Sometimes when we’re too close to a situation the idea of sending love to someone that irks us can seem an impossible task.

So perhaps practicing the opportunity to send love to a person who annoys us that we’re not so emotionally attached to, is a good place to start.

The embracing of being part of a global spiritual family is after all, simply an understanding that each being on the planet is just family once removed, and once removed, and once removed, etc.

So to practice sending love to the annoying person on the bus, or in the car in front of us, or next to us on the train, is a lot easier than trying to send it to the person you’re locked into an ongoing stress relationship with.

We can send a loving thought to the stranger that we perceive as annoying. A thought that wishes them peace and insight and clarity and we too, then feel the benefits of that loving thought within ourselves. We too, can see where we are being unconscious or judgmental or unaware in our lives, as a result of sending that loving thought to another.

It then becomes easier to do with the person who we can’t easily get away from or who we are deeply connected with. Even in the midst of a conflict (or soon after) we can wish them love, insight and clarity and then discover that we’re sending that loving thought to ourselves first and foremost. You see, it is us that feels peace descending in that moment.

We’re the ones feeling more peaceful as a result of not going into automatic reaction, or loving ourselves in the midst of an automatic reaction. That peace then exudes into our outer experience, subtly impacting the one we’re feeling challenged by.

They sense a releasing of our judgement, our resistance, and may become more open, more willing to engage at a level we didn’t think possible. Or they may continue to resist, and we will know then that this is their “stuff” and lovingly leave them to their version of the story.

We may find that we’re no longer triggered in the same way if a conflict arises again. For we have chosen to change our role in the drama and our significant other now has to find another being willing to play out that particular drama, in that particular way.

Our spiritual family is everywhere and whether they appear to us as strangers, acquaintances or biological family, they have something to teach us. They give us endless opportunities to see where we are being triggered and where we are not. Where we still have stuff that needs owning, or where we have moved beyond that.

We can know where we are in our developing awareness by seeing who we are able to send love to in the midst of challenging dramas and who we are not. We can see where we are in terms of our growth by seeing where we are sending love to ourselves when we are in the midst of “acting out” or being triggered.

Life and our relationship to life—including with our spiritual family—shows itself to be nothing but an opportunity to step into greater self love and grow and heal from any and all misperception of there being “others” in our experience.

All love is self love, exuding outwards and impacting the world, All feelings of disconnection are the lack of self love, exuding outwards and impacting the world.

This we come to know.

 

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Author: Yve Bowen

Editor:  Travis May

Photo: Wikipedia