Understanding True Love

The word ‘Love’ has been corrupted through misuse to such an extent that we, as a society, have lost its essential meaning. What is true love?

Just as space permeates everything in the universe, love permeates every part, every aspect of creation. If there is one answer to the question, “How and why does this world exist?” the answer, in one word, is ‘Love’. Rather, the answer is ‘Pure Love’, since the word ‘love’ has lost its meaning.

Your very existence is an expression of pure unconditional love of the Source (you may call it Consciousness, Creator, God, Divine Self, or any other name). This is the truth of your being. True love transcends both love and hatred. It is unconditional, unquestioning, boundless, unchanging love. It is overflowing love of the Source for the Source through all of creation.

True love is way beyond the personalized love that two or more individuals assert on one another. It has nothing to do with emotions like attachment, attraction, craving, or infatuation that is felt by individuals. Personalized love, though apparently selfless, is rooted in desires and conditional satisfaction.

While unpleasant emotions like anger, hatred or sorrow are considered as negative feelings, people assume attachment (disguised as love) to be a positive virtue. Between two people who are in so-called love, the feelings of jealousy or possessiveness are also misconstrued as love. There cannot be a greater corruption than this.

We have been brought up in a society that judge’s love based on conditions. Almost all of us have been raised in a belief-system of conditional love. We have been taught that love is something to be earned. We have been made to believe that we can receive love only when we fit into people’s expectations. If we are not good enough, we will be deprived of love. If someone does not love us back, they don’t deserve our love.

These beliefs have influenced the collective psyche of families, groups, communities, and societies since generations to such an extent that love has been reduced to fear of denial. While love is the all-pervasive essence of everything, such false notions of love have caused fear to be perpetuated into our lives.

We need to shift from the paradigm of false conditional love to the essence of pure unconditional love. The question is: How do we get to experience pure unconditional love? And the answer is: by eliminating the ego – the false ‘I’ – that we assume for our persona. As long as we believe that whatever is inside the skin is ‘me’ and whatever is outside the skin is ‘not me’, we cannot experience true love.

You can see waves rising in the ocean. If the waves start thinking that they are separate from one another, what will you say? You would say that they are in an illusion that they are separate. The reality is that they all are the ocean; they are an expression of the ocean.

The experience of true love comes with surrender of the false ‘I’, in letting go of the feeling of separateness. Without this sacrifice, it is not possible to attain divine love. When this separate ‘I’ is discarded, you embrace everything in oneness and catch a glimpse of pure love. You realize that this is what you were really seeking all the time, behind all pursuits.

True love can be experienced only through giving, not by demanding. People who exist in your life are not here to love you. They are here to remind you that you are the Source of Love.

Many people live with the belief that we can experience love only when we acquire it. Howsoever illogical as it may sound, the experience of pure love does not lie in acquiring, but rather in giving it unconditionally. If you receive love, it is merely a bonus.

Love by its nature is giving. It gives boundlessly when it is brimming in life. When you experience true love, you only feel like giving overwhelmingly and unconditionally. It feels great to expect nothing in return!

However, without knowing this, man spends his entire lifetime in seeking love, which often eludes him or her. He keeps yearning for appreciation, for consideration, for approval from people.

You can never find true and everlasting love in the external world. Whenever you find yourself feeling deprived of love, you need to remind yourself about this truth. By knowing that you are the Source of love, you can love yourself, instead of waiting to receive love from the world. Ask yourself, “Why do I need an agent to love myself?” Waiting for the world to love you, is like hiring an agent to love yourself!

It is time for you to honor yourself as the Source of love. You have undertaken this human journey to realize and express the boundless love that you truly are.

This Valentine’s day, let us all let go our negative emotions, let go of the conditions we have and feel the bliss of true love. Let us love ourselves and others alike by knowing that we are the Source of Love. Let aside the ‘me’ and become ‘we’!