Gaia Community: Love Tribe's Blog

Over and Over, I Love You

http://lovetribe.gaia.com — Wed, 27 Feb 2008 19:28:18 GMT

We put together a little collage of clips from our indie-film-in-production, "1000 I LOVE YOUs," and set them to music. The result was so wonderful, such a powerful communication of love, and such beautiful evidence how very endearing every human being is, that we wanted to share it with you here.

Enjoy, and pass the link along everyone you love!

For more information about our indie film, "1000 I LOVE YOUs," click here.

Tags: love, humanity, endearing, cute, video, music, uplifting, 1000 I Love You's, indie film, Living Love Fellowship

Love Tribe International is born!

http://lovetribe.gaia.com — Sun, 20 Jan 2008 06:01:00 GMT

If you're interested in starting your own Love Tribe where YOU live, we want to encourage and help you in any way we can. Let us know!

How to start your own Love Tribe

A Love Tribe is a group of people who are committed to creating friendship and support for each other, and working together to love and serve the world.

The basic formula is simple:

Regular meetings
Unity of spirit
Group Discussions
Cooperative service

Regular meetings: Create camaraderie with one another by meeting on a regular basis. It takes time and consistency to deepen friendships, so we encourage you to meet often enough to be a keep the feeling of connection alive. You can decide how frequently you want to meet, and modify it as your group takes shape and grows in inspiration. Here are some options: twice a week (recommended), once a week, twice a month.

Unity of spirit: Unity of spirit is what makes any group feel like a real spiritual family. To cultivate unity of spirit with each other and to generate an abundance of love, well-being, and spiritual attunement to bring to the group’s activities, we recommend starting each Love Tribe gathering with a brief meditation using a technique called "Unification." Unification is non-sectarian, entirely based on love, and simple enough for anyone to do. Meditate for whatever length of time feels right to the group. Some options are: three minutes, five minutes, ten minutes.

Click here to download a PDF of the instructions for how to do Unification.

Discussion and personal study: To enhance the effectiveness of your Love Tribe mission and to deepen your relationships with each other, we provide weekly discussion topics to incorporate into your Love Tribe routine. These materials (short readings with study questions) can help you develop a deeper understanding of love, service, humanity, and God.

Your group can use these materials as conversation starters at group meetings, and distribute them to members for private reading and consideration. These will be made available on a new website we’re currently developing to support the proliferation of Love Tribes. We’ll announce the URL here when it’s ready!

Cooperative Service: Serving the humanity is a very important part of Love Tribe’s purpose. Serving is a great joy to every human being, and a way to give love and care to others in forms that are clearly wanted and needed.

Also, it is great spiritual gift to learn how to harmoniously work together, make decisions together, and give your energy together. The high energy of a cooperative work team richly feeds both the givers and receivers of their works.

If your schedule allows, end each Love Tribe meeting by going out and doing a service project together. Or, you could do a service project at every other meeting, and have the group discussions at the meetings in-between. Whatever works best for you.

Look for appropriate opportunities to serve people in your neighborhood or city. And when there aren't any convenient opportunities for community service, take turns helping each other at your own homes.

Please contact us if you want to start your own Love Tribe!

Tags: love tribe, lovetribe, group, tribe, service, relationship, cooperation, community, spiritual family, humanity

Caring Enough to Find Out

http://lovetribe.gaia.com — Thu, 13 Dec 2007 01:30:02 GMT

There’s a lot of talk about bringing our spirituality to the workplace and not separating our spiritual life from our “normal life.” I finally got what that meant in my relationship with a co-worker.

I sat side by side with a coworker who I found very hard to understand. Basically, everyone thought she was nuts because it was seemingly impossible to understand where she was coming from, or what she meant when she said things. People would tend to get a little cross-eyed listening to her statements. And we would often roll our eyes when talking about her.

Just about every other day, with great exasperation, I would tell my mentor, Sara, about something unintelligible my co-worker had said to me, hoping to get Sara’s sympathy for my troubled situation. Sara would regularly reply, "Well, did you ask her what she meant?" Feeling justified in blowing my poor coworker off, I replied "Heck NO I didn't ask what she meant. She's nuts!" What a jerk I was -- I totally admit it.

Finally, one day it dawned on me that my position really stank, and nothing was changing or getting better. I needed to give this person a chance, and remember Sara’s advice WHEN those things were happening.

