Who Do You Love?
Can we ever truly love another? If we are not 100% committed to ourselves, then what hope do we have in being fully open and accepting of someone else?
I wonder if that true love is really only a quality of our own relationship with ourselves/God and never really that of another fellow human?
We all say and sense that there is something “greater out there” and I believe it may be that we operate as our own puppeteer on some other level and on a day-to-day basis live this dichotic life of the “out there” personae and the “in our heads/behind the eyes” spirit. Said another way, our physical life may actually be static in some regards and we are all more or less sleep walking through life in the physical form, with our “true self” (or God as some may prefer) watching over our progress in one slice of time/one continuous moment of observation. We drive our life from the seat of God.
Words fail to describe adequately this topic as others have found throughout time. I am merely repackaging what philosophers have entertained since time immemorial. Since I am attempting to describe the indescribable, language does an injustice to these values since words are limited and I am attempting to describe the limitless. POW!
Back to the topic at hand: If all of this were true, and we could assume that what is “out there” for each of us is, as the Hindus say, merely “maya” or an illusion, and what is “real” is really only the “inside” or spirit/psyche/Christ-consciousness then would it hold that true love is only possible between our inner states (and not the other person as we see them and interact with them)?
What I am babbling about is the fact that being married to someone, having a partner, kids, etc…. all involve open hearts and compassion and all the rest of it, but at the deepest root level, can we ever 100% love them? Can we ever 100% love ourselves? Thus I wonder if true love is really only possible within the inner state and therefore only for and of God?
In conclusion, we can live with other people and say we love them and really mean it, but without being completely “awakened” then we are merely talking about theories while living out something completely different.
As we say in yoga class, “Namasté”, which is supposed to be translated as “May my God-self recognize your God-self”.
Perhaps that is the best way to sum it all up.
Namasté!
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Tags: awareness, GOD, love, philosophy, psychology, reality
psychology | Nicholas Graham October 29, 2009
3 Comments to “Who Do You Love?”
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By Scott Blum, October 30, 2009 @ 12:19 PM
I tend to hold to the view espoused by C.S. Lewis in the Screwtape Letters: “He wants each man, in the long run, to be able to recognise all creatures, even himself, as glorious and excellent things. He wants to kill their animal self-love as soon as possible; but it is His long term- policy I fear, to restore to them a new kind of self love- a charity and gratitude for all selves, including their own; when they have really learned to love their neighbours as themselves, they will be allowed to love themselves as their neighbours.”
But I don’t think that’s something that can really happen in this lifetime. We’re not home yet, and it seems to me this kind of thinking is jumping the gun. If a person focuses on killing the animal self-love and concerning himself with loving others, then in due course I think God will work things out. To suppose that we can ourselves achieve that latter kind of self-love in this life, I fear is to invite deception. We may be merely dressing up that old animal self-love in fancy clothes.
I’m also very leery of the term “God-self” as I don’t really see that concept in Scripture. I feel more like C.K. Chesterton’s statement that “Of all horrible religions the most horrible is the worship of the god within. Any one who knows any body knows how it would work; any one who knows any one from the Higher Thought Centre knows how it does work. That Jones shall worship the god within him turns out ultimately to mean that Jones shall worship Jones. Let Jones worship the sun or moon, anything rather than the Inner Light; let Jones worship cats or crocodiles, if he can find any in his street, but not the god within.”
By Nicholas Graham, October 30, 2009 @ 12:47 PM
Wow, you share some very powerful statements, indeed.
I see your point about not worshiping the god within, as only to invite self-deception and all the rest of the psychological webs we weave.
However, I wonder if there is some merit and/or advantage to at least work with what you have; i.e. the mind within. The mind is so powerful and of course limited at the same time. To understand these limitations and tricks one may be able to make use of the mind as a tool for higher-achievement or perhaps self-realization. I don’t really know.
I do not feel committed either way if giving attention to the god within is beneficial or detrimental, however I do agree that WORSHIPING the god within spells trouble and that to worship anything else besides would be a step in the right direction. [Makes me interested in the writings of this C.K. Chesterton!}.
Interesting way to phrase this self-love as “animal self-love”. Hmmmm… Gives food for thought.
By Scott Blum, November 7, 2009 @ 8:48 PM
What can I say, C.S. Lewis and G.K. Chesterton are perhaps my two favorite modern authors! Some of their words just got burned into my brain it seems.
You raise very interesting questions about the mind. My gut reaction is to observe that intelligence and wisdom seem to be quite independent of each other in human beings. Of the two, wisdom seems to me far more valuable. And though it can be acquired, there’s no sure way to get it. Jeremiah 17:5-10 comes to mind, the central quote of interest being “The heart is deceitful above all things and beyond cure. Who can understand it?”