For most of us, Valentines Day is an opportunity to take a moment and express to our friends and family how much we love and appreciate them. Certainly this is a wonderful concept to put into practice. However, after thinking about this for a while, I decided that having one day to express my love is simply not enough time, so I made the commitment to see every day of my life as Valentines Day.
As I see it, each day is an opportunity to express my love abundantly, and to practice keeping my heart open under any and all circumstances, regardless of what they are. These are the moments when we put our spiritual teachings to the test. If we can have an open heart when things aren’t going our way, or when others are saying things or acting in ways that we feel aren’t appropriate, we are walking our talk and are being love in action.
Consider this: If we only express our love when the people in our lives are behaving the way we want them to behave – isn’t that kind of love conditional? It’s relatively easy to be loving when things are going our way. But how often does life unfold exactly according to our expectations? The key is to recognize that you cannot be judging someone and be loving them at the same time. These states of being are mutually exclusive, and either you exist in one state or another in any moment. Of course you can love your partner with all your heart and then 15 minutes later be screaming at them because they didn’t do something you wanted them to do. But in those moments you’re in judgment and you’re allowing your ego-mind to take over your life as you’re placing your expectations upon your partner and then judging them according to your mind’s rules and regulations.
The challenge is to go beyond this kind of behavior and re-program ourselves to be in love in every moment. This takes having clarity and the willingness to see that we are judging and to be able to detach from the need to be right rather than happy. This doesn’t mean we cannot express a point of view. Of course we can. But there is a huge difference between saying how you feel with love and a smile – and getting mad at someone and projecting your fear-based emotions in their direction. If someone is not going to see your point of view, then they’re not going to see it regardless of whether or not you’re smiling and being loving – or screaming at them. So if you have a choice – why not be in love rather than angry? A very interesting side-effect occurred as a result of me putting these ideas into practice in my own life. I started to find myself feeling “high” as a result of putting out so much love, and I started to perceive my reality differently. I began to see the perfection in all things and felt gratitude rather than resentment for the events in my life. Rather than encouraging my addiction to the chemicals that flow through our bodies when we get upset – I was starting to become addicted to the chemicals that flow through our bodies when we are in love. This in turn helped support my commitment to being in love even further simply because I felt physically better.
So I offer you a challenge for this month – explore projecting love at all times and if you are feeling frustrated, confused, angry or even a bit of righteous indignation – take a moment to get clarity about what you are believing about your situation and then ask yourself if you enjoy being angry or if you’d rather be happy. If you’d rather be happy, then realize that to do so you must let go of your desire to be right – simply express your point of view with love and let it go.
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Sheri Rosenthal DPM and Susyn Reeve M.Ed. are co-authors of WITH Forgiveness - Are You Ready? and co-creators of the WITH Forgiveness program at www.withforgivenessmovie.com. They both enjoy giving workshops, lectures and taking folks on spiritual journeys (you can see them at www.journeysofthespirit.com ), and being extremely happy! You can reach them at www.withforgiveness.com.
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