Divine Definitions: (1) The personification of all true, beautiful, and good qualities; God; (2) The greatest of all excellent qualities; the source of all positive qualities; (3) Charitable; (4) Endowed with admirably balanced qualities; (5) God’s benevolent concern for His creation; (5) The absolute capacity to give and draw intense interest or affection
Comments:
• God is Love. Love is God’s way. Love is the desire to do good for others. Love is genuine and unselfish. Love is best when shared. Love is the greatest thing in the universe and it can be attached to any person. Love is dynamic. Love is alive. Love is best understood in relationships.
• From our point of view, there are many qualities. To God there is only one: Absolute Love. If we parse absolute love, we will discover all of the positive qualities we recognize, and project the probability of many more. Yet in Him they fit together perfectly. He self-limits and balances every quality with every other quality. He is the ideal harmony of love.
LOVE
Human Definitions: (1) a deep affection for another person, idea, or ideal; to hold dear; cherish; (2) to feel a lover’s passion, devotion, or tenderness; (3) one who is beloved; (4) the heart of all true, beautiful, and good qualities; (5) ability to give and draw intense interest or affection; charitable; (6) the ability to elicit great pleasure
Compatible Qualities: caring, friendship, honesty, respect, trust
Consequential Quality: self-forgetfulness
Love is blind. When you are doing something you love, or are with someone you love, you are in a state of bliss that is oblivious to all ills. When you are in love, you think not of yourself; your joy lies in thinking of ways to delight, comfort, and interest your loved one.
At play one is enveloped in the excitement, interest, and concentration on the goal.
Too Far: smothering love
Music: “All You Need Is Love” (1967) — John Lennon (1940-1980) Revolutionary Artist; The Beatles {1960-1970}
Sayings:
• Aloha oe (Hawaiian): “Love to you”; “Greetings”; “Farewell”
• Amor vincit omnia (Latin): “Love conquers all things.”
Poetry:
Good shepherd, tell this youth what ’tis to love.
It is to be all made of sighs and tears;
It is to be all made of faith and service;
It is to be all made of fantasy;
All made of passion, and all made of wishes;
All adoration, duty, and observance;
All humbleness, all patience, and impatience;
All purity, all trial, all obeisance.
— William Shakespeare (1564-1616) As You Like It {1623}
Quotes:
• A single human unloved can set the universe afire. — Frank Herbert (1920-1986) EYE, Death to a City {1985}
• This is my commandment, that you love one another as I have loved you. — Jesus of Nazareth (7 BC-30 AD) The Bible, John 15:12
• That which is done out of love always takes place beyond good and evil. — Friedrich Wilhelm Nietzsche (1844-1900) German philosopher
• If you love, you are welcome in the universe; if you are loved, you are at home here. — Frank Pittman, M.D. (1935-) American psychiatrist
• You live that you may learn to love. You love that you may learn to live. No other lesson is required. — Mikha’il Na’ima (1889-1988) Lebanese poet
• If I have prophesy and know all mysteries and all knowledge, and I have all faith as to move mountains, yet do not have love, I am nothing. Love is patient and kind and rejoices with the truth. Love bears all things, believes all things, hopes all things, endures all things. Love never fails. There abides faith, hope, and love but the greatest of these is love. Pursue love, yet keep zealously seeking all of the spiritual gifts. — The Bible, Corinthians 13:2–13; 14:1
Affirmation: I am deliberately and joyously radiating divine love to myself, my friends, and all the world.
Inspiration: God provided the universe with the original patterns of truth, beauty, and goodness out of the unified reality of love. It is like the splitting of white light into a rainbow. Truth, beauty, and goodness are equivalent to the primary colors of red, yellow, and blue. Further diffusion and mixing of these basics create all of the possibilities of colors and qualities.
Reflections:
• In this day and age when people say “I love you,” what some mean is “I appreciate what you do for me” or “I really like the pleasure you give me.” Although those are facets of love, this is one reason why romantic love fails: the desire to be loved without the balancing need to love another selflessly in return.
• One of the characteristics of love is that it can be experienced and viewed on so many different levels. The highest level, the most spiritual level, is the intense desire to do good to, and for, other people. But not just people. All life is included. The universe is included; even the creature giving love to the Creator.
• The question “What is the purpose of life?” is one we seek until we realize the answer is “To love.” But then, that’s the enlightenment-type of answer. Although it is the simple and basic answer, it is the ultimate answer. It doesn’t tell you what it means. So, then the next questions are: “What is love?” and “How do I love?” These open a Pandora’s box. The diversity is expressed in the concepts of all of the underlying positive qualities making up the nature and value of love. Each positive quality can be traced to its source: love. Each positive quality emanates and is connected to its familial qualities.
Love’s components can be felt and observed. You can experience goodness, truth, and beauty. If you focus on the truth aspects, you recognize justice, faith, wisdom, and courage. If you focus on the beautiful aspects, you will appreciate joy, symmetry, humor, and relaxation. If you focus on goodness, you will feel grace, generosity, kindness, and nobility.
Each quality begets other qualities, and needs other qualities to fulfill itself.
Observations:
• Love is contagious.
• Divine love does not ignore or even transform the negative – it utterly destroys, evaporates, and obliterates it.
Comments:
• Love is infinite. As you approach what seems like the culmination of love, you are experiencing a relative state of perfection. You can plateau on this level, but there will always be greater heights and more valuable connections of understanding, being, and growing.
• The key to true love is not receiving love but is in giving love. The more you give love, the more you understand it; the more you appreciate it, and the more you have of it.
• When you love someone, even their simplest and most innocent mannerisms and traits are appreciated with fondness.
• When two people love each other, they each strive to be the person the other is in love with. There is a strong desire to live up to the loving image held up to you by your lover. If you appreciate yourself as being as wonderful as they say you are, you are becoming that ideal being, and even better. Love lifts both the loved and the lover beyond themselves.
Suggestions:
• Do everything with love.
• Love should not be reserved only for those who love you. Those with a love deficit need love the most.
How to Live This Quality Today:
• In order to experience love, you must love someone, including yourself. Go out of your way to do something pleasing to yourself or another – physically, emotionally, mentally, or spiritually.
• Acts you can do to or for someone you love:
◦ Say “I’m sorry.”
◦ Say “I love you.”
◦ Say, “Thank you.”
◦ Write a love letter.
◦ Be warm and tender.
◦ Take a walk together.
◦ Show your appreciation.
◦ Prepare a romantic dinner.
◦ Sit close together and touch.
◦ Give your special friend flowers.
◦ Find agreement on important topics.
◦ Talk to each other, revealing yourself.
◦ Be interested in the affairs of the other.
◦ Give the other support and encouragement.
◦ Let your lover know you are thinking about him or her.
◦ Be free with your hugs and cuddles, kisses and snuggles.
Color: red
Symbols: 1) Venus; 2) the heart; 3) the hearth; 4) tulips; 5) the number five
Fictional Figure: Beauty and the Beast (1740) traditional fairy tale illustrating the triumph of love over externals
Mythological Figures:
1) Eros, the Greek god of love
2) Kama, the Hindu god of love
3) Cupid, the Roman god of love
4) Astarte, the Greek goddess of love and fertility
5) Aphrodite, the Greek goddess of love and beauty
6) Freya, the Scandinavian goddess of love and beauty
7) Anteros, in Greek mythology, the god of mutual love
8) Ashtoreth, the Phoenician goddess of love and fertility
9) Ishtar, the Babylonian goddess of love, fruitful goodness, and the evening star