The Mercury / Tuesday

It is always time to love.

These unique days offer each of us extraordinary opportunities to learn about it in new and deeper ways.

When I say “us” I mean all of us.

I mean people on every continent, of every faith tradition. I also mean people who claim none and those who have formerly been enemies.

I have been good at love, even unselfish, for rare moments. Mostly, I have loved in selfish ways even though “selfish” and “love” are contradictions.

I want to be better at it.

I want to improve my love skills.

Please join me.

I have witnessed and experienced authentic love and noticed:

• Love seeks the highest good for all concerned.

• Love sacrifices wisely so others may benefit.

• Love is never jealous. Jealousy expels love.

• Love wisely forgives. Wise forgiveness remembers so traps, errors, manipulations, are not repeated. It is possible to forgive and to remember – actually it is rather wise.

• To employ a metaphor, love is a long-haul journey and not a brief walk in the park. It takes thirty or forty years for love to mature.

• Love resists all forms of coercion. It really does make others free.

• Love considers the big picture and not immediate returns.

• Love is not about who the “other” is or is not, it’s about who and what the one doing the loving is.

For a (far) superior definition take a long and enduring study – a month or two – of what the apostle Paul (formerly Saul) had to say about love in 1 Corinthians 13…. the whole chapter, not only the portions traditionally used at weddings.

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Posted on March 30, 2020 at 11:27 am in Difficult Relationships   |  RSS feed |   Reply   |   Trackback URL