Love isn’t a concept. It isn’t a story or a belief. It isn’t just a feeling either. Love is a remembering. It is a remembering of our true authentic nature…our wholeness.
When we’re really experiencing love we’re not "trying". We’re not pushing or pulling or struggling to be anything different, and we’re not attempting to change anyone else into someone different either!
We feel love when we accept who we are, where we’re at, and who others are and where they’re at, without a story or agenda. But what if we’re not satisfied with who we’ve been being or where we’re at, or with where someone else we’re in relationship is at? What if we’re not feeling the love? What if we’ve been thinking that things need to be different before we can feel the love?
Here are 3 tips for feeling and expressing more love no matter what the circumstances:
1. First find where you’re NOT feeling the love in your body/mind
Locate the actual physical region of your body, the place where when you touch it you feel sad, anxious, hopeless, etc. If you’re not feeling love, then there’s going to be a physical location where your body has anchored a more uncomfortable feeling. It might your chest, solar plexus or belly for example. Acknowledge that area to yourself by lying on your back or sitting in a chair and searching with your hands to find the place that feels the most "icky". Hold both hands over the area and while breathing in through your nose and out through your mouth tune into the area under your hands. Take a moment to become aware, to really be present with the feeling.
2. Notice the range of motion, the energy flow and your depth of breathing
When you’re not feeling love you’re not in your natural state of being. So, you’ve got to discover where you’ve disconnected or diminished your authentic depth, range and flow of movement, energy and breath. As you breathe in through your nose and out through your mouth in that same area of your body, notice where your breath energy and movement are synergistic and fluid and notice where they’re not. Notice how your body moves in the area under your hands. Notice the energy flow in that area. Is it restricted? Is it uncomfortable. Take a moment to acknowledge the kinesthetic feeling of the area.
3. Accept yourself where you’re at
Once you’ve become aware of and acknowledged the region of your body associated with not feeling the love, then all you’ve got to do is accept it as it is, in other words accept that that’s where you’re at. You might hold the area (it is often the symptomatic, painful, irritated area that you’ve been trying to "get rid of") and say out loud, "Right here it feels like nothing works." or "Right here I feel hopeless" or "Right here I feel like this is never going to end". This acceptance of what you’re feeling, while touching the area and tuning into the somatic or physical sensations gives feedback to your brain that allows you to integrate that part of you back into the whole.
This integration is essentially a remembering that the part was never separate in the first place. It just wasn’t getting your attention and acknowledgement…or acceptance. Ultimately there are no unlovable parts of us, just parts that we haven’t been accepting because we’ve got an agenda to change them.
The more authentic and accepting we are of those parts of ourselves that we’ve been avoiding or disconnected from, the more love we can feel for ourselves and therefore the more love we can express in the world.
Dr. John
Find me on Twitter: www.twitter.com/johnamaral
Great tips, John! I especially love the idea of diagnosing where in your body you feel the least loving.