“You shall love your Lord your God with all your heart, and with all your soul, and with all your mind, and with all your strength.” Mark 12
What is love? Love is all. Love surrounds things and people. Love is the breath of life. Love is presence of being. Love is God. It is the way one may define or come to know the seed of true love, that our lives can either, wither or flourish. A sweet-scented rose can awaken our senses, but without its seed, it could never have lived. The rain cascades to cleanse and water the earth, but without the clouds and heaven, it would shrivel. A soul that seeks to grow in great love in the absence of faith and creation can only live a limited, worldly view, that is like the wind that gushes and withers.
In my childhood, my father had compass on the dashboard of our gold, Dynamic car. It was a small globe filled with fluid that would bobble around letting us the know the direction in which we were headed. We enjoyed the way it navigated our way. My father said, “A compass will help you find your way home”. A compass or GPS helps us find our way to the places we need to go, but if we seek the passion of true love, the only way is God. God wants to be our guide. If we open our hearts and allow God to lead our way, our life can grow from, ember to alive with fire.
Growing up, I was blessed with a huge Italian, Catholic family of great faith, love and fellowship. Still, I had a deep seeded desire to seek things that defined love. I was always drawn to understanding, the wisdom of love. In my pain and joy, I pursued the purpose of life and love. Although, I enjoyed and was inspired with, the talks of Leo Buscalgia and Norman Vincent Peale, the symposium of Anthony Robbins, self-help and living better books, none filled the crevices, I desperately sought to fill. None filled me with the wisdom I craved. I only came to know true love when I humbled myself and placed my heart and sins in the lap of Mary and Jesus. What I received was a conversion.
We were created for love, yet we fail to live and grow in its realm. In all our actions and words, what we live every moment, either brings us closer or pull us away from living a fulfilled life. A restless heart, a grieving heart, a suffering heart can only be healed with the passion and love of Christ. We can either place a bandage on our heart or we can heal the root of all that prevents us from living true love. We can know love with worldly limitations or we can understand and live love with great passion. God gives us free will to choose. His journey offers one of immense beauty and the other a path that withers the soul. One path offers a truly fulfilled purpose the other a half-lived life.
We live in a world where violence, harm and injustice are dysfunctional norms and love seems distant, but if we walk in the light and guide another in that light, we can change the world from its darkness and fill it with God’s light. As we allow our life to unfold in God’s love, we are uprooted from discouragement and despair and filled with hope and purpose.
It begins with prayer and service. It begins with humility. It begins with loving thyself as you have been created. It’s in an act of forgiveness towards hate. It’s seeking God’s will in every moment, rather than our own. It’s turning away from defining ourselves from those around us and the nonsense in life and turning towards that which wants to raise us up to a rich, love filled life. It’s God’s love for each one of us. It is available to each one of us if we open our heart and mind to Jesus and Mary. God answers our prayers in His way and Mary guides us with her love, on our journey. Seek to see God in all things and then you will begin to understand true love and purpose. The more we know love the more we see the world and people through the eyes of God. Although, many of my writings are a version about love, it is because from love all things exist and grow. Love is patient, love is kind. It does not envy, it does not boast, it is not proud. It does not dishonor others, it is not self seeking, it is not easily angered, it keeps no record of wrongs. Love does not delight in evil, but rejoices in the truth. It always protects, always trusts, always hopes, always perseveres. Love never fails. But where there are prophesies, they will cease. Where there are tongues, they will be stilled; where there is knowledge it will pass away. Corinthians 13;4-8.
Let us pray. Lord, giver of life. Mary, our mother, full of grace. Show me how to open my heart and mind in new ways. Let us seek wisdom and love in that Jesus gave His life to save us. Show me how to live fully alive in your will for me. Let me be humble yet be a light for others. Lead me to a life of service of love. Forgive us our sins and fill us with your love. Amen
Peace,
Claudia
Our Nourished Soul