Love Is

“Is this love – is this love – is this love – Is this love that I’m feelin’?”

Well – maybe… Probably not really. We are surrounded by messages of love in our culture. Most of the songs we hear are about love gained or lost. Talk of dating and relationships. Most magazines, whatever the subject or market, feature beautiful women on the cover. Confused messages about what love is or isn’t, what we want and don’t want.

The basic issue is that we have an innate sense of what real Love is but no consistent way to experience it. Everything else is a letdown. So we spend our lives searching.

When I say love, you may think of a number of possible things. You may think of “making” love or sex. You may think of “falling” in love. You may think of love “lost” or heartache. You may think of a person. Or an idea. Or a symbol.
But none of these are real Love.

Its very much like ego and Self. There is the small self who sees itself as separate and alone, needing to control, creating scenarios to justify its position. And there is the “large” Self, our true Being or inner nature. Who we really are under the mask of the ego.

In the same way, there is the small love. The basic emotional love we experience associated with other people, with intimate experiences, and with certain memories of the past. And there is the “big” Love. The love that is boundless and unconditional. That is timeless and full.

The small love, like all emotions, is associated closely with the ego and its needs. So it is often a petty love, all about what “I” want and need. Relationships are often founded on this love and fall apart when people change and the other perceives their needs no longer being met. It is mostly taking place unconsciously. The result is that its founded on illusion. It is a mere taste of real Love.

We can certainly get the idea that falling in love and being deeply in love with someone is “true love”. But actually its not. The very fact that you are overshadowed by falling in love, then disappointed when it is lost points to the ego. Certainly, it is a full value of emotional love. And it is reflecting a larger value of real Love. But it is still only an emotion. It is still based on an ego’s idea of other. And it is still based on something “out there”. Another person and their ego and foibles, battered by the seas of change.

As I mentioned, real Love is much, much deeper. It is found at the most basic levels of expression. The first effulgence of Being or Self being aware of Itself. It is bright white light, it is bliss, it is pure, unbounded and timeless. That is Love.

Certainly we can have some taste of that in the loves of our lives. But it is a pale imitation. Real Love is pure, only between the Self and Itself. Only between your own true nature and the same divine nature of another.

If we want to have more than occasional tastes of such real Love, we need to know who we are. We need to connect with our true natures, our inner Self. Then, being that grounded reality, Love will flow from us naturally. Love will flow to all things, without limit. For we are That.

Love is about expression. So there is a subtle duality there. An other for love to flow to. But for pure love, it is only Self within Itself. Anything else is a facsimile at best. We may find the best vehicle for the flow is indeed through another individual. One that reflects our highest ideals of other that will then allow us to allow love. To connect with their divine nature. Or we may find it through a symbol of meaning for us. Or through a personal God, in the same way our highest ideal.

And then Love flows. And we become Love. Love Is. It is all there Is. It is not a dream. It is more real than anything you may otherwise know. The most real thing there is. It is the foundation of every experience you have ever had, every thing you have ever touched, every feeling you have every felt.

Love Is.