Ah, what a wonderful feeling it is to be in love. To look into the eyes of your beloved, child, sibling, friend, can evoke that wonderful alluring, mysterious feeling that we consciously or unconsciously seek to find in life. Singers can transport us into that feeling, so too can poets, dancers, photographers, plays, paintings; anything of the arts really that offers an opportunity to feel deeply into ourselves to find that space of inner beauty and connectedness. So where does this feeling come from? What IS love? Certainly not quantifiable by science at this point in time. We can’t put our heart under the microscope and say, “Ah, there it is….” and yet it would appear to be centred in the heart area of our chest when we feel for its presence.
I used to wonder what was happening for ‘the other’ in the deeper loving exchanges. Say for example you are in the depths of a really long, profound hug. That feeling of warmth is starting to spread through the chest area and seemingly radiating out through your entire body. Where is this LOVE to begin with? Where was it just before you felt it? Where does the feeling go after the exchange, when it seems to kind of fade out with the passing of time…….? What is happening energetically in this exchange? (I am not refering to physical chemistry at all here, rather the energy behind any of the physical happenings). Is the love being experienced by one participant, flowing to the other? Are we experiencing their love? Or is the energy of love a joint energy, created by the coming together of two souls who are somehow attracted to one another? So many questions and so many ideas about what is happening. What is the universal truth behind this experience?
Sometimes things feel too big to comprehend. Then one day along comes a writer whose words and explanations ring so true for you that there is a tingling excitement as if you have just unearthed a precious diamond in the dirt while kicking rocks. For me this writer is Dr David Hawkins. An enlightened, recently deceased American psychiatrist whose life was devoted to assisting others. His insights are recorded in a number of books. (I highly recommend Power vs Force and/or Letting Go.) David describes his journey into enlightenment as well as his discovery of the levels of consciousness during his many years on the planet. A brief precis may be as follows.
The levels of consciousness are the feelings that we all know well. The lower ones that belong to our personality are Shame, Guilt, Apathy, Grief, Fear, Desire, Anger and Pride. The soul attributes of consciousness are Courage, Neutrality, Willingness, Acceptance, Reason, Love, Joy, Peace and Enlightenment. We move around these lower levels (and occasionally the higher) frequently as life sends us the things that life sends. eg. The birth of a child may evoke, Love. The death of a partner may evoke Grief, the loss of a job may evoke Anger and so on and so forth. We accept this as the norm. However, Hawkins advises that the purpose of humanity is to transcend the suffering of the lower levels of consciousness and to reclaim our lives as soul and spirit. Eventually after much work has been done to divest ourselves of attachment to a series of beliefs that cause suffering in the lower levels, it is possible to LIVE in LOVE.
What does this mean? Traditionally our belief is that love arises as a result of an external source. We are prompted in to Love by a partner, child, friend etc. They are the catalyst. While this can still be true, a far greater truth is that this great love sits at our core as our true essence. We ARE LOVE. The heavier energies that we play with in the lower realms of consciousness distract us from being our unique, magnificent selves and awakening to this truth. When living IN LOVE it is not impossible to have LOVE taken away from us. We ARE love. No-one needs to validate us, praise us, hug us, elevate us. Life will send whatever it sends and there is simply a feeling of love flooding perpetually through us. We have awoken from our slumber. This shift in consciousness is usually accompanied by a deep motivation to be of service to others and to offer the information that may assist others to rise through the levels of consciousness also. The number of souls living IN LOVE on this planet are few, but their legacy is monumental. If this minute tasting, creates a stirring inside you, have a look at Dr David Hawkins writings and see if it resonates for you.