So the next time my coworker said something "crazy," I asked her what she meant. I still didn't understand her explanation, but now I was interested. So I asked what she meant by THAT, and she kept talking. Eventually, through enough talking, I understood what she meant, and surprisingly, she actually made sense to me! Even more surprising, once I had made all that effort to understand her, I actually began to feel affinity for her.

For weeks I went through this process with her, setting aside my knee-jerk reaction to her, and instead asking what she meant by things. I tried to understand where she was coming from, and asked for clarity from her each time it was unclear. We started to be able to talk through things, and to think together about how best to do our work. It was imperfect, but it was better, and our relationship was becoming sincere.

Then, she started opening up and telling me all kinds of things about her life and her current feelings. As I listened, she felt cared for. I became more and more interested in her, and started to really like her, to love her, and to understand her heart, and I desired to understand her even better. We became friends! Eventually, I knew what she meant without even asking her, even when it sounded crazy, because I understood the kinds of associations she made, and where they stemmed from. In the end I could explain to others what she was talking about, and would, on occasion, even speak for her because I knew where she was coming from.

More importantly perhaps than this, is the fact that she started to trust me. When she said something that really didn't make sense, I could talk with her about it openly and offer a different perspective so she could have more clarity -- I started to be able to help her be more clear, and cogent, and intimate. Together we became better people. I became less judgmental and more caring, willing to go deeper with people in general, and she became more understandable, more capable of saying what she meant, and more open-hearted.

It was a miracle of love – thank you Sara, and thank you love!
-- Mati

Tags: love, crazy, understanding, meaning, work, workplace, spirituality in the workplace, mentor, affinity, difficulty, reactivity

Addicted to Love - Skit!

http://lovetribe.gaia.com — Tue, 20 Nov 2007 01:33:59 GMT

Addicted to love? We are too!

Here's one of our favorite skits for your enjoyment.

Love, The Love Tribe

Addicted to Love - Love Tribe

Robert Palmer: Dinari
Air Drum: Mati
Air Guitar: Radha
Air Synthesizer: Carolyn

Tags: Love, skit, dance, music, addicted to love, Robert Palmer, Dinari, Mati, Radha, Carolyn, entertainment

Our Bi-Coastal Meditation

http://lovetribe.gaia.com — Sat, 17 Nov 2007 13:05:28 GMT

Our new meditation hall

This past weekend we dedicated a new meditation hall here at our home, and last night we had the best possible housewarming for the new room. Our dear friends at the Church of the Porch joined us for our evening meditation. The love and energy was so strong between us, we generated lots of love to flood the whole world!

We've been told by God that when two people who are far apart hold each other in love, everyone in between is blessed by that love, too. So, although normally we wish we weren't so far from our beloved Porch, last night we used our distance to real advantage... from Myrtle Point, Oregon and Atlanta, Georgia, to all!

Meditation Candles

Much love,

Sara

Tags: Love tribe, The Church of the Porch, group meditation, love flood, friendship

What Love Is

http://lovetribe.gaia.com — Fri, 16 Nov 2007 08:35:30 GMT

Dear friends,

We have been asked by God to give enormous love in this world. That is what we are trying to do, every day, in really down-to-earth, tangible ways. And that is what we invite everyone to do with us.

What does it mean to be a lover in this world? David Truman gave a tremendously moving explanation ten years ago, and to this day that talk remains an unparalleled description of what love is. Tonight he posted two video clips from that talk in his blog, "What Love Is!". If you want to love in a way that really makes a difference, it will help you.

Here is a very moving story from it (just to give you a taste; there's much more in the blog):

The Greatest Olympic Champion

"The greatest guy in all Olympic history was the time they set up this incredibly diabolical course that everybody remembers as being the worst marathon course they ever set up, because the stadium was on top of a big hill. And so it happened that you got to run 26 miles and then you went up this long grade. Climb, climb, climb, climb at the very end. So this one guy comes through.

Did you see this documentary movie of this Olympic event?

This one guy comes through and there’s a tunnel, like where the football players come out. They come out through the tunnel into the stadium. This guy comes through the tunnel into the stadium and he’s so tired that he gets disoriented. So he starts running in random directions. All he has to do is go one lap around the official track in the stadium to complete the 26, but he can’t do it, because he doesn’t know where he is. So he starts running randomly. And, if you touch him, he’s out. You can’t assist a runner in a race, or he’s disqualified. So nobody could do anything, but watch him run back and forth without knowing where he was.

