Love Unveiled by A. H. Almaas

Author:A. H. Almaas [Almaas, A. H.]
Language: eng
Format: epub
Publisher: Shambhala
Published: 2020-04-28T00:00:00+00:00

The Development of Object Love

I am not only defining object love and personal love here but also the transitions and various gradations of them, because each one of us is in a different place in our development. Some of us can experience personal love, but it is so vulnerable that if we experience anything negative about the other person, the love disappears. It is quite fragile, because it requires a positive object; otherwise, fear or disappointment come up and the heart closes.

At the next level, we can tolerate the negativity in the other person but not our own anger or dissatisfaction with them—the moment we feel dissatisfied, we start thinking of getting out. Our own reactivity seems to indicate that there is something wrong; we believe that we should always be loving or at least accepting. Here we believe that love means we always like the other person.

Some of us can tolerate the negativity in the other person and our own negativity as well, but in the presence of the difficulty, we don’t experience love. In that case, the relationship survives, with love continuing as an undercurrent that, in time, will dissolve the barrier of the negativity and then reassert itself again. We know from experience or some kind of faith in our love that it will return. That is not something we have to think in our mind: “Well, I have object love, so I am going to stay.” It doesn’t work that way. Your soul will stay because it intrinsically knows that it loves.

The next level is that you not only tolerate negativity, you can also experience the sweetness of love even when the person has done or said something you dislike or find negative or bad. The experience of the love continues. A variation of this is the capacity to feel sweet toward the other even when they are angry or mad at you.

A more challenging development is feeling your own sweetness even though you are angry. This means you are simultaneously experiencing anger at the other and your continuing love for that person.

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