One of my gurus, Radhanath Swami said, “Everyone is looking to Love and be Loved”. I too believe that we are all searching for loving connection. Not just “us humans” but every living entity is looking for this, including all the bugs and animals and every other creature is in some form or another looking for love. Yet, in the world today, this love is not easily accessible. This is so paradoxical because love is our eternal nature. We are naturally programed to love, but our conditioning makes this challenging.
We have smart phones, tablets and a slew of cool apps which can connect us to anyone, anywhere and at any time. We humans of the 21st century are so tech savvy, yet we find it hard to have a heart- to heart connection with another human being. It can be difficult to look at another person and see beyond their material designations.
Simultaneously, it’s so easy to see others as different from us that is almost happens on a subconscious level. Oftentimes these differences are conspicuous because they reside on a material platform. We may look at others and mechanically notice that they are of a different gender, race, socio-economic background, religion, age and otherwise. Yet we don’t always look at another person (or animal for that matter) and think, that being too has a soul and wants to love and be loved.
Oftentimes differences can be advantageous because they are what makes us all so unique. And it is with this individuality that we can develop authentic and loving relationships with the Divine. We can see the Divine how we want to see it, call it a name that we want to call it and have a relationship that resonates with our soul’s frequency and desire. Yet this relationship is developed on a purely internal level, not a level that is linked with skin colour, religious designation, caste, etc. To see beyond these external difference takes spiritual vision. It’s a vision that we all have yet can be challenging to access.
When I think of God or the Divine, I do not think of someone who cannot endlessly love. Rather, I think of someone who loves endlessly irrespective of how we practice spirituality or what we call God. I think of someone who sees our intention and our devotion, not which religion or group we do or don’t belong to. As such, it is up to us to have this endless love or everyone and everything irrespective of material and fleeting differences.
One explanation of Spirituality which has always resonated with me is the analogy of a mountain. At the apex of the mountain is the highest truth- whatever you may call it. Some may call it mukti or liberation, some may call it Heaven, some may call it Freedom and others may call it our true Home while others have a different name. There are many routes we may take to get to the top. We can walk in the footsteps of great spiritual teachers, or we can go our own way or perhaps do a bit of both. Yet we all ultimately have the same goal which is a goal of endless love. In seeing this as a factor that unites us all, we can be undivided in our faith to reach the supreme truth.
