Love Is
Love is all there is. John Lennon knew it and sang it to the world.
Patty Mooney contemplating love and life on a tree branch near San Diego River
On Valentine’s Day, doesn’t everyone wake up in meditation of love and life?
A friend of ours who is no longer on this planet, Robert Powell, was the author of many spiritual books. One is called “The Blissful Life: As Realized through the Teachings of Sri Nisargadatta Maharaj.” It’s the kind of book, like “Illusions” by Richard Bach, that you can flip through, poke a finger in and point to a paragraph or passage that reflects a teaching appropriate for you at that very moment. For instance, in leafing through that book seconds ago, I found this:
“Harmony between the inner and the outer is happiness. On the other hand, self-identification with the outer causes suffering.”
Life is But a Dream
Nice reminder that in a time when “the world is going to hell in a hand basket” as my grandmother used to say, or so it seems, with terrorism spreading like wildfire and affecting even the smallest things like entering a football stadium in time to see the kickoff, it is time to focus within and realize what is really important. It’s all an illusion anyway, isn’t it?
I imagine Robert Powell sitting near the master, jotting down notes as Sri Maharaj, a cigarette merchant, spoke his truths while smoking his incessant beedis (little cigarettes). So you see, even an enlightened master has a vice or two.
Importance of Forgiveness
Forgiveness is huge on the path of Self Love. And Self Love is necessary before reaching out to love others. For if your vessel is empty, then how can you share its contents with anyone else?
I remember when growing up during the 1970s, there were these “Love Is” cartoons in the daily newspaper. These one-panel cartoons originated from a series of love notes that New Zealander Kim Grove drew for her future husband, Roberto Casali. The strip is still syndicated worldwide today by Tribune Media Services.
One of Kim’s most famous drawings, “Love Is…being able to say you are sorry”, published for Valentine’s Day 1972, was marketed internationally for many years in print, on cards and on souvenirs. The beginning of the strip coincided with the 1970 film Love Story. The film’s signature line is “Love means never having to say you’re sorry.”
“Love Is” Cartoons
The “Love Is” cartoons were wildly successful, and you’d see cute panels on tee-shirts, posters and coffee mugs. That the cartoon is still syndicated into the 21st Century means that Love Is something that never goes out of style.
Patty’s father, Joe Mooney
For many years I wondered if I would ever find my one true love. I had the iconic “Tall, Dark and Handsome” man in mind (like my father, a handsome brown-eyed man who sported a thick head of dark hair until he died at 86.)
And yet, thank goodness, I was open-minded enough to go on a date with a blonde hazel-eyed man whom I met on Valentine’s Day of 1982, who was shorter than me. Good things do indeed come in small packages and it’s a testament to his romance and passion that we are still together walking hand-in-hand towards that Great Big Sunset together.
Mark and Patty hiking on Cowles Mountain, San Diego
If you are still frantically searching for that special someone, stop and take some deep breaths. Do you know yourself? Do you love yourself? These are simple questions that pose some difficult work on yourself. Have you forgiven yourself for past mis-steps? Have you been able to move forward in a more positive direction, learning from your mistakes?
Mark and Patty still loving life and each other after over 3 decades
Finding Love
Are you looking for a certain type of person (like I was) and will only consider that type? Then you might completely miss “the one” who may be not fit that constricted description. Remember the old joke about the drowning guy who begs help from God? He envisions God reaching down to pluck him out of the whorling waters. The guy refuses to jump aboard his neighbor’s pickup truck, refuses to climb into a passing boat, refuses to get hauled up into a helicopter. So he drowns. When he reaches heaven and asks, “God, why did you not save me? I believed in you with all my heart. Why did you let me drown?” God replies, “I sent you a pick-up truck, a boat and a helicopter and you refused all of them. What else could I possibly do for you?”
Be open-minded. Smile. Laugh. Be yourself. Easy to say, not so easy to do. AFTER you have done the work on yourself, THEN you are ready. Hooking up with someone BEFORE you know who you are, and BEFORE you truly love yourself, will lead you in the wrong direction.
Read books like “Illusions” and “The Blissful Life.” Realize why you are here on the planet. (Hint: Love is…)
“You’re never given a dream without also being given the power to make it true.”
― Richard Bach, Illusions: The Adventures of a Reluctant Messiah
Embark on a Date with Love on Cowles Mountain