So, what happened? He ran around a bunch, and then he fell down. And then he got up, and he ran around a little more, and then he fell down. And a little more, fell down. Pretty soon you saw that he could not finish the race.

This guy is the champion of all time, and he lost the race and he never even finished the race. But he ran until he couldn’t run any more. Nobody else did that! What a runner! This guy is a national treasure. And throughout all history, as long as there is a copy of that film, everybody ought to know — this guy is a runner. This guy is the all-time champion of all Olympic champions, because he’s the only one who ran till the end. His end. His."

-o0o-

Also, you can get some fabulous, everyday ideas about loving from this article on the Soul Progress website: "How to Buy Happiness... By Being 100% Committed."

Love,

Sara

Tags: love, commitment, David Truman, Olympics, self-sacrifice, giving, unselfishness

The Cure for Depression

http://lovetribe.gaia.com — Tue, 13 Nov 2007 03:01:44 GMT

depression

Is there a cure for clinical depression? Millions of people want to know. Some of those millions are on antidepressants known as Prozac, Zoloft, or Paxil trying to get some relief. I used to be one of them. As a young teenager of 15, my first boyfriend broke up with me for no apparent reason. In response, I went into an existential depression so deep that I completely withdrew from life, alienated most of my friends, and thought most of my days would be better spent in bed so I could avoid as much as possible. I developed all the symptoms of depression that they tell you about – thinking that life was not worth living, gaining a bunch of weight, and losing interest in most of the things that used to make me happy. I created a living hell for myself, mostly due to the constant barrage of dark thoughts I was willing to entertain on a daily basis. Though I didn’t see that at the time.

My depression continued for years after the break-up – though the degree of it did lighten up some. It just didn’t completely go away, all the negative feelings and judgments toward myself and my ability to make my way in the world. I didn’t really understand it, why I continued to feel so bad and hard-pressed to make any worthwhile commitments in my life or to feel positive about anything. What the heck was wrong with me? This wasn’t how a human being was supposed to feel. I knew that some of my family members were taking Prozac to alleviate their own bouts with depression. I thought maybe I had the “depression gene” that was messing up my body chemicals and making my life difficult. At that point, I was willing to try anything because I was in so much emotional pain. I found a psychiatrist who asked me a few questions and was more than willing to give me Prozac as a possible solution to my problems. I was 19 years old.

I tried it for about a year, and it totally didn’t work! I felt the same. Exactly the same! No magic cure for me. I was still emotionally unstable and moody as hell, chronically insecure, and very dissatisfied with my life.

My saving grace was that I still had my spiritual sensitivities intact, and they led me to my spiritual mentor David Truman, despite the internal madness I felt inside. My life began to change when I learned that the real cause of my suffering was my MIND. You know how they say your thoughts create your reality? Well I had no idea just how negative my thoughts and reactions really were until my mentor pointed that out to me. Mostly I rode an emotional rollercoaster with no one steering the ship. My mind was a wild little pony that had the freedom to roam anywhere it wanted, and I did very little to control it. Naturally, I felt victimized by my negative habits, and felt it was all just “happening to me.” Why me? The truth was, I needed to take responsibility for the quality of my thoughts, attitudes, and interpretations of things – which tended to be predominantly negative to this point. I needed to intentionally and committedly steer my mind and life in a truly POSITIVE direction. I needed to become a loving and giving person, not someone focused so much on herself and living in her “own little world.” So I decided to give it a try. It took a few years to start seeing a positive result that lasted more than a few days, but now I can honestly say that most of my days are GOOD days. Clinical depression no longer applies to me, and I’m no longer riding an out-of-control emotional rollercoaster.

I suppose it’s easy enough to say, just discipline your mind and life will work swimmingly. But there’s another practice that goes hand in hand with mental discipline, that is truly the great healer and redeemer. And that is the practice of LOVING. To be loving in your life and outwardly oriented is to have a higher purpose besides selfish desires, reactions, concerns, and fears. If you are spending your time loving and serving others, you don’t have time to think about yourself. This is the way to true, lasting happiness. No amount of contemplating one’s navel ever did that.

And the truth is, God didn’t make our lives impossible to resolve. He has given us unlimited choices, and the free will to choose as we wish. We each have beautiful life possibilities, which wait only for us to embrace and manifest them. Over time, as you more and more consistently choose positively and discipline your ego mind, you will strengthen spiritually. And, by making those same good choices, you will be building a great foundation for the life your heart desires. With a strong commitment over time to achieve this, it can be done! I’m living proof of it.

