Hello,
And welcome to this guided meditation on the nature,
The essence of God and love.
Let us begin the meditation by establishing the body in a comfortable position.
A comfortable position is one in which nothing is tugging or pulling at the body.
It is recommended that we maintain the spine in an erect position that enables that we remain alert and aware throughout the meditation,
But if at any time minor adjustments need to be made in order to alleviate strain or stress on the body,
Please do so.
And once we have established this position of comfort in the body,
We may begin to deepen our relaxation by focusing on the breath.
And as we begin to relax into our state of meditation,
We may begin to contemplate the nature of love and God.
We may start by remembering that it has been said that God is love.
And in one sense,
This is true.
This may be so,
But to say that God is love is also to say that love is God.
And this is not necessarily true.
The two are not necessarily equal or the same or interchangeable.
It would be better to say that God is and also that love is.
But what is love?
And what does love have to do with God if indeed God is?
We might begin by saying what love is not.
Love is not an activity.
It is not something that we do.
Love is not an action.
It is not a verb.
No matter how hard we try,
We cannot do love.
And despite what we may have heard,
We also cannot choose love.
Love is not a choice.
When we speak of love either as an action,
Something that we can do,
Or a choice that we can make,
What is happening is we are confusing what we call love with something else that we call devotion.
Devotion is an action.
And devotion can be a choice.
Devotion is something that we may show or do.
And devotion may be ignited by love or it may be demonstrated by choice.
And in fact,
Over time,
When we consistently choose to demonstrate devotion,
This may even result in love being revealed where love had previously not been recognized.
In other words,
The act or choice of devotion may result in the discovery or the uncovering of love.
Another thing that love is not is an emotion like pleasure or sadness.
These are sensations recognized in the body and which rise in response to stimulus.
Lust,
Physical attraction,
The chemistry between two humans.
These should not be mistaken for love.
These may lead to love or the uncovering of the recognition that we call love.
But they are not love.
Love is possible without these sensations.
For example,
Parents holding a newborn child know love.
And some will say that a mother's love is due to having been literally connected to her child,
To having shared the child's being for a time.
This is part of the reason but not the whole of it.
Father knows love as well.
Father was not part of this connection necessarily.
The reality is that all things are connected.
All are one.
One is all.
Because there is no other.
There is no separation between subject and object.
Between I and you.
Me and mine.
Between mind and matter.
There is something prior to all of these from which all of these arise and out of which all of these are made.
In the same way that an oak tree grows from an acorn.
But not without water in the soil,
Readying the nutrients of the soil,
Enlivened by sunlight,
Enriched by carbon dioxide,
Exhaled from breathing bodies.
Just as the fetus in a mother's body is nourished by the mother's own food and the air that she breathes and the star that warms her skin.
In essence,
What is shared by the fetus and the mother,
The acorn of the soil,
And the breath and all things that are one thing,
Is actually being itself.
Love simply is itself the recognition of our shared being.
Love is the dissolution of the sense of separation between I and other.
Love is the crumbling of the wall that says,
I am me and you are you and the world is made of other stuff.
Love is the realization of the source of all that is prior to all and gives rise to all and is in harmony with all.
To describe love beyond this is to ask words to do more than they are capable of doing and thus they are the words of poets.
And so the question is,
What has love to do with God?
To answer this we might say that if God is and if God is the source of all and all arises from God and is within God,
Then because of this,
Love is known.
We might also say that love is and therefore God is.
The guided meditation has come to an end,
But you are encouraged to remain in silence and in quiet contemplation.
Namaste.
