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Love Yourself So That You Can Love Your Neighbor One
of the teachers of the law came and heard them debating. Noticing that
Jesus had given them a good answer, he asked him, "Of all the commandments,
which is the most important?" "The most important one,"
answered Jesus, "is this: 'Hear, O Israel, the Lord our God, the
Lord is one. Love the Lord your God with all your heart and with all
your soul and with all your mind and with all your strength.' The second
is this: 'Love your neighbor as yourself.' There is no commandment greater
than these." The
ancient Jews had hundreds of commandments. Sometimes a teacher would
be asked to summarize the law in the time he could stand on one leg.
Jesus is asked such a question and his answer is very clear. Love is
the core of the law. Love of God, love of neighbor and a proper love
of self. But, what is love? In
THE ROAD LESS TRAVELED, M. Scott Peck has a lot of wise things to say
about love, what it is not, what it is. He says that love is not something
that you "fall into." We do not fall in love. We fall into
a crush. What happens when boy meets girl is basically a sexual reaction
or attraction and is of its nature temporary. It attracts two people
towards each other, it makes them want to know one another better. Love
may grow as a result but the "falling in love itself" is not
love. He points out that love is a mystery and so cannot really be defined.
He then goes on to define it thus; the will to extend one's self for
the purpose of nurturing one's own or another's spiritual growth. There
are a number of things to be noted about this definition. Firstly, It
is a definition that starts from the purpose of love - one's own or
another's spiritual growth. It is looking for the spiritual or overall
or long-term welfare of the other. Unfortunately, much of our so called
love in families is not directed to the good of the other at all. Family
members may be motivated by their own security, saving face to making
an impression rather than seeking the real good of the person. For example,
I once spoke to a nurse who was offered a scholarship to Canada. Her
mother said to her, "I have high blood pressure. If you go I might
die and you will be responsible." This ends the possibility of
a loving relationship. The mother can only see her own need and has
now created a situation in which her daughter is angry if she stays
and guilty if she goes. This kind of thing often happens in families
that claim to be loving. The
second thing to notice in Peck's definition is that as we extend ourselves
in true loving we also grow. Thirdly, it includes self love with love
for the other. Since I am human and you are human, if I am to love people
I must also love myself. We are incapable of loving others if we do
not first love ourselves. Unfortunately, in the process of our education
we have been blamed and scolded so often that we have come to believe
that we are basically bad. We have been made pay for love but very often
we could not come up with the behavior that we were asked to produce
to pay for that love. We then ended up believing that we are not lovable.
It is only when we can accept ourselves as good, beautiful but imperfect
that we can also accept the other who is good, beautiful but very imperfect. I
believe that the great obstacle to love of others lies in the fact that
we have been taught not to be at home with ourselves. If we believe
that we are bad inside then we cannot be at home there, and if we are
not at home there we are not comfortable to bring others into out lives
in a free and detached way. We usually relate to others in a clinging,
grasping or controlling way. Traditionally, we also use prayer to relate
to God in the same way. We use it to help us get the things we think
will make us secure. Meditation is a way of being present to reality. It is a way of being uncritically present to our first home, our inner selves. It is being there without desire of reward or fear of punishment. It is just being present to ourselves as we are. This puts us in the presence of God as God is and sets us free to be present to others as they are. This is love.
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