Copyright 2008 SOUL Research Institute
C
bliss
WHAT LOVE IS
Weekly Meditation Gathering
and Potluck, 02/14/10
Join us on Sunday, 10am onwards with your family and friends.
"I have found the paradaox, that if you love until it hurts, there can be no more hurt, only more love."
Mother Teresa
"Love is the strongest force the world possesses, and yet it is the humblest imaginable."
Mahatma Gandhi
"What will survive of us is love."
Philip Larkin
"This is how we love: Impartial to all, free from attachments, false hope, and expectaions; accepting, tolerant, and forgiving."
Buddha
Do you ever wonder what “love” really is?
If you do, and if you contemplate its nature, you’ll go through a process of realization that will eventually lead you to a deep understanding of the most beautiful emotion—love— that we feel.
First, you will realize that love is essentially a state of abiding in which there is no distaste or aversion (collectively termed as hatred). With that understanding, if you further your contemplation, second, you’ll realize that love is also a state of abiding in which there is no possessiveness or clinging (collectively termed as greed). Once you understand that love is the absence of hatred as well as greed, then, automatically, deep contemplation and mental absorption will arise in you. If you are lucky, you may then realize that love is ultimately a state of abiding in which there is no sense of separate self or ego (collectively termed as delusion).
Next, the following reality will dawn upon you:
Love is not only the absence of hatred, greed, and delusion but also the presence of their opposites: non-greed, non-hatred, and non-delusion. Based on your experience, you know that the mere absence of hatred or greed (as in case of a toddler) does not necessarily make one a lover. You have to actively ‘love’ to become a lover and to experience love. These active and experiential parameters of love arise from the three opposites.
Through years of personal practice, I have come to realize that loving-kindness, compassion, gladness, and oneness are the four active and experiential parameters of love. Loving-kindness is the ability to see and treat oneself and others with friendship, kindness, and harmlessness; compassion is the ability to see and alleviate suffering in oneself and others; gladness is the ability to appreciate goodness (and success) in oneself and others and to derive joy from that; and oneness is the ability to live selflessly with an aptitude of equanimity. (click on following links to read more).
SOUL RESEARCH INSTITUTE NEWSLETTER, FEBRUARY 11, 10
EVENTS AT S.R.I.
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INSPIRATIONS
The four elements of love arise in different intensities to give rise to various types of love experiences. These love experiences range from crude form of romantic love (or the love of worldly relationships) to refined form of transcendental love to the pure form of perfect love. We can call this range of love experiences, “the ladder of love.” (See illustration below).
The ladder of love is a hierarchy of wholesomeness, purification, and evolution. Worldly love is the first step of the ladder and perfect love is its top rung. Without climbing the first step and then subsequent steps, we cannot reach the top of the ladder. It is similar to graduating from 5th grade so we can go to 6th grade and eventually graduate from the high school. In this sense, worldly love is not lower (in a derogatory sense) than other forms of love but rather rudimentary in nature.
The easiest and quickest way to understand the ladder of love is to grasp the expression which corresponds to each form of love as illustrated below.
In addition to our Weekly Sunday Gatherings at Flying Horse Location, we are now offering -
Weekly Soul Meditation Service
@
Colorado College, CO
Venue: The beautiful & historic Shove Chapel on Colorado College campus. Fridays, Starting Feb19, 10. Current time slot for soul meditation practice followed by noble discussion: 6-8 pm.
Sam Adettiwar's Groundbreaking Book
Now Published and available on
amazon.com
!
Book signing event
At the famous local book store in downtown Colorado Springs: Poor Richards' at 320 N. Tejon Street. March 05, 2010, 4-7pm. All profits generated from the sale of books are donated to Soul Research Institute for conducting research and facilitating cost-free retreats and services.
! Cost-free !
Residential Retreats
Thanks to the selfless generosity of Paul Fuess and Nya Gregor Fluron and the contribution of old students, S.R.I. is now able to offer cost-free meditation and yoga residential retreats in Larkspur, CO, a 15-20 minutes drive from CSprings and 30-45 minutes drive from Denver, CO. Limited seats available.
