The Illusion of Deserving Love

“The spiritual answer to any problem is immediate. It’s our own perception that is slow to catch on. The Divine’s ability to love us is limited only by our ability to receive that love here and now. Since our loved ones represent manifested portions of the Divine in our lives, the same could be said for them. To receive Divine love we need only increase our ability to receive the love being reflected back in our intimate relationships…The love we get is limited only by our ability to receive it. It’s amazingly easy to shut someone else down. Without thinking about it we let pass countless occasions during the day when love makes a tentative appearance –in other words , we turn our backs on spirit. Our beloved may start to say something nice or give us an affectionate touch or ask how we are feeling. Notice how often this seed isn’t allowed to grow, how quickly we simply cut the gesture off or take it for granted. In this way we limit the love we are receiving, rather than nurturing its faint beginnings. One might ask, ‘Why would I cut off the very thing I want? Why would I cut off love?’ Because negativity inside says no when love is offered. Look at body language as well as words. What tendencies do we discover about ourselves when looking deeply and listening deeply? Keep the following thought in mind, ‘Being shown a gesture of love is like being offered a portion of the Divine.’ The ego, with all its fears and self-interests, blocks our ability to perceive the portion of the Divine love that is being offered. Eventually our expectations become self-fulfilling. The more we learn to stop shutting love down, the whole problem of not deserving love is exposed for the illusion it really is.”

~Deepak Chopra~