On Love
April 5, 2012
Lou Catarino
Tristan asked me to write a post about love. I admit it has stumped me all week. I have to write it now, as it is driving me crazy. So here it is in all its greatness or mediocrity.
What the heck is love ? You can not measure it. It is one concept that you can only see through its effects.
I mean, we all love someone. We fall in love. We suffer its consequences or its rewards. We talk and sing about love; it’s in our music and poetry. I will leave that kind of love for the poets.
Instead, I will expand on Love as a powerful force in our universe. Times and time again I have seen evil operating out of the minds of people. I have come to the conclusion that evil arises from ignorance. Ignorance can ignite hatred and produce evil. If you see it this way it gives you a tool to combat hatred, ignorance, and evil. And the only energy that can combat those three is love. Love as a force of transformation. A force of positive energy that can alter the chemistry of hatred.
What is Love ?
I don’t know. All I know are its effects. I have seen souls drastically changing or altering their lives because a mist of love engulfed them. Souls who were on the brink of destruction coming back to life and the light.
Loving family is easy, as you have no choice really. Loving an individual is easy once all the prerequisites are in place: physical chemistry, common background and social spheres. All it takes is for the love butterfly to nibble at you and you are in a state of delicious infatuation. But, like I said, I will leave that to the poets.
I want to address Love for others. Strangers. The people out there. The great mass of people.
It is not easy to Love others, strangers. Our preconceptions and prejudices create barriers that prevent us from seeing that we are all connected, that we are all in the same fantastic journey of life and death.
A clerk does not smile or acknowledge you and you don’t like that clerk anymore. How dare he/she not recognize my greatness ? We are indeed simple creatures that are influenced by how others relate to us.
Siddhartha taught us to look at others as if they were our mother. Also, that we should look at others as if we were their mothers. If you see others as part of yourself, as travelers on the same journey, you cannot help but to experience feelings of Love towards them. You see their weaknesses and watch them fumble the ball as they go on their daily illusionary realities.
You learn to accept others for what they are. Not what you think they are. You do not want to change them anymore. You recognize the variety of experiences that human beings exhibit. I realized long time ago that every one of us has a unique talent or excellence. The street alcoholic used to be a professor. The cab driver knows quantum entanglement. The server at your local café is an incredible artist. Etc.,.
We are all part of an invisible cosmic web that stretches through time and space.
I have been practicing this form of understanding and it has helped me tremendously in accepting and…gulp, loving others for what they are: A part of me.
We live in an era that promotes greed and egoism. We value abnormal competition above all else: we need to have more than our neighbors or our sense of self is diminished.
We need a new paradigm. A shift in consciousness from the ape-like greedy mentality to a new way of thinking that promotes sharing, acceptance, and satisfaction for what we have. There is never enough ? Is there ? And it’s all empty. Material possessions have no value per se, but we perceive them to be our vehicle for happiness. Which one would you rather have: a calm and peaceful moment in a healthy body by a lake observing a sunset or driving down the highway in a $100,000 vehicle ?
It’s all a matter of perspective. And no, you can not take it with you.
Peace and love to all
Lou
This is a beautiful post. And the “love butterfly,” I like that. 🙂
I would say that this post contains a certain Greatness.
What sets someone down the path to Living in Love is the realization that Love is meant to be shared with everyone. Even the people that we don’t like at first. When we begin to understand that everyone has a unique story and a different set of passions and suffering, we begin to see that everyone is deserving of our Love. Life is not a competition. It is an adventure. And it is meant to be shared with everyone.
Loving someone you are attracted to is easy (and it isn’t all that easy). Loving someone because you understand that they are human, and have emotions and desires just like you do, is another story altogether.
Thank you for sharing this post, Lou.
Very well put!
Excellent, Lou.
This is so profound. Deserves several re-readings.
Thank you Lou. Amazing!!!
Thank you all, you made me blush…
“We need a new paradigm. A shift in consciousness from the ape-like greedy mentality to a new way of thinking that promotes sharing, acceptance, and satisfaction for what we have.”
Completely agree on that. Human race is such that if it wants, it can reach very high levels on the strata of Humanity or …. it can reach to the lowest of low where humans no longer deserve to be called humans.
“We are all part of an invisible cosmic web that stretches through time and space.”
You words impressed me.
I’m so glad to meet another Love Warrior, ha! who is combating ignorance, hatred, etc w/Love.
And as for ‘leaving it to the poets’ — Love butterfly nibbling at you ……… FABulous image!
Thanks darling
Reblogged this on MindMindful and commented:
Here is another Love Warrior, & his thoughts on ‘what love is’ …..
I really do like this post. It gives me pause to think. Just one little point, you do our cousins, the apes, a disservice suggesting our behavior mimics theirs. When it comes to greed, apes are a rank amateurs when compared to humans.
Good point.
A great piece of work you have here My Friend. Thank you so very much for sharing it with all of us who care to study and gain knowledge from those who are willing to share what God has blessed them with. Continue to use the great gifts God as provided you with. Today, I leave you with my peace that we all may share in this great celebration that is unfolding right in front of our eyes.
Nicely presented.
Our human selves expect others to react, respond and love the same way we ourselves do. One of the lessons I’ve learned along the way is that everyone loves differently because of who they are, experiences they’ve had. And I’ve had to remind myself many times over the years that this person or that person loved me the best that they could. Realizing that has made my life so much easier.
AS for apes, I wish Gorillas were our closest relative not Chimps. We have so many innate challenges to love one another as a species, it takes all we’ve got to overcome our violence. The hope lies in your reference to Siddharta; we have the wisdom of many great teachers. Daily practice of Buddhist teaching keeps reminding me that we are all connected. We all want the same things, love and acceptance. The superficial toys of “success” don’t fill the holes in our hearts, only love and the daily observation of living in love and compassion will fill those chasms. I am enjoying the posts and comments of everyone who visits this site. It feeds my soul. Thank you for your post.
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