20 LOVE


We can love any number of people equally and totally and we have
the capacity to love every person on the planet.

The most basic example of human love in this reality is the mutual love
of our parents, our spouse and our children.

One facet of this love is that we can love two parents totally and equally.
If we have more than one child, we can love them each totally and
equally. In other words, if we have five children, they do not each
receive one-fifth of our total love. They each receive 100% of our
total love.

In fact, if we think about it, we do not divide our love between our
parents, our spouse and our children. They all receive all the love that
we have without reducing our total capacity to love one single bit.
We love them totally and not as a percent of totality.

However, if we generalize to an elementary example like polygamy, we
refuse to acknowledge that a man can love two women or that a woman
can love two men. To further generalize, we tend to believe that no one
can love everyone the same. We believe that only God has the capacity
to totally love us all. These beliefs are false.

Another facet of love is that when we love someone, we make
allowances for their behavior which irritates us or makes us mad. If our
loved ones hurt us, we tend to forgive them or ignore their behavior
because we love them.

However, we apply a different standard of love to our parents, our
spouse, our children and even our close friends than we do to everyone
else. We overlook the faults and negative conduct of our loved ones
because of our love for them. But we generally refuse to overlook the
same conduct in others.

We seem to have a very difficult time applying the same standard of love
that we have for parents, spouse, children and friends to the rest of
society even though every human being on the planet, in truth, is
possibly someone's parent or spouse, is definitely someone's child and
is probably someone's best friend.

Why do we not treat everyone the same? Why do we draw lines that
separate us from the majority of society? And how can we justify
treating others like alien beings?

When we forget that we are at one with God and at one with each
other, we lose the ability to love ourselves. Loving ourselves becomes
easy when we look inside ourselves and remember our oneness. When
we remember that we are at one with all of Creation, we flow in the
peace and harmony of God's infinite, unconditional love which is the essence
of our being.

Inner peace comes when we begin to see other people as our parents,
our spouse, our children and our friends.

Inner peace comes when we apply the same standard of total love to
everyone, refrain from judging them and forgive their unkind words and
deeds.