The following was printed in a publication in the 1970’s under the heading of Awareness. I will be writing extensively about this subject updating the material.
FALLING IN LOVE WITH LOVE IS NOT VERY MAKE BELIEVE
One of my favorite things in the whole world to do is to fall in love. I do it spontaneously with everyone. It doesn’t matter what you look like or what you wear. You can be green or purple, I don’t care. And as a result of my willingness to do this, I get nothing in return except love, happiness, joy, communication, acknowledgement, a full sense of self expression and a wonderful feeling of aliveness.
It hasn’t always been this way. Though I started out like that, an incident happened when I was three years old that changed it around. My mother and I were having a particularly difficult day together. Out of my inability to communicate with her, I was essentially acting mean and nasty, and out of her inability to communicate with me, she was essentially screaming and hitting me.
While I was in my room sitting at my apple green play table in one of its matching chairs, hammering on my peg board, thinking hateful thoughts about her, my father came home from work. He was tired and irritable, had words with my mother, then came into my room and squeezed his slim frame into the other chair. I snuggled into his lap, looked at him square in the face and with all the manipulation I could muster, I asked, “Daddy, you don’t love Mommy — do you?” He put his arms around me and said, “yes, but you are my favorite girl in the whole world, you are the special one in my life. My mind delighted in this. It validated all my feelings about my mother and aligned my father with me against her. We had a secret special relationship. I felt warm all over. My little heart was pounding, my stomach tightened and I even felt a little dizzy. I made a decision at that moment which affected me for the rest of my life.
I decided that in order to love someone, that person would have to be very special so my body could react appropriately, and that would make me special too. To me, that was what “falling in love” was all about. So, for many years I lived with the lie that I was special ONLY because people loved me, and in order for me to love them, they had to be extraordinarily special too. Can you see how limiting that was? By the time I was a teenager I was bragging with pride that I could count my close relationships on one hand.
The incident of my childhood was long forgotten, but in order to be right about my decision, I pretended not to love most people, judging and evaluating them, closing myself off from my natural ability to love. It wasn’t until years later that I told the truth and forgave myself for having made such an incredible mistake. This freed me, allowing love to return to my life, and now I fall in love and give it away gratefully. And I accept it with the same humility.
Take a look at your life and see if you made a similar decision somewhere back there. Forgive yourself and whoever else you think you have to forgive. I promise you miracles. You’ll never make believe about love again. You’ll just love. And I love you!
