“When love beckons to you, follow it.” Khalil Gibran
Indian philosopher, Jiddu Krishnamurti, once famously said: Only those who’ve never truly loved, ask me questions about life’s purpose.
Why does living need a purpose other than its mere being? Are we not worthy, as is? Krishnamurti wondered, “Is it because of emptiness that we need to identify some grander purpose to happen outside of us, to fulfill us?”
Defining a purpose is a product of the mind, where as beingness is just a natural state of the soul. The purpose can be found in our inner state of being, or rather, our own ability to enrich our inner experience. When was the last time you were in love? How did it feel? Didn’t everything seem meaningful? When you are living in gratitude, do you even question life’s purpose? And isn’t gratitude a part of love consciousness, also?
It is no surpise that the wisest people will tell us: to find God, don’t look up to the stars or into the structures and paintings of temples; all you need to do is look into the eyes of the people that you love. This is where you’ll find God; this is where you’ll find meaning.
I’ve often wondered why people who identify themselves as religious or spiritual, are still treating their fellow humans with disrespect. Is it easier to love the perfect structures and statues, than it is to love a human being, who isn’t “perfect”; whose own emotional and spiritual world has the freedom to make mistakes and even sometimes hurt us?
In chaos is fertility.
Love is not there to make us happy always; it is there to shift us, transform us and change us, so that we evolve beyond the limitations and boundaries. This means that it may hurt, and that often times it will bring us to our knees. And yet – it is worth it all. If we only love the perfect, is it truly loving? We need to accept the flow of life by breaking the rigidity of our self-imposed beliefs and narratives. That’s the only way to surrender and expand.
This happens through intimacy. Intimacy means “into-me-see”; it is when we allow another to see the real us. In order to peel our layers and transform, we need to possess the desire, courage, aliveness and devotion to allow ourselves to be changed by the peelers of love; by intimacy, by allowing another to truly see us. Love, and anything or anyone that we love, will make us think we are losing our identities, and that’s a scary feeling. But it is precisely in that perceived loss, that we uncover who we truly are beneath the bark of our skin; to see our naked hearts. Good and bad are only perspectives. We may lose along the way but it is never a failure. To merge ourselves completely in connections and be absolutely passionate, is the only way to feel and truly experience life. Allow love to peel you, through intimacy.
True intimacy, to be truly seen in our complete vulnerability by another, is what causes us to grow.
What is love anyway?
Love is everything. It is not confined to a definition or a list. It’s just a word until we give it meaning. It is not an emotion, although it feels so sweet. It is a verb because we need to treasure it, and care for it and nurture it – to experience it. But most of all, it is what makes sense and why all else is happening. It is the answers for the questions we don’t even know how to ask yet. It is the immortal feeling of the face of our beloved beyond death. Love is what gives us meaning in life. Love is worth dying for.
We yearn for union. Everything in life is a relationship. We love and are capable of loving everything. Even when confined in a room, we will develop a relationship to that room. Everything in life is a relationship. And it is love that gives weight to all else we experience. And it is love that gives learning, gratitude. It is not something we can give to someone – it is something we can share with another. And approval is not love. It is accepting even that which we may not accept otherwise. Love is a connection. And we can connect to everything. We are always seeking this connection. Because on a deep level we are seeking that union – we are seeking to reunite ourselves to that oneness, from which we all came from. We are all seeking togetherness, whether consciously or unconsciously. This is why we have religion, gangs, genders, categories, groups – and yet what we are actually doing by creating these, is separating ourselves further.
Love is what matters to us most deeply. This is what we will remember at the end of this road; how much we loved and how did we express it. The world will always kneel at the feet of love.
Many mediums will tell you, that one of the greatest regrets from the other side is: our soul regretting we didn’t open our heart to love completely and that we didn’t value the importance of relationships; all the times we didn’t follow our hearts, all the times we wanted to express our love but didn’t because we were afraid it wasn’t mutual or because we’d look too sensitive or sentimental or because we’d be rejected. You see … it’s not about the other person. It is all about us expressing our love and living intentionally and lovingly. Years from now, looking back, whether from the other side or hopefully from this, all we’d care about is how much we loved and how much we expressed it.
Only those who truly love and are truly strong in their love have the ability to change life’s stones into flowers of discovery; they are the ones that live a life of purpose and the ones who enrich the dreams of humanity, within and without, and it is these dreams that create history. These people are the unknowing transformers of all things, of life itself, only by their love.
