If we were to search for the "highest," most
consistent cross-cultural ethical, philosophical and spiritual guideline for living, it
would probably be "to love one another.” Even aliens are telling us to do it or
else.
It's easy to say, and it feels right, but how do we love
one another in a world of lies, deceit, murder, abuse, torture, ignorance, and people who
are simply exasperatingly irritating? How do we get from the words to the act without
being false to our real feelings and just acting a part?
Actually, pretending to love each other is a lot better
than killing each other, but we don't have to let that be our limit. We can learn to love
each other to a far greater degree than we do.
There is a way that works, that is simple, and that
doesn't take a lot of effort. The trouble is, it usually isn't easy.
It's easy to love people who make us feel good. It's easy
to love a smiling baby, children playing happily, or helpful adults. It can be very hard
to love a screaming baby, destructive children, or arrogant adults. It might be nice to be
able to step instantly into unconditional love, but it is more practical to think in terms
of expanding our love from where it is now, maybe even by just a little bit at a time.
Like the idea that a long journey begins with the first step, the road to loving one
another can start with one instance of more tolerance, or one un-rewarded act of kindness.
The experience of loving one another may be active or
passive. Active loving is doing something for the benefit of someone else. There can be
personal benefit in it, too, but for it to be called active loving the intent to benefit
another must be the main reason for doing it.
Many things we do out of habit or obligation could become
acts of love if we would only think of who we are benefiting by doing them. Even paying
bills or paying taxes could become acts if love. Inhaling could be an act of love if you
do it with the thought of giving oxygen to your cells, and exhaling could be an act of
love if you do it with the thought of feeding the plants of the world.
Passive loving starts with tolerance and slowly moves its
way up to appreciation. The way to increase tolerance is to start eliminating some of your
rules. Everyone has rules about right and wrong, good and bad, possible and impossible,
etcetera and etcetera.
When someone breaks one of our rules we tend to get upset
and either nurse our anger, criticize the rule-breaker or commit violence against them as
punishment. Sometimes all three. The rules that have this effect most often contain the
words "should" or "shouldn't." Have you evergoten upset because
someone in front of me drove right past a stop sign? Maybe one of your rules is that you
shouldn't drive past stop signs without stopping. Well, it also is a state law, but the
evidence that your personal rule had been broken was that you probably got upset about it,
even though maybe there was no traffic and no danger.
So maybe you should change your rule to "If someone
wants to take the consequences of breaking the law and they aren't endangering anyone
else, that's their business." My new rule could not only increase your tolerance for
others, it could help reduce your stress level, also.
Consider this: if you want to leap from tolerance
to appreciation, you could have admired the stop sign runner's daring. But, then, maybe
the other person didn't even see the sign!
Appreciation really takes off when we get into the habit
of noticing more of the good things in people than the bad. This is without a doubt the
most effective way to start, maintain, and repair a relationship.
There is actually a funny little thing about loving one
another. It gets easier to do the more you love yourself, both actively and passively. In
the commandment to "Love thy neighbor as thyself," it is assumed that you love
yourself because otherwise it doesn't work.