Love,
Carolyn

Related articles:
The Yoga of Love
Love : the Only Solution

Tags: David Truman, Love, depression, negative thoughts, anti-depressant drugs, meds, fear

Divine Reminder System

http://lovetribe.gaia.com — Mon, 12 Nov 2007 05:14:50 GMT

I don't have a long history of meditating and I've recently started meditating regularly. When I sit down and begin to quiet my mind, generally all sorts of practical items flood into my consciousness and I have to put them all aside.

On this particular day, one of the things that popped into my head was an important reminder to contact a friend of mine. This person needed to receive a message and the sooner she got it, the better. I knew I didn't have any written reminder about it yet so I opened my eyes to look around for a note pad, hoping I could write it down and get on with my meditation with an empty mind.

No luck! It just so happened that there was nothing to write on in that room. "What should I do?" I thought to myself. I have a very busy schedule and a short time planned for meditation. If I go out of the room now to take care of this, I will have shortened my meditation too much.

Then I remembered reading that Jesus had offered to help in times of need.

I closed my eyes and connected with Jesus in my heart. "Jesus, will you remember this thing for me and remind me when I'm done so I can proceed with this meditation?" I was immediately flooded with a feeling of quiet confidence, the type you feel when everything has been effectively handled. I settled down and went on with my meditation.

When I was done, as I was getting up from my seat, the reminder I needed was delivered to my consciousness! Joy and gratitude also filled my heart. What wonderful caring support had just been delivered to me in the form of this reminder!

Off I went to take care of the message that needed to be delivered to my friend.

Love, Dyana

Tags: meditation, meditating, Jesus, Divine, support

A Divine Dream

http://lovetribe.gaia.com — Tue, 06 Nov 2007 02:50:32 GMT

I feel so happy today, and blessed. I had a wonderful dream last night of love and goodness, and God. In my dream I was going to see God. I approached a statue that was in a reclining position. It was so beautiful. It was slightly larger than life-size, and it was made of a very smooth stone, and it looked like a kind of Buddha, with a great roundness in feeling, like an African woman. I approached the statue of God, and as I did I was filled with the most amazing love. I immediately put my hands to the face of God in a caress and I felt myself loving God completely. I was absorbed in this radiant feeling of bliss and then God spoke to me. Though the image didn’t come to life, God said, “You know. You know what to do.” And I felt so happy. So incredibly happy.

I found out later that morning that David Truman had put up a new blog last night (Divine Help and Divine Being,) and I thought I would pop over to his Gaia page and take a quick peek, just to see. Well, I did see! The photo on his blog was almost exactly the image of God in my dream -- a little different in appearance, but identical in feeling. I was floored! I called Amadon and told him and we were both amazed.

The Divine is finding as many ways to get the word out on love as can be found. So keep your heart open. God’s words of love are everywhere. I’m sure you know what I mean.

Love,

Radha

Tags: Divine Love, Divine Dream, David Truman blog

Identity Theft – Let Them Have It

http://lovetribe.gaia.com — Tue, 06 Nov 2007 01:03:47 GMT

In the new world of cyberspace our identity has become a valued commodity. Everywhere, protection against identity theft has become an important consideration, and the decision to protect oneself against this injustice is an important step in the lives of most people today. But when we look to those who we admire the most, those spiritual beings who are able to shine the light of God through them and bring divinity into everyday life, we see that they have let go of their identity and with that, their egoic persona. So therefore, when faced with identity theft, I say, "Let them have it!"

When you see an Amma or a Dalai Lama, what do you see there? Is it a list of favorite this and most disliked that? Do they seem to have a lot of angst, personal problems and distrust? No, they don't, because when they got mugged in a back alley of Calcutta, or had their entire country stolen, they let them have it. And they loved the thief that took it.

Fair credit reporting act
So when you have a particularly good moment with someone else and give your love to them, but your ego is saying, “That’s not me, I’m not like this normally.” Don’t listen to it; just let the identity thieves steal it. Make a fair assessment of things and ask yourself, what good has my ego done for anyone, anyway?

Identity crisis looms statistically
Let’s look at some statistics that might help give a broader perspective on this VERY SERIOUS worldwide problem.

