The power of Love.

One day my teacher told me of an incident that had happened in the monastery. An English woman, a friend of his, had arrived and was immediately angry with him, standing in front of him shouting and waving her arms. I was shocked to hear this, for in my mind I could not understand how anyone could be angry at this beautiful, smiling brown skinned man, so I asked the question, ‘Bhante, what did you do ?’

« Oh, » he said, ‘I just waited for the anger to pass, then my friend was back.’

This is the power of love.

Without understanding, perhaps this story shows that when we are weak, we will accept the anger and abuse from others ?

With true understanding, we will see that it is the absolute power of love that allows us to be in difficult situations in life and not take them personally and equally importantly, not be drawn into the madness of the world and react, like with like.

When there is no wisdom and no love this is how the world manifests. Anger leading to more anger, fighting leading to more fighting, killing leading to more killing.

Hatred is never overcome by more hatred.

Only love overcomes hatred,

This is an eternal law.

(Dhammapada : verse 5)

It is only when we are out of balance that we allow ourselves to be abused and drawn into conflict. Choosing, taking sides, arguing who is right and who is wrong, always seeking blame and humiliation of the other.

Love exists beyond this level of mind and is the only true and real balance in our life.

It is love that will bring peace to ourselves and the world, but this practice of Loving Kindness (Metta Bhavana) is rarely fully understood.

People have told me that their style of Loving kindness is different from mine and that they take all the people that they don’t like and wrap them in pink fluffy clouds, ‘but you know,’ they say, ‘they’re still as horrible as ever!’

Here is the truth we must understand :

We don’t practice Loving Kindness to change the other. We practice Loving Kindness so that we can be with the other – however they are !

This is our strength, not to continually insist that the world and everything in it, is always the way we think it should be so that we can be happy. Vipassana and Loving Kindness is a very mature way of life and living, it says ‘I accept you as you are and make no demands that you should be different so that I can be happy.’

Love is the real and beautiful power in our life.

It is never weak and never subservient. It manifests in every moment as complete and unconditional acceptance of the universe exactly as it is in this moment. Things are like this, that is the reality of this moment, now, what is our place in this ?

With awareness we see, with love we accept, with wisdom we respond.

This is the whole of the Dhamma.

May all beings be happy.