I Know That Everything is Love
But knowing isn't enough
I know that everything is love. I've read it in books, heard it from teachers, even experienced it in peak moments. But between knowing and living, there's an ocean.
The Knowing
Intellectually, I understand: Fear is love calling for safety. Anger is love defending a boundary. Sadness is love grieving what was precious. Even hatred is love, twisted and confused, protecting something vulnerable.
In meditation, in moments of grace, I can feel it—the love that underlies everything, that IS everything.
The Forgetting
But then life happens. Someone cuts me off in traffic. My child throws a tantrum. A client cancels. My partner withdraws. And suddenly, all that knowing evaporates.
I'm angry. I'm hurt. I'm frustrated. And love feels like a beautiful theory that has nothing to do with this moment.
The Gap
This is the human experience: Knowing truth in our highest moments and forgetting it in our triggered ones.
The spiritual path isn't about never forgetting. It's about remembering faster.
The Practice
So I practice. When I'm triggered, I ask: "Where's the love in this?" Not as spiritual bypassing, but as genuine inquiry.
- In my anger: What am I protecting?
- In my fear: What do I care about?
- In my sadness: What did I love?
- In my judgment: What value am I honoring?
Sometimes I find it immediately. Sometimes it takes hours, days, years. Sometimes I need help seeing it. But it's always there.
The Integration
The goal isn't to always see love—that's inhuman. The goal is to remember that even when I can't see it, it's there. Even in my blindness, love is present. Even in my resistance to love, love is holding me.
The Paradox
I know that everything is love, and I forget that everything is love. Both are true. Both are love.
And in accepting this paradox, I find peace with my humanity.