The positive power of love

According to Dr Robert Anthony, love is the bond that holds humankind together. He says that there are many definitions of love, yet each one is inadequate. “Love can be found in the dictio­nary somewhere between ‘like’ and ‘lust.’ And maybe that is where it belongs.”

To understand what love is, we have to understand what love is not. Love is not hate, violence, ambition or competition. It is not infatuation. Infatuation focuses only on external traits and is merely a form of conquest, which fills a personal need that is invariably followed by disappointment. Love in not sex. You can have sex with­out love, and love without sex. But when sex and love are combined, the result is a beautiful, spiritual experience, one unequalled by any other.

LOVE DEFINED

Dr Anthony believes that “love is the attracting, uniting, harmoniz­ing Force of the Universe.” Love is the desire to support a person in being all that they can be. It is helping the other person to grow emotionally, mentally, and spiritual­ly. Most of all, love is allowing an­other person the complete freedom to be himself or herself and ac­cepting that person without trying to change them. The problem with many relationships is that love is one-sided. In order for a relation­ship to be balanced, you must give, but also expect to receive.

Your needs must be met as well as those of your partner. The compulsion to keep giving without expecting a return, or keep receiv­ing without expecting to give, does not support true love.

It is important in a relationship to preserve love. In order to do this, it is necessary to realize that you are not a couple or TWO­SOME or anything else. Despite the abundance of poetic imagery, it is literally impossible to merge two human beings as one. You are simply SEPARATE INDIVIDU­ALS who have found a great deal to share together. You came into the world alone, and you will leave this world alone.

It is sheer recklessness to promise to love another person forever. While it is beautiful to hear someone declare that they will love us forever – it is an empty promise. You cannot count on your lover loving you forever, no matter what he or she says, for love is a moment-by-moment experience. Yesterday’s love has been spent, to­morrow’s love is not here yet, and today’s love must be earned.

The fact is that love will only continue as long as each person fulfills a need and contributes to the relationship. And love must continue if a relationship is to be held together. A legal contract will not do it.

In order or preserve love, one partner must not attempt to change the other. This happens much too often and is a major contributing factor to break-up and divorce.

Love, romance and excitement are all possible when you permit your partner to express his or her own individuality. When a relation­ship is not stifled by unreasonable demands and expectations, it will grow closer. The more indepen­dent you feel, the more you will value your partner. True love depends on true freedom. “Only those who are free can afford to love without reservation.”

Time spent together should be devoted to motives of love and sharing those things you both enjoy. This will eliminate boredom and keep the relationship alive. Vital, in this regard, is the devel­opment of a romantic personality. Without romance, a person’s life lacks magnetism, so it is im­portant for you to cultivate it. A romantic personality will increase your magnetism and enable you to attract the people, events and circumstances you desire. We all need romance in our lives and are grateful to those who stimulate and encourage it.

STOP LOOKING FOR OTHERS TO LOVE YOU

Most people believe that they are not loved enough. This is because they cannot recapture the love they once knew as children. And so, they go through life trying to regain this perfect emotion by searching outside of themselves.

If you are seeking someone to love you, you will go through life disappointed. Love begins with loving yourself first. Unless you first love yourself, you will not be able to find it in another. Only when you generate love and radiate it forth until it embraces everything and everyone, will love be yours in return.

But remember, you cannot GIVE your love to another person. You can only be LOVING. Being loving means learning to love your mind, thoughts, body, life and the God-power within you. Loving is one of our strongest needs. It has been discovered by behavioral scientists that it is not lack of love that causes negative personality disorders, but lack of loving.

DOING UNTO OTHERS

The idea that we cannot possibly love another until we have first learned to love ourselves may, on the surface, appear to be a very self-centered philosophy. But it is not if we realise that we are connected to every other person on the planet. In the same way that our heads are joined to our shoul­ders, our hands to our arms, our feet to our ankles, each person is an extension of everyone else. An infection in one part of the human body means that the entire body is affected to hurt another person mentally, physically or emotionally, means that we are hurting our­selves.

For this reason, we cannot say, “To hell with the rest of the world, I am just going to take care of myself.” Instead, we want to make it our desire to elevate the con­sciousness of humankind for, like a chain, the human race is only as strong as its weakest link.

SOME IMPORTANT AS­PECTS OF LOVE

Remain calm and love regardless of the circumstance. Love is not a placid state but a conquering force. If someone does something to you that seems unjust or unfair, learn to forgive that person, for forgive­ness is part of love. Mentally note that the situation has come into your life as a lesson. The way you meet the experience will determine whether or not you understand the meaning of love. If you do, you will be able to forgive know­ing that everything will work out for the good of all concerned. To pass ‘love lessons’ victoriously is to reach new dimensions of success, prosperity, peace and fulfillment.

Learn to love everything that happens to you because your expe­riences give you a chance to grow in the consciousness of love. Say to yourself many times a day, “I am growing in the consciousness of love.” As you do, it will enrich your life in marvelous ways.

Many people go through life hating, criticizing and condemning others for their own lack of love. They have a talent for putting others down with joking sarcasm and making them feel so inade­quate. Negative people withhold love, recognition and compliments because they must always say what is on their minds, regardless of how destructive it is. They justify their verbal hostility as “construc­tive criticism,” an “honest relation­ship.” Their greatest talent lies in the ability to find and identify the weaknesses in others instead of their strengths.

Love is the means by which we help others to be successful. It expresses itself in the ability to make others feel important, alive and capable of self-improvement. By giving others recognition and assurance, and pointing out their positive traits, we can stimulate them to make the best possible use of their unlimited potential. One of the greatest gifts we can give to other people is to open their eyes to their own greatness; to the potential they never realised existed. This is what “loving thy neighbour” is all about.

By offering encouragement we are helping ourselves as well. Not only does this satisfy our own need to be loving, but also each positive action generates an even more positive response and increases our total self-confidence. Emmet Fox put it so well when we said, “Sufficient realisation of love will overcome anything…. Love will lift you to the highest dimension.”

• BY CAPT SAM ADDIAH (RTD)