As you can see in the graph above, identity theft is on the rise. Projected statistics based on yearly incidents are going exponential, with skyrocketing events leading to a worldwide identity theft crisis. Thank God! And good riddance.

But what does this mean to me?

There’s no need to worry about yourself. Our Divine Parents created us all as a chip off the old block, and they didn’t skimp on endowing us with all the best in divine qualities, either. Qualities like love, compassion, beauty, feeling emotion, caring, attention, etc. Only problem is, we’ve decided to protect all the other things that we’ve created on our own, and decided that all of these qualities are “keepers”, too. Things like insecurity, distrust, doubt, selfishness, insincerity, inattention, etc. Your Divine parents knew what they were doing, so have a little faith in their divine creation - You. Maybe it’s time to take a trip to the trash bin and lighten your load of a few of your own “personal favorites” that others find less amusing than you do. Your friends will notice how much lighter and more divine you feel and thank you for it.

Love,

Hanuman

Related articles:

Save YourSelf – Abandon "yourself"!

Uncreate Yourself

Tags: ego, love, identification, personhood, identity, divine, spiritual, compassion, attention, co-create, transcendence

WindSky, a Spiritual Love Story begins....

http://lovetribe.gaia.com — Sun, 04 Nov 2007 04:16:12 GMT

In this blog, we will periodically share excerpts from a book currently in preparation. This book, WindSky, is comprised of letters exchanged between our spiritual teacher David Truman, and Mana, a teenager from South Africa who was destined to become Asha, another of our spiritual teachers. It begins as fifteen year old Mana searches the internet for answers to deep spiritual questions, and discovers the spiritual teachings of the Living Love Fellowship. The first letter in the book is her initial inquiry about the teachings. Amadon, LLF's founder, responded to Mana’s inquiry, and soon became her friend and mentor.

On one level, WindSky is a unique journal of spiritual dialogue between teacher and student, covering a wide range of spiritual and emotional concerns. On another level, Wind Sky is a love story — a living chronicle of the evolution of a growing love between a man and a woman. After three years, Mana and David finally met in person — and married.

~o0o~

CHAPTER 1

About Love

July 2002

I have read a lot of what you have to say and am extremely interested. You see I'm right at the beginning of a search for the truth. I've looked at every religion that I could ever imagine myself being involved in and find that there is a strong force of good behind all of them, but in the same way each of them closes the doors of any other religion. For this reason I find it almost impossible to commit myself to any religious spiritual path because I cannot deny the truth and goodness that lies behind all of them. I would like to keep an open mind towards all truth and love based religions while still following some sort of pathway. Your method of spiritual development seems to me the best option and so I would like to start now. You should be aware that I am 15 yrs old and therefore a difficult student 50% of the time. Taking into consideration that teenagers are difficult students (in any subject), I am asking you to teach me in any way you will.

My biggest spiritual problem at the moment is my impulsiveness, hot temper and inability to control myself. I'm afraid I have a reputation for being a wild streak but I'm working on a more stable lifestyle (without much success so far). I want to gain wisdom, develop my relationship with God and find inner peace and the ability to love purely and untainted. Your help would be appreciated more than you can imagine. Thank you for your wisdom. Please write back if you're interested in teaching me in some form.

Mana

P.S. Having read some of your teachings I haven't yet come across a statement that I would recognize as purely of one source or religion. Where have you picked up the teachings that you know?

_______________

Dear Mana:

Thanks for your interest. I was very impressed with your understanding for a teenager.

We agree with you, that there is truth and goodness in all religions. Only dogma and prejudice are bad. To be open to God and to love is best. This is what real spirituality is all about, all over the world, and probably all over the Universe.

God gave you the inner wisdom to know these things in your soul. You are greatly blessed to be so keenly aware of these true things.

We built this teaching out of the good things we learned from many religions. You noticed that. We wanted to show that the basic spiritual truth is something all religions and all people can know, and do know.

And also we have learned many things directly from the still small voice. Especially I have learned from It, because this is something I can hear. I am led and guided, and that's just the way it has been for me, for a long time now. I got that because I wanted that bad, and for a long time, so I was given that. "Knock and it shall be opened," you know.

And we also learned from talking to people, and being with people. I spent many years asking more questions than anything else. And so people told me many things, and I learned a lot of things from people.

I know what you mean about how teenagers can be difficult. But really, teenagers are a not a problem — ego is a problem. Ego meaning being selfish and self-centered, and not loving.

