One Love

The insanity we seek out is what we call love— the desire to be fully with the beloved, the one that we love.

And it is one that we love. The desire we have is specific, a pulling of our own center outwards, actively seeking what we long for, the object of our desire. And our desire is named, transformative: we long for a thing that we can purchase and own but we personify it, feeling a relationship, attachment, to our possessions. We love a certain state of being, of feelings within ourselves, and we desire to be in the places that we think create those feelings within us. And most of all, we take the people we love and hold them steadily in our thoughts, objectifying the dynamic nature of another human being.

This action of desiring, of actively naming and knowing what we want for and within ourselves, is the work of alchemy. We take an ordinary object, a space we’ve visited, a person we’ve seen and held, and we turn them into the extraordinary, the magic that we long for.

The energy of longing draws us away from what we are already: complete. We feel inspired by the pull, the sense of direction, the path that we are sure will be better, and best, when we have all that we desire.

And there is the insanity: wanting what we do not have. Our eyes and energy shift away, double sighted in longing for what is-not, and therefore blinded to what-is. We look for, rather than look at. But how joyous, uplifting, to know where to pour the energy of passion.

To rebalance, recenter, rediscover the sanity of knowing our innate completion, we only have to find the stability of the here and now. It begins with focus, and expands into awareness. From there, we can truly experience love: knowing that we are complete, and have much to give.

Our desires often stem from a sense of lack; then we love in a grasping, attaching way, clinging to a person, place, or thing as if it were a life raft. From a stable, centered state of mind, we can see that lack is not real, but space is. When we have space as well as desire, we look for filling, fulfillment.

Sometimes we are aware that we have everything we could possibly need, with adequate but not too much space. Then our desire is for inspiration, for an energy to animate our own. We can seek the energy that enhances our own, because it is similar, or the energy that balances our own, because it is very different.

When we have what we need and abundant energy we are already directing towards our path and purpose, then we can care for another. We can take on the joyous responsibility to give our energy to someone who feels the space, or needs the animation that we can offer.

Desire becomes a need, an unsleeping appetite, when we let it run unchecked. In that state, anything and anyone will feel temporarily fulfilling. But when we open our minds, soften the cravings by drawing attention inwards, we can be more subtle in our senses. We notice the qualities of our desire, and of what or who we desire.

From that conscious awareness we can create the bonds that are best: flexible, with the feeling of space, and the certainty of positive effect on both ourselves and the beloved. There is, then, a freedom, an always-choosing to engage and empower that bond. And when we cultivate the energy of desire in this way, we open ourselves to loving not just the specific object of our desire, but loving everything that is within and around us. The one love.