I once knew a man who was rich and famous, who kept asking me what his purpose was, and how he could have a soothing in his soul? And I asked him: How are you living your life? When was the last time you made someone’s day better? How do you contribute to the people in your life whether by helping wherever you can, giving a sweet compliment, encouraging people in times of need? The truth is: he’d just sit and do yoga poses, post social media “new-agey smart” posts but he never even gave money, which he had a lot of, to anyone in need; never did he appreciate nor love nor support the people who cared and loved him. No amount of yoga poses or social media posts will ever give the soothing in our hearts and souls, like contributing to someone and living an intentional life. People ask me how they can build their self-love? Love others and you will inevitably love yourself, also. Love other and you will inevitably feel like you are living a purposeful life.
Many years ago, we lived in a tiny place, where at the corner of our window, a swallow bird had built her nest. Shortly after her little ones were born, a horrible thunderstorm hit, breaking the nest in half and leaving the babies hanging, as if they’d fall any minute. We quickly took them in and placed them in a tiny shoebox with paper shredded to resemble their home; they were trembling, crying, and were so incredibly fragile and small, that we barely found a small enough eyedropper to feed them some water. In the morning, we placed the shoebox with them in it out on the window’s railing, hoping their mother would come back. A few days passed, then a week. We cared for them as best as we could every day. Until one morning when we woke up and saw that some swallows were feeding the little ones in the shoebox. All of them survived and grew healthily. One September afternoon, we saw them standing on the edge of the box and as they jumped down, their wings took flight in the most beautiful way; they circled around a few times – before us, coming as close to us as a hand’s length, until finally flying away, together. The next year, new ones came, or perhaps it was the same ones.
Devotion can sometimes be regarded as some grand thing – high minded and even abstract. But it is often found in an ordinary day. It’s an injured animal that we find on the street and then take it home, to care for it and nurture its wellbeing.
Devotion is not something we find; devotion finds us. You don’t have to look up high and the truth is, even when we do, we may still not find it. Devotion appears in its own shape and following its own timing and rhythm of heart. But when it finds us – it is an absolute, non-negotiable extend of hands, that we do our best, love wholebodily and wholeheartedly; not just a little bit or partly, and not just when it’s convenient or easy.
To live a life of purpose, we have to find something that we can devote our love and daily care to. Loving does not have to be towards another person – it can be any thing and then nurture it like a garden. This is what we learn from the stories of Buddhist monks too – they have daily routines caring for the monastery and its gardens, and this is regarded as their great purposeful work. No task is too small, or too insignificant. And the rest unfolds as it may. Feeding the animals, volunteering, helping a stranger, preparing a meal, reading a story to a child – all of these mirror to us how purposeful our very being is.
To live a purposeful life, often means to live life like a prayer.
Prayer is a hug or a meal cooked. Prayer is helping someone even when they didn’t ask or ask “how are you”. Prayer is when we encourage someone or say a sweet “good night”. Prayer is a natural state, when we give someone our time and energy, even if all we did was listen to them. It is a vibration, a feeling, a thought, a voice of love and an expression of our silent being. While we pray all the time, it is often unintentional because we are not aware of it.
So to live a life like a prayer means: to live intentionally. What if we are consciously and intentionally grateful for every person and everything continuously, daily? What if we dedicate to lovingness, compassion and mercy towards ourselves and one another? This allows us to be more receptive to all the beauty that life already is, as it unfolds before our eyes – rather than wonder around, away from the present moments.
Life’s meaning cannot be understood by running away from life. We can read all the books and ancient texts in the world, yet if we don’t actually experience our beingness, it’d still be a question mark. In a way, when we spend so much time wondering and intellectualizing what purpose is, we are not really living it.
I often say and I’ll say it again: We are not here to become spiritual, because we already are. We are here to remember our spiritual being and apply its wisdom towards our human connections and relationships. This is why we have these beautiful bodies; a relationship of many cells coming together for a mutual decision to say, Yes, to life. We experience so much beauty and feeling and touch, all thanks to our bodies; holding the hand of love, smelling vanilla and tasting a fig.
You, in this body, in this moment and reality, are the perfect union between soul and flesh. There is nothing more beautiful than that; to be the dancing union of love.
