LOVE
What a Feeling!!!!
Happy Valentine’s Day my lovely readers! This blog on the concept of love is my heart shaped box gift to you.
Love is its own special realm within my mind. When I close my eyes, and think of love, I enter a world with pale pink brick paths lined with large peonies, iridescent rolling hills that go on to the horizon, where love beams light the sky and everything has a soft warm glow. Wanting to fully understand love, I bend over to smell the flowers, I take a long inhale filling my lungs up with love. On my exhale the idea of unconditional love comes to mind. I pause, struck by a concept I had been perfectly fine accepting for decades only to wonder, “is there a need to define love as unconditional…does that mean that some love is conditional”?
With this thought, the rosy path of love begins to crumble, leading me to ponder “if love is something one can give is it also something that can be taken back”? The ground starts to shake, and I fall to my knees as the façade of love I had so purposefully constructed begins to disintegrate all around me. I sit there and wait for the rumbling to stop, accepting that old ideas must crumble in order for greater understanding to breakthrough.
It is then I hear the music, adjusting my position, I press my ear against the source. It’s the melody of the islands, soon recognizing the song as Bob Marley’s, ”One Love”. A knowing smile etches across my face, seeing a tattoo with the words “One Love” painted on the back of Jenilee’s (one of my teachers) arm. “Aaaah yes” I murmur, finally understanding that there can only really be one love, for love is too great, too powerful, too universal to be broken down into levels. Love cannot be conditional, for when we express love, we do not also accompany it with a list of rules and regulations that must be abided by. All love is unconditional, and if conditions are laid upon it then it’s not love. It is only when something happens: feelings are not reciprocated, expectations not met and promises broken, that we begin to question our love. With that consideration the rosy path fully erupts, leaving behind a transparent walkway that reflects back the beams from above.
As my eyes take in the new pathway, I notice flowers on either side have started to wilt. Standing up I touch one, and the petals fall to the ground. What does this mean, what else have I been misunderstanding about love? I close my eyes, remembering how I had inhaled the aroma of love, thinking that it was produced for me, only now to reconsider this. For, the flower would emit love’s scent regardless if I was there to smell it or not, and yet I’ve associated this love with me. Often times we say “I love you” to others, and with that we place the responsibility of that feeling on them, but is that true?
We own our feelings, love is a feeling, so that would mean the love we feel is our responsibility. We do not give our love, for it is us experiencing that warmth within, the lightness, ease and life when we are in loves warm embrace. Yes, I do believe that the presence of certain people, and our willingness to be vulnerable allows for us to feel love, but love is truly available within ourselves always. To say that another is needed to feel love, would be placing conditions on love, and if there is only one love, and it is unconditional, then no conditions would be needed to feel love. With that, all of the flowers vanish, as the smell of sweet love permeates the air.
“Be love, so much love, that when others are with you, they are love.” – Abraham Hicks
Looking around, I notice it is when the breeze picks up, that the iridescence of the rolling hills starts to shimmer in response. Of course, though love can be found within, the emotion can also be spread from one to another. The love I feel within myself, can be felt by those around me, and I can feel their love as well. I start to laugh giddily with all that has transformed, and I allow myself to touch the feeling of love within me. Think back to an instance were you felt love, think not of the environment or the people, no go back to your body. Once you know and understand how love feels (feeling happens in the body, where do you register love, what sensations do you experience, how does it rise and move within you, when you label it as love what reactions do you express) you can feel love when you choose, and I do hope you choose to feel love often. The amount of love and the intensity of it is all up to you, and who wouldn’t want to feel love every day, hour, minute and second? Our time here is limited, please, spend it in love.