Do you find it challenging to love other people?
Does it require extra effort out of you to be kind to others on a regular basis?
I certainly have plenty of room to grow in learning the lessons of love, and after reading the below, was reminded of how much room for improvement I have to yet to go.
Give like the rose gives its perfume—effortlessly,
unconditionally, because it is its own nature.
~ Swami Vivekananda
Love is not a commodity we store in the back room of consciousness and use only when we want it, like bringing the peanut butter out from the pantry when we want a peanut butter and jelly sandwich. That’s selfish love.
Love is not a feeling that can be withheld at will, like deciding whether to take a walk or not. That’s human will love.
Love is of God, not of the human mind, and therefore takes on God-like characteristics, not temporal attitudes.
Love gives because that’s what love does.
Love shares without condition or qualification because that’s what love does.
Love blesses one and all because love never discriminates.
Love shines like the sun shines, upon everything in its path.
Love doesn’t have bad days and good days. Every day is a Love-day.
Love just is, and nothing less.
The more we understand the true nature of love, the more we reflect its disposition and attitude in every relationship we have. Love is not an effort any longer. It just happens because we’re letting God’s love happen through us. No mortal mind censure gets in the way.
Dear Evan,
The photo of the daisies looking up at the sun is, to me, a beautiful example of the love your words so accurately describe.
The daisies are not concerned with impressing the photographer. They are not contorting their petals in an attempt to mug for the camera lens beneath them.
Instead, their faces remain fixed upon the source of warmth and light — the orb that symbolizes God, Love, the parent of their reflected love.
Love,
Daisy Face
I remember a lecture some years ago based on the first sentence of the chapter on Prayer (I think the lecturer’s name was Nora Cook?). I remember her explaining each section, including “unselfed love.” This article is a good summary of that part of the lecture. It is wonderful when you realize that it is effortless. We love because we are the loved of Love.
Dear Evan,
Beautifully written! I will hear your words as a reminder, a place to come back to and and strive to dwell there.
Many thanks,
Susan
Dear Evan,
This is JUST what I needed to read this morning!
And I LOVE the photo you chose, too! PERFECT!
Thank you!
Christine
In a modern translation, our friend, St Paul, said, “Wherever I go I carry the perfume of the Christ.
It is interesting that Mrs. Eddy used the term unselfed love instead of unselfish love. It is of course unselfish, but unselfed seems to mean it is not something we can do ourselves. Our love is unselfed when God is loving through us as us.