You can take courses from us. We will give you a mentor for that. And, if you like, because I respect where you are coming from, I would be glad to write you about any questions if you want, and things you are going through. That is what I am here for, you should know. You will be important to people, and that's another reason why I would invest energy in you. I will talk to you about anything, as long as it is real and important to you, in your life.

As you know, it is not religion that a person really needs. What they need is spiritual wisdom, and a way to connect personally to God, and to their own higher Self.

To connect with God and your higher Self within, the most important thing is that you love in your heart. This is how to do it: Sit down maybe twice a day, for five to twenty minutes, and love with all your heart. Who are you supposed to love? Just love! You can love other people, or God, or if you want, you can love the whole world. But just do it sincerely, and feel it truly. When you do that, I bet you will begin to feel God's presence. That's how you know you are loving for real. Okay? Just try that for a day or two, and let me know what you think. Okay?

Later on, once you get the hang of this part, then I will show you how you can do that with your friends. God will show you wonderful things when you do that, because God said, "The Kingdom of Heaven is among you." And He also said, "Where two or more are gathered in My name, there I am also." My friends all do this, together, and I can tell you one thing — God keeps His promises!

Be good — and being a little bit wild is not necessarily too "bad," you know. Don't be too hard on yourself, Okay? But at the same time — as you know — you must control yourself better, and you must be especially careful not to hurt others with that temper. Okay? Otherwise, it will be very hard to feel good about yourself. So just take care of it? You can do it. You just have to decide, that's all there is to it. Do it for love’s sake, Okay?

Thanks for all your interest and your true sincerity.

Bye for now,

David Truman

_______________

(...a few letters later...)

Dear David,

I did the love thing for the first time last night. I've always thought that the act of loving is to give but everyone was asleep so I had to start somewhere else. I began by thinking about what I love about the people closest to me. Concentrating on that made me feel the love I have for them very intensely. I even discovered that I love the things about them that irritate me. I felt the most amazing warmth. It was as if love was flowing through me. Soon I had reached a deep realization about how much I really love everything and everyone, even the people that I don't get along with (including myself). I realized that they are all part of me in a way, and we are all entwined in each other's lives and beings along with the rest of creation. Even when I stopped concentrating and moved onto some things that I had to get done the love stayed there. It was still there when I woke up this morning.

This morning I loved actively. By talking, and looking after some of my parents needs. When I'm with them and loving them I feel as if I'm shining and the light is reaching into them and lighting them up. I think it uplifted the mood of the household. I don't plan to wait until tonight to start again. I think that the only way to live is to love as much as you can. As soon as you make the decision to love there seems to be a huge supply of love in your heart ready to be used. Love is endless and it seems to become more and more a part of us. It feeds life into you and all those around you. I think that it is the purpose of man, to love each other and God.

I have seen that the problem with most relationships is that people are always thinking of how they have been affected and how things have hurt or healed them. I think that for a relationship to work, people need to take each other's feelings on themselves. In other words they need to suffer for each other, be happy for each other, and care about each other’s feelings and needs, in place of each other. As soon as people are willing to forget themselves and worry or rejoice for some one else, there is nothing that can break the relationship except for a willful change of heart, which is unlikely once you reach the point of true love. True love is living for others as you would live for yourself.

Thank you for your guidance,

Mana

______________

Yes, my dear Mana:

Good job! You tried, and Love responded to your love, as I knew it would.

I feel the softening of your spirit in that. My dear girl, a little piece of yourself, a beautiful piece, is returning to your awareness. In all the chaos you experienced you were hardening, and becoming too fearful. That's when you start putting up the walls. So this is good, now, because you are coming back to the goodness in you.

Love has an active aspect, and one should use it. Your comments on that are true. Yes, one should be there with friends, in every feeling, and this personal love. We are on the same page on that. I have long objected to the spiritual idea of impersonal love, because people do need to love personally, with great care and real personal commitment, as well as “generally.” Besides, love involves real sacrifice, and the love that someone will not show is probably not a very strong love. You must love in action and in your mind.

Do remember, though, to love with your heart when you are loving with your body. Then it is complete and whole. That keeps it being love, and makes sure that it never becomes just going through the motions.

About your love meditation: When that love flows through you, at some point, it becomes God's love that is flowing through you. Then you realize this vibration of God is around you. Then, at some point, you love everyone, not just someone. And then you realize that you are Love, just as God is Love. At that point, it is best just to surrender yourself, and just be with God. The most blessings radiate from that, so it is okay that you are not trying to love then, just being love at that stage.

