Click for audio: Love, Thought and Emotion
In this final part of our February Love series, I want to focus on the distinction between love, in the spiritual sense, and thought and emotion, particularly emotion.
When the apostle Paul speaks of the carnal mind or the mind of the flesh, he is referring to the senses-based composite identity that I associate with the self-image.
“For those who live according to the flesh set their minds on the things of the flesh, but those who live according to the Spirit set their minds on the things of the Spirit. To set the mind on the flesh is death, but to set the mind on the Spirit is life and peace.” (Romans 8:5-6).
We should not think of death in this context as the loss of heart and brain function, but as a severing of our awareness, through distraction with external conditions, with deeper reality. Eastern traditions refer to this distraction as maya, or illusion, the “power or the principle that conceals the true character of spiritual reality”.
This world of illusion exists and is sustained in the realm of our own thought and emotion. We’re presented with an appearance, we analyze it, brand it negative and have the corresponding negative emotional reaction. This whirl of mental and emotional energy becomes our experience. If someone asks how our day is going, we look at this internal dust devil and say, not so well. Our response is a product of Paul’s mind of the flesh.
Merely changing our thinking, as advocates of mental science suggest, is not enough. We want a change of experience. We want to move our awareness from the whirlwind of thought and emotion to the eternally steadfast experience of the soul. The common belief is that we must first remove the apparent source of the mental/emotional disturbance before we can have a better experience. The soul, however, is always at rest. To set the mind on the soul (Spirit) is life and peace.
In the midst of whatever whirlwind you may be experiencing, practice knowing that love is doing its perfect work in and through you now. Love is dissolving that which seems to stand in the way of your highest good and love is attracting to you that which is best. Release the tumultuous mental and emotional energy and move toward the peace that is ever present.