“Thought is Cause; experience is Effect. If you don’t like the effects in your life, you have to change the nature of your thinking.”
“When we attach value to things that aren’t love—the money, the car, the house, the prestige—we are loving things that can’t love us back. We are searching for meaning in the meaningless.”
“In asking for miracles, we are seeking a practical goal: a return to inner peace. We’re not asking for something outside us to change, but for something inside us to change. We’re looking for a softer orientation to life.”
“There is no Mr. Right because there is no Mr. Wrong. There is whoever is in front of us, and the perfect lessons to be learned from that person.”
“Love is the essential existential fact. It is our ultimate reality and our purpose on earth. To be consciously aware of it, to experience love in ourselves and others, is the meaning of life.”Marianne Williamson – from A Return to Love.
One of the most profound, inspiring and heart-opening books I have read over the last several years (and more than once as a matter of fact) is A Return to Love by Marianne Williamson. It is about reflections on the Principles of A Course in Miracles, and was first published in 1993.
People often quote a famous passage from this book, “Our deepest fear in not that we are inadequate… our presence automatically liberates others.” I am not sure if they always know it is also based on the Principles of A Course in Miracles.
So what does it mean to return to love? We have two ways to live our lives: the first is from a place of love and the second is from a place of fear. That’s it, that’s all. All other emotions fall into one of these two at any point in time.
If you find yourself in sadness, depression, guilt, resentment, anger or any of the other “negative” emotions then you are in fear. If you find yourself in joy, happiness, glee, laughter, compassion, inspiration or any of the other positive emotions then you are in a place of love.
Ultimately everything we do or say is aimed at finding love.
We are either expressing love or making a cry for love. When I learned this, it had a profound impact on my life as well as on the way I viewed myself and others. I could find compassion (versus resentment), I could let go of hurts and allow myself to forgive. Even in my darkest moments, I could see the only thing that needed to change was returning to a place of love.
That place of love has to come from within however. That is where things can get difficult. Nothing outside me could fill the void or lack of love within myself. Try as I might to fill it with things outside myself, these things could never really suffice, because only I had the power to fill my heart with love. This is where the work begins
This is where the healing begins, and where self-discovery begins. This is where we look at what scares us, where we get honest with ourselves and others, where we discover who we really are, and where we become real. And this is where we set course on a journey, away from living our lives from fear and to living our lives from a place of love.
This is a life long journey and we will be challenged many times along the way to Return to Love. We will be hurt, and we will feel hurt. At times we will feel broken and in the deepest of despair.
This is all a part of the journey; this is all a part of our human experience. We will always have a choice, however, and that is to look within our hearts and find our way back to love. Make it a goal to always find a way to Return to Love.
Of course, if this resonates with you I do highly recommend reading the book that has steered me back many times.
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