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Rules #43: Learning to Love Others: "For Love & Love Alone"

"To others we are not ourselves but a performer in their lives cast for a part we do not even know that we are playing." Elizabeth Bibesco (Haven)

The Role of a Lifetime

Whether we realize it or not, the role that we play in the lives of others - those we know and those who know of us - is that of karmic instructor. It is the same role that others we know play in our lives. Each of us is constantly teaching all others around us - by our words and actions - about different ways of being. From these examples, each decides what to do and how to be as we make our own journey through the universe.

Love One Another as God Loves You

So as Thomas Carlyle said "everyone is my superior in that I may learn from them." Often others teaching us what NOT to do/be is just as valuable as their teaching us what to do/be. Being open to learning from others is the first step on the long journey through the universe that we all undertake to unfold into greater levels of love, joy, and awareness. It is easy to SAY that we love others but...

It is more difficult to SHOW that we love others. All it takes to show that we love others is to "love one another; as I (God) have loved you." (Bible: John 13:34) Treating others with such loving kindness is easier said than done.

So how does one begin to love others?… by doing the following:

1> LOVING OTHERS IS ACTING AS IF THEY ARE WORTHY

"For one human being to love another… that is perhaps the most difficult of all our tasks, the ultimate, the last test and proof, the work for which all other work is but preparation." (Rainer Maria Rilke)

Everyone exists because God loves them and with that love all things are possible. Everyone is perfect in God's eyes and is loved more than they will ever know. We are our own worst enemy when we think, act, and treat others as anything other than Divine Beings. When we think "I hate them" or "They do not deserve to live" or "Too bad they are (fill in the blank)… otherwise we could be friends" or "If only they were more like me" or "If only they believed like me", we are saying the God made a mistake when "they" were created.

Constant criticism of others does nothing to change them and it hurts us. Being unloving to others is like taking poison and expecting them to die… when it is you who will be harmed by the barrage of your unloving thoughts towards them. To stem the tide of negativity towards others, you need to start one thought at a time.

As you go throughout the day, for every person you see (yourself or others) say silently to yourself "I love you as Soul". Soul Love is impersonal and unromantic. You can love someone's Soul even if you actually hate everything about them because their Soul is the "love" part of them. It is the perfect part that God sees, that God knows, that God loves. That is how you can connect with their worthiness and act as if they are worthy… and really mean it (for more click here)!

2> LOVING OTHERS IS RESPECTING THEIR BODIES

"We too often love things and use people when we should be using things and loving people." (Rueul Howe)

The primary means for showing love to others is respecting the body that God gave them. To respect the bodies of others requires that you do it no harm. Most would agree that doing obvious things like helping others to breathe, eat, drink, sleep, get exercise, receive proper clothes and shelter - especially where they have difficulty in doing this for themselves - shows other people's bodies respect.

If you love the other person, contribute to their health by nurturing their bodies with loving touch. Leo Buscaglia (the "Love Guru") has rightly said that four hugs a day are the minimum for good health, 8 a day are really needed, and 12 a day lead to personal empowerment (for more on loving touch, click here).

To show love to another, work to encourage them to love their own bodies. So often we join others in the present day trend of "woundology" (Caroline Myss) where we trade stories about how ugly, bad, or imperfect our bodies are.

Let's stop the insanity: love is the only way to respect bodies whether it is yours or others. Think for a moment how hard it is for you is exist in a world without love… this is often how your bodies live all the time. They go on quite unappreciated: who can work well under those conditions? No one!

3> LOVING OTHERS IS RESPECTING THEIR MINDS

"Love is a good teacher, it teaches in no time at all." (Pierre Corneille)

Mental "woundology" is greatest damage that we routinely do to one another. We think that by sharing our sorrows that we are supporting others. The reality is that continually sharing heartache - especially once the painful crisis has passed - only serves to keep our wounds and theirs alive. For what we lavish our attention on is what we manifest into our reality. Everyone has made their share of mistakes… we are meant to learn from them and move on.

We show the greatest respect to others when we refuse to keep their pain alive… when we speak of ways that they can solve their problems and move past their pain. Or when we show them the path to their own empowerment or how to achieve their dreams… anything but nursing their pain.

