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Defining Love

Love is our greatest need. What is the difference between love and attachment? How can we determine whether what we feel is love or attachment?
How can we purify our love and move into a higher level of consciousness? These are some of the many questions that we need to answer in order
to create happiness.

Love is perhaps more easily described by what it is not. Love is not fear, hurt, pain, jealousy, bitterness, hate, separateness, lust, attachment, aggressiveness,
ego-centeredness, indifference, possessiveness, suppression - the list goes on.

Love can be perceived more easily through the effects that it creates. We cannot see the wind, but we can see its effects, such as the leaves moving, branches
swaying, or the sound of air rushing.

What then are the effects of love? Love creates feelings of unity. We feel toward others as we feel towards ourselves. We are as interested in their welfare,
happiness, success, health and spiritual growth as much as we are about our own.

Loving others means wanting them to be happy in whatever ways they are guided to their happiness. Love encourages understanding, compassion, forgiveness,
happiness, excitement, peace, joy, fulfilment and a desire to be helpful in any way we can.

Love is the ability to let go of our self-interest and personal needs enough to really hear and understand the other’s needs and interests. It means caring enough
to sacrifice, when necessary, our own pleasures and desires when the other’s needs are more important.

Our basic nature is love. However, our ignorance, mistrust, fear and attachment have buried it so deeply within us that it is sometimes difficult to find or
maintain. Loving others steadily, in spite of their behaviour, is not easy.

Love Is NOT Need

We often use the word love when we really mean, "need". We say, "I love you." But, if we analyse ourselves deeply, we may come to realize we really mean,
"I need you."

This is not the highest form of love. It is love mixed with need, attachment and addiction. If it were love in the purest sense and the other was happier by
leaving us or even happier with someone else, we would be happy for him or her, not full of sadness for ourselves. Loving others means wanting them to be
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happy, healthy and successful in the ways that they are guided to be.