardless of all of the People like magazines, the incredible romantic stories that paint delicious and juicy dramas that we might see on the TV and in movies, love is not what the media suggests.  It is a growing process that we need to be actively invested in, and then the rhythm, tenor and harmonic energy of love begins to reveal itself through us.  We just cannot receive a clue by just watching.  We have to feel it to know it.

What works for me is taking baby steps, finding my version of a gradual and steady progress.  Unlike in my youth, when I tried to tackle major fields of physical, emotional and spiritual love calisthenics’, I am aware that I am considerably happier making incremental steps along the way.

As I continue to grow in my ability to embody “selfless love,” I realize how much there is to realize  – even though I have done my best to keep growing through the highs and lows of my life, in good times and in times that were very challenging as well.  Now that I have realized that it is not the personality that expresses love… but the constant flow of grace that uses me when I am open, inclusive, selfless and supportive and genuinely interested in wellbeing of others.

I love the wisdom I find in Eknath Easwaran’s books.  “A More Ardent Fire is one of those treasures.”  It inspires me to think about love in more expansive terms.  Love is not what we seek to “get,” and it is far more than “what we give.” There is an expansive nature that embraces the oneness of life and helps us understand and love all those around us, the ones we like, as well as the ones we do not like, it reminds us to seek the divine in all of our relationships, and lets life teach us what we need to know. I am discovering that when I am willing to grow compassionately by changing our unloving habits and that prevent us from loving a little more each day.

Know that you are loved!    Blessings,  Rev. Barb