Love

Love is the most important force in the universe.  When you project love you attract whatever and whoever it is that you love.  The greater the love the stronger the attraction.

Whatever it is you want to achieve in life, therefore, it is so important to develop love.  A genuine and deep love.

"Love what?" you may ask.  A good question.  My answer is you should love everything.

Some may disagree with this statement and say you should only love the positives in life and not the negatives.  How can you love evil for example?  I don't disagree with that, but in my view the negatives do not really exist.  They are simply the absence of the positives.  Not everyone will agree with my take on this and I don't intend to push it here - so simply accept that, yes, I am saying love everything positive.

You should start by loving yourself.  This is something many people find very difficult.  The more difficult you find it, though, the more important it is to love yourself.  Lack of love for yourself results in a lack of self-esteem, a lack of belief in yourself, an inability to move forwards and achieve what you want to achieve.  It will also make it far more difficult, if not impossible, to love anyone and anything else.

Love your whole self.

Love your body, with all its imperfections.  If you see something in your body that you do not like, and if it is something you can and should change, then change it.  But if it cannot be changed then love it how it is.  A number of religious denominations refer to the body as the temple of God.  Whether you refer to "God", "the Self", "the Universe" or something similar, this is very true.  Your body is where this Spirit is living at the moment, so love it and treat it well.

Love your mind.  Don't worry if you don't have an IQ of 140 or more.  That doesn't matter.  This is your mind, unique to you, and it deserves to be loved.

Love your spirit.  That spark within you that leads you along a certain path.  A path that eventually you can see was exactly the right path for you.  Love this spirit and thank it for all it has contributed to your life.

Really get into the habit of loving yourself until it becomes a natural, seamless habit.

Extend that love to everyone around you.  Starting with your family, but extending outwards.  Everyone deserves your love, so give it to them.  Even those you may feel do NOT deserve it.  You cannot judge them.  Just love them.

You will start to see some amazing results quite quickly.  Not necessarily from everyone, but certainly from some.  People can sense when you really love them and they will begin to respond in kind.  Your love will get reflected back - sometimes from directions you least expect.  Sometimes from someone you thought was a miserable unloving person.

Go further than this.  Love the things you want to attract into your life.  Don't focus on the absence of those things, simply love them.

At this point I am going to be quite controversial.  Love money.  I can already hear the growls of those who believe it is wrong to love money.  After all, 1 Timothy 6:10 says "For the love of money is the root of all evil".  Ecclesiastes 5:10 says "If you love money and wealth you will never be satisfied with what you have".  But neither author really meant you should not love money in the way I intend.  You are simply extending a natural love and including money within it.  I am not talking about developing avarice and greed, but rather pure love.  Don't be like so many people who don't have money and then start developing a hatred of money because they do not have it.  You should love money and attract it to you, but then make sure you use it in a positive way.  Money itself is neutral, not evil.  Love it so you can use it to help others.  There is a story about Rabbi Avraham Yehoshua Heshel which I think brings a little clarity to this rather difficult subject.  This Rabbi said that he looked on money kindly before gifting it to the poor - in this way he valued the gift he was making as a way of expressing the love of God.

I hope I have opened your eyes and made you think about love differently.  Develop love and cherish it above all things.