To really love is a great discipline, because we must love stably and consistently and regardless of whether or not our love is returned. In other words, we love despite our likes and dislikes, despite our selves or egos. We simply ALLOW love to be a transformative force in our lives. ALLOWING is the key. And this is not a passive but an active discipline... Genuine love asks for nothing in return, through it always works toward duplicating itself in others. Thus, the greatest reward for one who practices the discipline of love is that another being has been illumined by that love and is now carrying that gift to others.
Dark and cold we may be, but this
Is no winter now: the frozen misery
Of centuries breaks, cracks, begins to move:
The thunder is the thundering of the floes,
The thaw, the flood, the upstart spring.
Thank God our time is now when wrong
Comes up to face us everywhere,
Never to leave us til we take
The longest stride of soul we ever took.
Affairs are now soul-size.
The enterprise
Is exploration into God.