the power of love
Feb 1st, 2008 by indigo-daisy
I have always believed that love is the most powerful force in the universe, that love is omnipotent and eternal, with no beginning or no end. God is Love and love is God. If you don’t believe in God, love to you may be the universe, the living source of energy that gives us life.
How is it then that hate has found its way into this universe of love? People are not born with hate. Hate can be passed down from generation to generation, however, one is not born with hate.
Hate is often viewed as the opposite of love. But if love is omnipotent and eternal as I have always believed, then it is present in some form at all times. And if love is always present, it can not be the opposite of another force.
Hate seems to always be derived from some sort of fear. Fear to me is more than an emotion or feeling, it is also very powerful force in the universe. I would not say that it is the opposite of love, but it can cloud our vision of love. Fear can make people do things that love would never let them do. Fear is so powerful that it is used as a tool by governments, religions, and other organizations to make people conform to their wants and needs, and people will conform even if it destroys them. Entire countries have been moved to hate and kill based on nothing more than fear itself.
Have you heard of the Marvel Super Hero that goes by the name of “DareDevil”? The amazing thing about this Super Hero is that the source of his power is the pure absence of fear. This is quite an amazing concept, that letting go of our fears could actually give us power.
We have been brainwashed into thinking that love is weak, it is feminine and only serves women and children. You can’t run a country on love. Governments need to be tough and rule with an iron fist. They must rule with fear to remain powerful.
However, as in the Super Hero “DareDevil”, I tend to think that if we start to remove the layers and layers of fear, we will begin to see hate diminish and we will once again see the power of love.
After pondering all of this, I started to think how fear has clouded my own life from seeing love. So I think this year, I will start looking at all of the things I fear, and really start working at pealing it away, because underneath it all, I know I will find love, and in love I will find everlasting peace.
The following comment came by e-mail from a very insightful friend. I just had to post it for him as it is a very thought provoking response:
“it would be easy to describe to a blind person that black and white are very different, and in fact opposite. white is the addition of every color and black is the absence of many colors.
however, such an explanation is very restrictive, and fails to provide a true understanding of what a color is, why it is important, and most of all, how beautiful a painting can be with the use of colors.
maybe black is the opposite of white, but in some sense, they are both colors, and the two pictures you posted on your latest blog would not be the same if there were no black or white.
even more important is that between the black and white, you have over 32 million beautiful colors, making up the entire color spectrum. an endless array of scenery with which artists can use to create and recreate snapshots of imagination, reality and more.
love and hate are no different. maybe they can be described as opposites, but they are one in the same. they emotions that we feel, and while we could describe them as opposite, and good and bad, a world without hate, is a world where no one can understand love, and a world without love is one where no one can admit there is hate.
by looking at them as the same thing, but maybe on edges of a spectrum of emotions, we begin to understand that as humans we have millions of emotions, all essential for us to live and explain our lives.
bad governments and people have exploited this knowledge throughout our history. by seeing love as a form of hate, they have turned people who love their nations, family or religion, into people who hate other countries, neighbors or religion. yes, fear was likely used, but people gave in, because they were still in love, while others would see it as hate.
you bring up an insightful point, that if good governments and people were to do the opposite, we need to accept that people incorrectly think of love as weak and feminine. This understanding is the first of many obstacles we need to overcome so we can turn hate into what other people see as love.
i think the answer lies in the heart of education.”
While this may seem a little lame, especially following your profound post and your friend’s insightful comments, I have always loved this quote (from the Star Wars film) : “Fear leads to anger. Anger leads to hate. And hate leads to suffering”. and I think it sums up my response to your post , which I agree with entirely,. I think fear IS at the root of most hatred. If we were less fearful, we would hate much less and there would be less conflict in the world and consequently far less suffering….
Thank you Tex’s Missus,
Not lame at all. The quote sums it up pretty well.
Here is another quote that came up this week that I really liked.
“I don’t want to just end the war, I want to end the mind-set that got us into war in the first place.” -Barack Obama
I just found this statement so refreshing as I am tired of politicians resorting to fear tactics to get what they want. Maybe there is hope that change is on the horizon. Dare I “Imagine” like John Lennon?
-Deborah
Thanks for that Obama quote Deborah - I love it; something like that would inspire me to vote for him (if I lived in the States of course !) I say dare to imagine Deborah - if we don’t, we abandon hope and if that happens, we may as well all give up - and we can’t do that
I love the Obama quote too! And after much research and consideration, I decided last week that Obama has my vote (if I had one)
Anyway …
I have always considered hate to be an absence of love, as in dark is not the opposite to light but just the absence of light, but considering your wise words, and the power of hate I am having to rethink that analogy. Let’s face it, the dark can be banished by the presence of light - no matter now small or seemingly ineffectual - but hate does have a power all of its own. Love can sometimes drive hate away but it isn’t always the case.
I think you have captured it all so much better
Tex’s Missus, I shall indeed imagine that change for the good is on its way.
Mountain Girl, my ramblings on love and hate, and light and dark are just my way of making sense of it all. I agree that love is light and there would be no color if there were no light. Fear is something that blocks light. When we let go of fear, and let the light in, life is more beautiful.
-Deborah
Great post Indigo…
To me, when we are love & nurture, we hold close, touch or hug, its an inward gesture (physically), warms inside us..when one hates, one strikes out, often blindly, they externalise the feeling, hitting, yelling, screaming.
So perhaps when a nation loves, it holds it close…where a nation that hates externalises it…
It would be brilliant, if a nation was seen as confident, if they refused to fight, but expressed love in giving to others…not just tokanism…but by saying ‘we as a people have enough to fill our needs, now we will give without any expectation to your country as you are doing it tough’…that to me is love, when we acknowledge we are all equal…globally, when we give expecting nothing…
Abby,
Oh how I would love to see the day when nations start refusing to fight and generously give of their own free will, expecting nothing in return. -Deborah