Love is the Cohesion of the Whole

3-10-17 Love is the cohesion of the whole

I can see the idea of totality.  I can know the truth of oneness.  I can be aware of my being, united with everything else.  And yet psychologically there are boundaries of self-protection and desire for proof of personal worth, while still seeking a profound meeting with the other.  There is grasping for more, a feeling that there is never enough, and a wish for more intimacy, for continuity in relationship, for an exchange of profound appreciation.

Imagine – all of this miraculous existence and to be conscious of it and to be included in it, to be fed by it, to be sustained by it and still to feel that you, the limited person, are not enough.

There is a craving for relationship but on our terms.  And the other has their terms and their offerings that we can accept or reject. We are attracted and repelled by the other.  Planets circling and still kept at a safe distance. 

We reach out hoping the other will fulfill our desires, but not overtake us.  We want to embrace but not be consumed.  What attracts us can also repel us. The other does not come to fulfill our desires, to be only for us. The other also comes with dreams to be fulfilled, and with pursuits and attributes of character that may not match our own.  We must let each other go as we discover that our shapes do not interlock.  Sometimes we can let go with joy as we see the other blossom, but often it is with sadness as we long for the sustained meeting, the continuous relationship.  We want the joy to be within our sphere, our boundaries, our being, but we can imagine the boundaries extended to allow all relationships to include us and the many others as we are not divided even in space, and even in conflict we are related.

If Love is the cohesion of the whole, it cannot be felt when the being divides itself off to suffer its separateness. When the being senses that it is separate, that it is not complete, that it still wants to be appreciated, that it wants to be individually loved, it has created an illusion of personal being. It is in the delusion of fragmentation.  Nothing exists in separation, although it can be thought of separately.  

Love will hold us even when we are pretending to be isolated, separate, alone.

(Image: The Couple)