SPIRITUAL PRACTICES ARE AIMED AT BRINGING LOVE TO FLOW
Can real love be blocked? If I love someone and that someone leaves the mortal frame or for any other thing, should I regard that flow within me to be blocked? That love can never be blocked if it is genuine and not just an emotional attachment.
People do not seem to understand what love is all about because people are self-centered. They are forever thinking, what can I gain out of it? How much will they love me? Or how much will they not love me? That becomes the predominant thought in man’s mind. But the idea should be this, “How much do I love? And what is the quality of my love?” You could never ask what the quantity of my love is because love knows in no amount. But in the various facets of life and according to man’s evolution, man’s awareness of love categorizes itself into quantities as we perceive it. In reality, there is no quantity of love.
Language is so limited, but for expression, we would say that love depends on our awareness. The greater the understanding we have attained through spiritual practices, the greater the love. What is the measurement of man? How do you measure the greatness of a man? How many million is he in the bank? Or by whatever possessions or external show, facade, that there is? That does not judge the greatness of man. Hitler achieved world fame, did he not? He had millions of followers. But was he a great man taking the lives of millions of people? Bloodshed was an expression of hatred and personal aggrandizement to achieve his ends. I tell you this: we are all Hitlers in miniature because we all want to achieve our ends!
This comes about because of a lack of awareness, and spiritual practices aim to bring greater clarity and expansion to awareness so that that indefinable quality, called love, can flow through. Like the usual analogy, I use the carburetor in the motor car. The more you open the carburetor, the greater the amount of petrol will flow through. Similarly, when our awareness expands, a greater love flows through, and what does that flow through? What is that love? That love is none else but Divinity, and only our thought processes, self-centeredness, and attachments that color the love that is forever flowing through. It is like a crystal. You put a red flower behind a crystal, which will seem red. You put a blue flower behind the crystal, and the crystal will appear blue.
So, our spiritual practices are a cleansing process of the mind so that real love can flow through, and by understanding the philosophy behind it, we also understand one thing: that unless I do something about myself, I block the love from flowing through – for love is forever there. Love is not only within but without.
WE WANT LIVING GODS
If I love you, what am I loving? I am not loving you as a person but loving the Divinity within you. So, if love is God, it can only communicate with God, and you are just the exterior frame. Therefore, love knows no difference. If someone does you wrong and you have the strength to love that person just as much, then you have some idea of love.
Someone might besmirch you. Someone might do anything to you. As Christ would say, “Love thine enemies, even.” It is easy to love a friend. Learn to love thine enemy. That is the mark of greatness; that is the mark of truth. That is the mark of portraying and living the living God. We do not want dead gods. We want living gods.
WHEN YOU TRULY LOVE, THE OBJECT OF YOUR LOVE IS LOVE
When a person passes away or a person is away, what is away? Love is not away! Only the body is away. The outer frame is away. But love is forever there, and love knows no separation. If one’s dear one dies, it does not mean the dear one has perished. That Spirit within man is immortal, and if something is infinite, how can it pass away? It is there everywhere. So, when you love someone, you bring that Divinity within you to oneness with the Divinity within the object of your love.
What is the object of your love? It is not the person. The object of your love is love! The object of God can only be God, and how can there be two Gods? Therefore, that within you is at one-ment with that within me.
When you realize this, you become that love. There is a difference between understanding and realization. You can understand the mind, an intellectual concept. But a realization is assimilation. It permeates every pore, every cell of your body. So, when you realize this, you become that love. You do not need to love anymore; you have become that love. Then you are that love. Then, if anyone harms you with distortions, malice, or whatever, it does not hurt you, and you will keep on loving because that is your nature. You have become that.
So, the hurt we suffer when we lose someone is the hurt not of love, but the hurt of the mind, for the mind is a patterned mind, a conditioned mind, an expecting mind, the mind that has expected so much or so little or whatever from the object, from the person. But if there is no expectation, love could never bring about suffering, for love itself is an offering. When you offer yourself your inner being, which is love, you have no right to expect any return! If you love, you love, or you do not love. Otherwise, you think you love. Many believe that they believe, and many people feel they love, which is not the spiritual path.
THE PROOF OF THE PUDDING IS IN THE EATING
But let us talk of the man in the street who knows nothing. His life is very mundane. He has his expectations, and he expects this from the woman, and the woman expects that from the man: that he must be like this, and he must be like that. That means he has a preconceived idea, and there cannot be love whenever there is a preconceived idea. With that preconception, how can you flow? That is the block; that is the blockage. So, we develop a greater awareness through meditational practices, and our preconception of things ceases. When that ceases, then all suffering eases.
