"Unconditional love
is a state of being,
not an emotion."
-- Anita Moorjani
I'm so enjoying Anita Moorjani's new book, What If This Is Heaven?. I'm listening to her read her book on audio while reading along and highlighting what resonates with me. I'm going slowly on purpose to absorb it more fully at only a chapter a day, and so far, there are highlights on almost every page. I highly recommend getting her book, on audio or the book, or both. There is something so much more powerful about the author reading the book to me.
There is so much I could discuss, so I will begin with unconditional love. In her first book, Dying To Be Me, she explained how she had a near death experience (NDE) and learned about unconditional love, and especially loving herself unconditionally, and this is in the end what healed her.
We, in this physical plane on earth know of love, but generally what we know of love is that it comes and it goes, that it is balanced by not love in this world of duality; i.e., white and black, hot and cold, day and night, forward and backward, etc..
Learning from her NDE, she says, "I realized that I'm loved unconditionally just because I exist! In fact, even the word unconditional is superfluous, because love, by its true definition, is unconditional. Conditional love is an oxymoron--a contradiction in terms. As soon as we put conditions on love, it becomes something else entirely."
She was asked to explain in more detail the difference between conditional and unconditional love, and on page 30 of her book, she gave a very interesting comparison:
"It would almost be like comparing the soft, cool glow from a firefly to the blazing heat and light from the sun. When the sun is shining, we are bathed in glorious warmth and light that completely wraps us up in its brilliance. It's unconditional. The sun doesn't choose to whom it's going to give warmth and light and to whom it's not. The sun just is."
She continues, "The firefly's small glow, on the other hand, has much less power; and it's much more discriminating, more selective, and more conditional. You have to be in a direct line of sight with the firefly to see its light, and even then it's really easy to miss or lose sight of. It's beautiful in its own way, but rather paltry compared with the sun."
Because all my life I have had so much experience with conditional love, falling in and out of love, loving me as long as I draw within the lines, watching parents loving and then hating each other, and so much more, I have been on a journey to experience and promote love in the unconditional sense. Wayne Dyer's definition of unconditional love has guided me, and I have practiced it every day in some way, even if only sitting here thinking. I have also been turning it on myself and practicing loving myself unconditionally too. It's working, and I also need more practice. It's a worthy endeavor--and, has become my number one objective.
I love Anita's comparison and this chapter on love. I especially loved the sun comparison and the statement, "the sun just is," as in unconditional love just is. We get to choose to bathe in its warmth and light and share that place with all others, or we can choose to stay indoors so to speak. It just is, but we need to line up with it, allow it in, feel it as a state of being rather than simply an emotion. This, of course, doesn't mean there isn't a certain feeling in unconditional love because so far in me, there is nothing to compare that joy to. It is beyond words.
"Unconditional Love Just Is. It's Not One Side Of The Coin--It's the Whole Coin!" -- Anita Moorjani
Spread Some Joy Today--by practicing a love that is the love of God, that which never fails, and is completely and wonderfully without condition.
No comments:
Post a Comment