“What is love?”
We are in error if, after asking such a question, we then attempt to use our intellect to provide the answer. Such an approach would be the same as a child in kindergarten attempting to come to terms with The Theory of Relativity.
An experiential awareness of what love actually is comes to us from what we do not know.
The capacity to authentically intimately comprehend love is given, not gotten, because attaining it is beyond our current physical limitations, mental understandings, and imprinted emotional predicament. However, this does not for a moment mean we cannot dive into its unfathomable depths. On some divine level this ‘diving into an experiential awareness of what love is’, and most likely ‘drowning what we currently assume about ourselves in the depths of what is revealed’, is what we are here for.
Love is what I am here for.
What we may trust is that by sincerely asking “What is love?” we invite a wave of unexpected dismantling and re-framing of everything ‘we thought love was’. This means a dismantling and re-framing of everything as we thought we knew it, us, and our world to be. This dismantling and re-framing of everything is what most of us are alluding to when we declare: “On some level the idea of exploring intimacy frightens me.”
It is therefore important to approach an exploration into intimacy as humbly as possible. We are to expect to, at times, to be humiliated along the way as our assumptions shatter. It is important to ask the question “What is love?” from the point of view of one who sincerely admits to knowing anything about it – even if we still mentally assume we do. Asking “What is love?” is the same as asking “What am I?” or “What is God?” There are no greater questions – and when asked sincerely – the experience we are setting ourselves up for cannot be surpassed or in any way anticipated.
What is also useful, when asking such a question, is to remind ourselves we are living in an ‘ask and receive’ and not an ‘ask and go get’ universe. This may not be obvious to us right now, because we live on a planet infatuated with seeking answers, not asking the questions. Whenever we ask a question we automatically seek a fast food version of the answer – one that can be instantly transmitted to us through a book or through mental communication from someone we assume ‘knows’.
Others may impart 'their understandings' to us – but only we have the capacity to truly ‘know’. ‘Knowing’ is a deeply, intimately, personal experience.
Accepting others understandings as being ‘the answer’ won’t wash if we are serious about exploring intimacy. Our task is not to answer the question, “What is love?” - our only task is to ask it. The question is causal – the answer if the effect. We currently live in a cause and effect paradigm, and this arrangement works well for us when we work it. It also works against us when we ignore it – or are ignore-ant of it.
Whenever we ask a question and ‘go get’ the answer using our limited physical, mental, and emotional capacities – we confine the caliber of the answer gained. What love is cannot be know through any level of confinement. For many – such limiting answers may be enough. Most of us believe what we read in books and see on TV over and above what our experience is actually revealing to us in each moment. Such an approach won’t benefit us if we intend exploring intimacy authentically.
Approaching intimacy authentically requires embracing our experience as it is unfolding in each moment as being our most highly honored teacher. When we ask “What is love?” we are served best by not trying to figure out how to answer this question emotionally, mentally, and physically. The most efficient approach is to stay in the question – to remain in a causal-consciousness about it.
When we approach the adventure of exploring intimacy in this way the answer unfolds organically - in an integrated manner - somehow revealing itself miraculously through the limited parameters of our ongoing emotional, mental, and physical experience. Only love itself knows how to accomplish an intimate response to our seeking. Being integrated and organic, the answer to this question unfolds in a manner tailored specifically for us – in a manner we are able to experientially contain according to our current perceptual capacities.
We commence such a profound journey by simply and sincerely asking:
An experiential awareness of what love actually is comes to us from what we do not know.
The capacity to authentically intimately comprehend love is given, not gotten, because attaining it is beyond our current physical limitations, mental understandings, and imprinted emotional predicament. However, this does not for a moment mean we cannot dive into its unfathomable depths. On some divine level this ‘diving into an experiential awareness of what love is’, and most likely ‘drowning what we currently assume about ourselves in the depths of what is revealed’, is what we are here for.
Love is what I am here for.
What we may trust is that by sincerely asking “What is love?” we invite a wave of unexpected dismantling and re-framing of everything ‘we thought love was’. This means a dismantling and re-framing of everything as we thought we knew it, us, and our world to be. This dismantling and re-framing of everything is what most of us are alluding to when we declare: “On some level the idea of exploring intimacy frightens me.”
It is therefore important to approach an exploration into intimacy as humbly as possible. We are to expect to, at times, to be humiliated along the way as our assumptions shatter. It is important to ask the question “What is love?” from the point of view of one who sincerely admits to knowing anything about it – even if we still mentally assume we do. Asking “What is love?” is the same as asking “What am I?” or “What is God?” There are no greater questions – and when asked sincerely – the experience we are setting ourselves up for cannot be surpassed or in any way anticipated.
What is also useful, when asking such a question, is to remind ourselves we are living in an ‘ask and receive’ and not an ‘ask and go get’ universe. This may not be obvious to us right now, because we live on a planet infatuated with seeking answers, not asking the questions. Whenever we ask a question we automatically seek a fast food version of the answer – one that can be instantly transmitted to us through a book or through mental communication from someone we assume ‘knows’.
Others may impart 'their understandings' to us – but only we have the capacity to truly ‘know’. ‘Knowing’ is a deeply, intimately, personal experience.
Accepting others understandings as being ‘the answer’ won’t wash if we are serious about exploring intimacy. Our task is not to answer the question, “What is love?” - our only task is to ask it. The question is causal – the answer if the effect. We currently live in a cause and effect paradigm, and this arrangement works well for us when we work it. It also works against us when we ignore it – or are ignore-ant of it.
Whenever we ask a question and ‘go get’ the answer using our limited physical, mental, and emotional capacities – we confine the caliber of the answer gained. What love is cannot be know through any level of confinement. For many – such limiting answers may be enough. Most of us believe what we read in books and see on TV over and above what our experience is actually revealing to us in each moment. Such an approach won’t benefit us if we intend exploring intimacy authentically.
Approaching intimacy authentically requires embracing our experience as it is unfolding in each moment as being our most highly honored teacher. When we ask “What is love?” we are served best by not trying to figure out how to answer this question emotionally, mentally, and physically. The most efficient approach is to stay in the question – to remain in a causal-consciousness about it.
When we approach the adventure of exploring intimacy in this way the answer unfolds organically - in an integrated manner - somehow revealing itself miraculously through the limited parameters of our ongoing emotional, mental, and physical experience. Only love itself knows how to accomplish an intimate response to our seeking. Being integrated and organic, the answer to this question unfolds in a manner tailored specifically for us – in a manner we are able to experientially contain according to our current perceptual capacities.
We commence such a profound journey by simply and sincerely asking:
“What is love?”
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