The man in the street has so many dissatisfactions in life. Those dissatisfactions are created by a sense of insecurity that, in turn, breeds a sense of inadequacy that makes him act contrary to his inner nature, which is love. A vicious circle sets in, and we can do nothing. We can only bring that person to their senses: although your behavior is in such a manner or your viciousness or whatever, think of it differently. Here is a different perspective on life. Think on those lines and see what could happen. Try it. The proof of the pudding is in the eating. Try it and see how it benefits you. See if it does not change your perspectives.
WHEN WE FEEL HURT, THE HURT ORIGINATES FROM WITHIN OURSELF
There is no hope lost. As long as there is life, as the old saying goes, there is hope. But if you hope, then let not that hope be covered or shrouded with preconceptions. I see a beautiful woman and fall in love with that woman. That is I. Have I ever thought, “Does that woman love me?” No, I am only concerned about myself. That I want that, and I like that, and when it comes to the question of I want, and I need this, I, then naturally suffering, sets in.
Why do I love that woman that does not love me? Why does the man love the woman that does not love him? Why does the woman love the man that does not love her? Why? The woman might love someone very much, but this man does not respond, and the woman feels hurt. Where does that hurt originate? Not from the opposite. But the hurt originates from within oneself. I have no right to expect Miss So-and-so or Mister to love me. I have no right to expect that, and it is my very expectation that is causing me this misery, that is causing me the suffering. If someone befriends me, it does not mean the person loves me. There are many kinds of friendships. But if the lady expects the friendship to turn into a deep love for her, then I feel sorry for the person thinking that way because it is a form of attachment and dependency.
LIFE IS MADE TO GIVE AND NOT TO TAKE
Once we get freed of the attachment, whatever happens, we will be unaffected by it. We are unaffected by the exterior because something beautiful is happening within ourselves that has to express itself and not take. Life is made to give and not to take. So, when we develop the idea that love is concerned with giving love, the idea of receiving love is gone. To receive love must be a spontaneous, automatic process from the opposite person without coercion. There should be no coercion. And if we gain the necessary strength within us through meditation, then if the opposite person does not respond, we are unaffected.
The person who has passed away, to come back to that, is not gone. The body is shed, and if you love that person, truly unselfishly, motivelessly, then your love here now reaches that soul, that individual soul, wherever it is. So, love is never lost. True love. Genuine love.
TRUE LOVE IS SO POWERFUL THAT IT CAN TRANSCEND ANY BARRIER
You hear all these pop songs about true love. You know what comes with it. It is a waste of time. But at least it is a start. They have some ideas. They are trying to fall in love. You see the contradictions in this phrase: trying to fall in love. Firstly, you cannot try. Love is spontaneous. Secondly, you cannot fall in love. You get elevated by love—all the contradictions. And thirdly, they do not know what love is! To many people, love is taking, grasping, gratifying one’s needs, or whatever. And that they call love. I ask you, is that happiness producing? Never! Never. I talk of experience! I have gone through the mill! But here is the strength that we all must develop. It is to stand up after you have fallen. It is easy to fall, but he is the lion man who can stand up after falling. Then true love is realized.
That love is so powerful, so strong that it could transcend any barrier. It even goes beyond death. The love you have for a person, which is born from deep within, can transcend any barrier at all times, even while you are sleeping. That love is working, for you cannot sleep without that love. For love is God, and God is love. So, to understand what love is all about, one must understand what Divinity is all about, for they are no different.
EVERYONE HAS TO REACH HOME
Without understanding that which is Divine, we could never fully love. Of all our loves, four thousand million people in this world, very few know love. Many people know love to a certain extent but not love in totality because total love requires a total integration in man, an integration of body, mind, and Spirit. Until that condition comes about, no one can love. But this is no cause for disappointment. We are on the path, and it is good to be on the path.
This path could be filled with many obstacles to the achievement of love, which is synonymous with the accomplishment of God. These obstacles come about, and we have to have strength within us through meditational practices and by making an effort in our daily lives to overcome these obstacles and problems. And it is not easy. Vivekananda, for example, has said that the path to God is the hero’s path. It is not for weaklings. They will become strong. It might take a hundred lifetimes or whatever. But they will reach. Everyone has to reach – everyone has to go home!
… Gururaj Ananda Yogi: Satsang US 1980 – 02