You said: “I did the love thing for the first time last night. I've always thought that the act of loving is to give but everyone was asleep so I had to start somewhere else.”

But Mana, as you see, giving is not just actions, like doing favors, taking care of, or doing dishes. Giving is also these things:

You give your heart. You give your tenderness and feelingness and empathy and consideration and realness. Oh, what gifts those are whenever they are shared!

You create a gift in your mind, which you can then give later. This is like making a painting or a poem for someone else, because you work on it in advance. It might take hours to make it, but then, taking time to make a gift is part of the giving, yes? For example, you can give people a good feeling about themselves by holding a good feeling about them inside yourself. Then when you see them, that feeling that you stored up for them comes out even if you don't outwardly express it. They can feel it anyway. When you feel their beauty and goodness, they can feel that, and this makes them feel so much better.

Our thoughts about people are — or can be — great gifts. For example, have you ever thought, "I wish people would just recognize me. They just think I'm a stupid child, or I'm irresponsible, or over-sensitive, or something. I just wish they would think well of me, and have faith in me, and hold me as my higher Self.” You know, if someone would cut you some slack, and have faith in you, what a difference it would make! That might be the biggest and best gift of all. So, when you start your giving in your mind and heart, you are doing for them as you would have them do for you. This is the answer to that prayer everyone has: to be thought well of.

You see, everyone feels what we think of them. What you hold someone to be in your mind and in your heart has a huge effect on them. So, by thinking thoughts of loving and blessing for people, we are creating in ourselves an attitude that will be supportive of them when we see them. Actually, it’s supportive of them already. It is a great thing we can do to help them, to think beautiful things about who they are. Yes?

And then, another part of loving is being:

When you are love, then you automatically radiate that love. And this gives love to everyone around you. Like when you see a friend, and they are so full and so happy, that makes you happy instantly! You feel it. They are giving you a great gift just by being in that condition, yes? Like they say, you can't give what you don't have. If you are love, and you are in the bosom of love, then you have much love to give.

So, part of love is creating in yourself the state or condition in which you are able to give.

This is the primary love-reason for you to avoid that downward spiral you were in: it makes you unhappy. And if you are unhappy, it is hard to help others to be happy. The love-reason for avoiding bad stuff and trouble is to protect and cultivate the seed of your happiness better. Then you are not involved in too many thoughts of fear and shame and terror. It is knowing your limits to say, "I cannot do this and most likely still be happy."

Granted, no one can always be happy. That would be fake. But you can protect your happiness from too many low things, and there are things you can do to boost your happiness also — with higher things, positive things. And so, you do what you can, and it makes a difference. That's all.

I have been working on being in a high state for people lately. I do it exactly as I have instructed you. I am extremely aware how much difference my state is making to people. It makes them happy when I am full. And then, everything we share together gets to be higher and brighter. And I must say, I am seeing more beauty in people when I am coming from a higher place. And they can feel that I am seeing the beauty in them, and that makes them feel good. This hardly requires any talking between us. You can sure feel it, even if nobody says anything. So that works.

Love is worth investing in, yes? These are things I believe in, and I work for. Things of the heart.

Love,

David

_______________

Dear David,

Thank you so much! Through loving people I have seen so many changes take place. I wouldn't have believed it was possible. I “worked on” loving my parents most of this day and by this evening they are more close to each other than I've seen them in years. They are appreciating each other for all that they are. It's as if the love that I purposely gave them today is growing and shining in their relationship with each other. Love has worked miracles in my house today. I almost can't wait to get to school tomorrow and love all my friends in the same way.

It's wonderful to be able to tell you these things. This kind of talk makes many people I know uncomfortable. Because of that, I don’t really feel like I can really talk about all the amazing things that are happening in me right now with my friends. I just don’t think they would respond that well. What do you think I should do?

Once again, thank you so much.

Love,

Mana

~o0o~

Tags: Asha, David Truman, WindSky, Mana, Living Love Fellowship, student-teacher relationship, disciple, love, love story, spiritual teachings

You Are the Most Beautiful Thing God Could Think Of

http://lovetribe.gaia.com — Sun, 04 Nov 2007 00:01:12 GMT

During a meditation, I got this sublime teaching from Heaven about the way God feels about each of His/Her children. I’ve done my best to put it into words. Enjoy!