Our bodies comprise of so many different cells, all of which have their own purposes. Some cells are truth seekers while others are calm bringers. Some are the kings of discernment in our times of confusion or crisis. Other cells are the hard workers flushing crap as well as distributing food, information and energetic resources. Some are alchemists and magicians, others are transformers and catalysts; bringing us from one state of consciousness and beingness, into another. Some sit quietly yet alert with animal instincts, that will warn us of coming dangers. Some are defenders, like jaguars who will keep our immune system strong. Our cells are living their purpose just by their being, and accepting their being. And so are we. Just like a rose is a rose is a rose; being unmistakably herself while others experience through her touch and scent and vision, something beautiful inside themselves.
Running away from the immense depth of feelings experienced only through our connections, is just a way to run away from purpose. This is why we wonder what other purpose is there. Just love. Experience passion whenever you eat, drink, dance or just lay on your couch. Fall in love with your life. Love wholeheartedly and wholebodily. Love when you shouldn’t. Love when you know and accept that it may hurt or that you’ll be rejected. Love more and more, and then more again. Devote yourself to loving more. Love because of you; because this is about you experiencing the greatest depth and meaning of all, which is found in the wide spectrum of emotions that ultimately enriches our inner world, and opens our perceptions by challenging our old beliefs, perspectives and narratives. This is what spiritual development is: the ability to open ourselves to new perceptions is how we expand our consciousness.
When we look for something, this only applies we don’t have it already within us. It’s like love. If you are looking for it, you are only subconsciously telling yourself that it is not present within you. And as universal consciousness is expansive, your energy is only expanding that, meaning: it is expanding your lack, or belief of lack. To find love – we have to live love through our own body, mind, heart and soul – and through all of our connections and have the eyes to see it already existing; because love is a state of being. In the same way, the more we look for purpose, the more we are actually not living it.
God is Love; this is the universal Christ consciousness comprised of compassion, harmony, graitude, forgiveness, non-judgement, oneness, peace and love. It is the ability to recognize the divine and the love in everything, outside of categories, genres, groups, races, beliefs, definitions and the limits of “words”. Through the childlike eyes, we enter the kingdom of heaven. Because it is the childlike eyes that see life in an inclusive, non-judgemental way; with the purity and innocence of heart. The purest love is that of children, and so as such, this is how we must love and this is how we find meaning and purpose. When we have the humility and bravery to see and accept life, and ourselves, as is and as are, we begin to just be. And as we enter our state of gratitude for beingness, we will live a more fulfilled existence. Love and purpose are found only when we are being.
So what do I think is our purpose when someone asks me that question?
I think that sometimes we get so focused on what it is, that we forget we are already living it, just by living our life. Our main human purpose is to be a kind, compassionate person and to be of some contribution to others. We need to allow ourselves to experience joy and express our love to others – and to contribute to others with our joy and love, and service. And if not – at least not to harm others. We must inspire to be the best version of ourselves, which is of as much love as we can hold. At the end of the road, all that would matter anyway is how much we loved and how we expressed it. Every little thing in life matters and has its own purpose. You just being present is purposeful and needed – your presence matters. Is a lawyer leading a less purposeful life than a nurse? It is all about how we are living, and not our job title. If the lawyer is helping those around him/her than it is purposeful. A house wife is living an incredible purpose – she takes care of the home, the family – what bigger purpose could there be than her care and love?
And sometimes just a smile is all the purpose you have to contribute to something life changing. Never underestimate the power and purpose of a smile and a kind word. You standing on the sidewalk and smiling at someone, matters. You smiling at your family, matters. Just being a kind person is all you should focus on. So don’t bother yourself with what you are doing – focus on how and who you are while you are doing it – and how it is affecting others around you and how you are contributing to this world. The kindness of your heart is your biggest contribution. In order to find our dharma (or purpose), we need to first be clear about who we truly are. Once we know ourselves, the rest will unfold as long as we follow the higher values of life and our true heart’s intentions.
To live a purposeful life, all we need to do is just be. Allow life to breathe through your body and mold you naturally into what you were always meant to be. Surrender and immerse yourself fully, completely and passionately into being. This is an experiential process of living that is often invisible to our immediate eyesight and human understanding for its “results” – but it is all we ever needed to do anyway.
Devote yourself to life, not just partly and not just when it’s easy or convenient. Devote yourself completely, absolutely, passionately, wholebodily and wholeheartedly, and don’t hold back. Love others and you will inevitably live a purposeful life.
And wherever love beckons you to go, you must follow it. It’s your heart calling the souls of your feet and hands.
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Cover art by Wilhelm Gunkel on Unsplash.