4> LOVING OTHERS IS RESPECTING THEIR EMOTIONS

"Love is an irresistible desire to be irresistibly desired." (Robert Frost)

Emotional "sandbagging" is another way we often disrespect others. We encourage sandbagging when we recommend "ego defenses" which have us inappropriately handling our emotions. Help others to deal with the emotions head on… for that is the truest love and the highest form of respect. "Ego defenses" include:

* denial ("the upsetting event is not really happening to me"),
* repression ("the upsetting event really never happened in the first place"),
* dissociation ("was there an upsetting event? I cannot remember one"),
* projection ("the upsetting event is happening to anyone else but me"),
* minimizing ("the upsetting event happened but it is no big deal… so what?"),
* conversion ("the upsetting event will be OK after more sex, food, drugs").

5> LOVING OTHERS IS RESPECTING THEIR SPIRITUAL BELIEFS

"Love is the only satisfactory answer to the problem of human existence." (Erich Fromm)

Religious beliefs are the most sacred part of any individual. In many different past lifetimes, I have been a Jewish rabbi, a Roman Catholic priest, a Russian and Greek Orthodox priest, a Protestant minister, a Buddhist monk, a Hindu cleric, a follower of Confucius, Lao Tse, Islam, Sihkism, Shinto, and numberless other religious, spiritual, and philosophical paths. I have translated religious texts (for the best of these, click here) into many languages over the course of several lives.

I have great respect for all beliefs for all religious paths can lead one to a greater love for God. I show this respect by not trying to convert others to my point of view. For I know that each path contains it's own beauty and offers it's own special gift to it's followers (for more on this, click here). I have found that showing this respect is one of the greatest gifts of love that I can give others.

6> LOVING OTHERS IS ACCEPTING THEM AS THEY ARE

"We love the things we love in spite of what they are." (Louis Untermeyer)

No one is perfect, not me, not you, not anyone else. No matter what you dislike about others, it is of vital importance that you value others - just as they are right now. For by doing so, that is how we create peace within our own hearts. The fact is that we all are - from the saints to the sinners - a "work in progress": changing every day and evolving into becoming who we already are.

As Philo the philosopher advises, "be kind, for everyone you meet is fighting a hard battle." When you can accept others just as they are right now, this is the ultimate way of respecting the hard battle that they are fighting. If you can think of them as Soul, as a being struggling as you are, you will find that it is not so very hard to achieve this level of acceptance.

7> LOVING OTHERS IS SHOWING THEM KINDNESS

"All disease is related to a lack of love… all healing to giving & receiving unconditional love." (Bernie Siegel)

Love is the most powerful force in the universe. It is the universal solvent which cuts through all hate, all fears, all obstacles, all difficulties. Where difficult, problematic relationships exist, it is due to the absence of love energy between us and others. By always holding thoughts of loving kindness toward others in your heart, you rebuild the love energy bridges between you and other(s).

This dissolves away the problems between you and others like magic - without you trying to change them (which would be a form of psychic attack and bad karma). Giving unconditional love to others is the greatest gift that you could ever give them.

8> LOVING OTHERS IS SHOWING THEM COMPASSION

"Love is the strongest force the world possesses, and yet it is the humblest imaginable." (Mohandas Gandhi)

Although it may be hard to believe, the truth is that everyone does the best they can with what they have. For everyone is just living out what they have learned in this or previous lives. Compassion comes when you realize that those who hate and hurt others are just lashing out against times when they were hated and hurt themselves. For it is then that you can see that "it is the pain talking" and not the person.

Given that you understand there are no truly bad people - only hurting people who say and do bad things - you can be compassionate towards every person in every situation. Pouring the oil of compassion, tolerance, and understanding on the troubled waters of daily life is the very essence of loving others.

9> LOVING OTHERS IS SHOWING THEM RESPECT

"Love is the extremely difficult realization that something other than oneself is real." (Iris Murdoch)

Everyone is a spark of the Divine and brings a unique note to the universal song we are all singing (notice that the word uni-verse means "one song"). This means that everyone has something unique and valuable to contribute. Even though you may not understand their contribution or believe it is valuable, know that it is.

Unfortunately, the world is all too ready to teach us that others should be discounted because they differ from us in some way (gender, race, nationality, religion, etc) when we are all the same and equal as Soul. That is why the word "Namaste" is such a powerful greeting because it conveys respect in a very pure way. For when we respect ourselves and others, we are acting from one of the deepest places of unconditional love.