You are the most beautiful thing, the most beautiful thing God could think of. That is you!
God’s love for you is enormous. The Divine Mother, the Divine Father, sees and feels the perfection of what you are, and who you are. She made you that way – perfect. She made you that way.

He loves you with the love that is pure and perfect. He loves everything about you. He loves your nuance, and your boldness, your bigness, and your youth, your maturity, and your depth, your simplicity, and your passion. He loves your comprehending nature, and simple sweet innocence. Everything about you God adores, for you are His special child. And He loves the way you love things – the way you see life, the way you feel about it in your heart, when you really tell the truth about IT.

God sees all that you do, and loves you. God knows all that you think, and loves you. God never leaves your side, and is always inside you. Your heart is the home of God, your love is the home of God, your mind is the home of God, your body is the home of God. All that you see is God, and all that you are is God.

God is you, and you are entirely made up of Him.

EveryONE is a most incredibly beautiful and unique and brilliant individual. That is why you find people so charming, when they are expressed and simply being themselves. Your heart floods out to them, because they are so beautiful, and when your heart does not flood to them, it is because either they or you have forgotten who they are, or you are not responding properly. If you saw anyone, a tear would come to your eye.

Love,

Mati

Tags: God, beauty, God's love, love, home of God, individual, message from God, meditation, Heaven

Selfishness and Spiritual Aspiration

http://lovetribe.gaia.com — Sat, 03 Nov 2007 23:53:56 GMT

Beloved Fellow Spiritual Aspirants,

I want to talk with you all very honestly and humbly about a problem that I’ve had that I think many spiritual aspirants also have. It is a problem of selfishness and a kind of selfish orientation to life, and even a selfish orientation to spirituality.

Personally, I’ve had a lot of mystical, beautiful, and wonderful experiences with God. God has graced me with great visions, beautiful emotions, with Her own Divine presence dancing and living through my body. And all of God’s intentions and orientations to life and people, are those of love. The most beautiful, tender, and intense love.

God loves people, and God wants what’s best for people. With a sublime sensitivity She will always dance with those before Her in such a way as to make them feel so loved, so held, so appreciated and known, in a way that makes them feel at home. That is the kind of love that I have known from God through mystical experience and even at times in direct relationship to loved ones.

And then I have known the way of ego as an everyday experience and motivation, the tendency to give people short shrift, the tendency to cut corners on my responsibilities, the tendency to want things to work out well for me, the way I want them to. Even in my spiritual ascent I have wanted these things and not really let them go sufficiently to be more or less continuous love and stability for those around me. And I have learned that even my highest states of rapture and God-consciousness can quickly fall like a stone due to insufficient attention to my friends, or to the practical realities of life.

So, I’m sharing this with you because I do not want you to do what I have done – to be overly enamored with mystical life, and insufficiently attentive to the care of our friends.

The truth is, spiritual life is the life of love and surrender, for the benefit of the beloved (and the Beloved is those around us, our friends, our co-workers, the people who are counting on us for love and steadiness). And we need to bring our mystical experiences of love into real life, and cultivate a kind of personal responsibility that is Godly. That is the work there is to do.

When our loved ones feel that they can count on us to be openhearted, steady, practically responsible, and rightly sensitive to them in real life, then we really will be succeeding spiritually. Until then, “we’re on the way, and in the way,” as one of my closest friends likes to say.

I have five friends who are primarily out of the way, they move as the spirit moves and not as the ego moves. What they do is they help. They help people all the time. They write to people, they cook for people, they plan for people, and they are honestly available to help people sensitively round the clock. These five friends are the pillars of spiritual inspiration and sustenance in my life, and they’ve helped me learn, over the years, what real spirituality is.

You aspire for a long time to be enlightened, or to have some intense spiritual experiences or knowing, or to have certain kinds of relational fulfillment that may not be all that pure, and then it dawns on you one day, that what really needs to happen is you need to be a good person. That it would just be so wonderful to just be a good, trustworthy person, who people rely on, who friends come to talk to openheartedly, who feels good towards people and life in general, and who is willing to help however it’s needed, without personal complications, or anything like that. Just to be a good person. That’s it. It seems so nothing, but it is so much. It is love, pure and simple.

Love!

Mati

Tags: spirituality, spiritual ascent, god-consciousness, rapture, ego, selfishness, love, friendship, responsibility, fulfillment, stability