Wear Your Love Like Heaven....

(**I am back from my medical maze. Thanks for all of your good thoughts. :) Gratefully accepted! The medical stuff wasn't all that bad. It's just preparation for eye surgery. At my age and given health problems, they make me go through blood tests, an EKG and such. That in itself wasn't so bad but the flourescent lights killed me! I'm ready to curl up in a ball in a dark room. Too much light, too much noise, too much, too much... but I'll be around later today.

Thought I'd clarify one thing to have this post make more sense. It is not about romantic love ~ which is something I know absolutely nothing about. The more I consider the notion of romantic love, the more I come to believe that I am not really constructed for it. This is about community and friend love.**)

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I got an off-list note about one of my comments from long ago. We were discussing love and I mentioned it as a behavior, not a feeling. I had to take a few weeks to really think about what I am trying to say when I use that phrase.

One time, I read that when Mother Teresa was awarded the Nobel Peace Prize, someone in the audience asked her how we can help facilitate world peace. She said, "Go home and love your family."

Naturally, my own approach is a bit more inclusive in the sense that "family" can mean all kinds of things to different people. For me, it just means the people who surround me. My community in Sacramento. My community in Thailand. My friends and their friends and families. Basically, it means most people I come in contact with in the process of daily life.

Authentic love, the kind that binds us together as a community is not a euphoric emotion that sneaks up on our blind side. Instead, it is something we keep learning and relearning it, over and over again.

A springboard quote for me is from Antoine de Saint Exupery, the author of "The Little Prince". He wrote "Love does not consist in gazing at each other, but in looking outward together in the same direction." It is recognizing commonality that enriches experience of love. Knowing that we are all here for a similar reason, to learn our lessons of this incarnation, allows us to grow and mature as uniquely different individuals, yet bonded together.

The core of it ~ and what determines our behavior ~ is a willingness to believe the best about the people in our lives. I struggle with this on occasion because my monkey-brain tries to turn me away from that basic view. The world has not been friendly in the past and it takes constant effort to change my thinking. But I insist on doing it.

When I assume the best about others, which in itself is a chosen behavior, manifestation of that seems to naturally follow in my actions. The way it manifests is in kindness, even when kindness isn't easy or convenient. It means being kind, even if you don't choose to be kind in return.

If I assume the position that I will love you only if you love me, that's not love. That's business. That's trying to pull something from you for me. It's bartering. That's about the farthest thing from authentic love that I can possibly imagine.

I believe loving behavior is a willingness to encourage the best in us. It is a recognition that while we are flawed, we are at the same time perfect ~ just as we are.

I believe loving behavior is benevolent. I give to you because giving to you is joyful. I don't keep score or have expectations of a particular return. It's not an investment. It's a gift.

I believe loving behavior doesn't allow me to lie to another person because it is easier than telling the truth. And telling the truth should always be done with compassion and respect.

I believe loving behavior requires me to understand that when someone hurts me, they rarely do it intentionally. It is equally important to recognize that sometimes the most loving thing to do is separate myself from someone who is toxic.

On a global level, I believe loving behavior includes respect for the resources around me, to respect animals and people. It means loving the ground that I stand on and the earth that ground covers. It means loving the beauty we have that surrounds us on a daily basis.

Within this fairly simple (and perhaps even naive) framework, it allows me to live a loving life which then passes along to the next person ~ and the person after that ~ and the person after that. Those people love ten more and on it goes.

In that regard, I understand what Mother Teresa meant.


Peace,


~Chani