Learning to Love

What is love?

Love is closeness.

But it’s more. It’s committed closeness.

The heart’s warm flutter is often fleeting infatuation, here today and gone tomorrow. But love is something different. It’s substantive; it’s real. It’s a bond that stands strong in the face of day-to-day volatility, an emotional anchor that’s unshaken by life’s waves.

In Torah language, it’s called a Covenant (Bris in Hebrew), which is when two parties reach a deep, integral Oneness. It’s an authentic RELATIONSHIP.

That’s what Abraham had going with G-d. We, too, can each find this beauty in our own interfaces with the Divine, and with our loved ones.

But love is acually more than commitment. It’s other-centered commitment.

There’s a Chassidic story about a child who watches an adult catch and prepare a fish. Before his first bite, the adult exlaims “I love fish”. The child responds: “Sir, you apparently don’t love fish; for if you did, you would have let this one stay in the water. You actually love yourself, and this fish is just another avenue for feeding your self-love!”

Genuine love isn’t about us gratifying ourselves (although that may be a nice by-product). Love is about making space for the other’s needs; it’s about the other’s sensitivities becoming our personal concern.  

Of course we need to look after ourselves too; but that needn’t be a contradiction to other-centeredness. If I take a day to care for myself, so that I am better fit to discharge my responsibilities to G-d and the world, I’m living a day of other-consciousness. Filling my needs is a necessary preparation for benefitting others.

Abraham modeled this attitude for us. His relationship with the Divine showed total commitment. He made genuine space in his life for G-d’s Will. And he had the ability to find meaning in everything he did; even his physical life, including his ‘self-gratifying pursuits’, were opportunities for deepening – and expressing - his relationship with the Divine.

That’s why G-d commanded him - and us - to embody the Covenant by marking an area of the physical body, and specifically an organ which is symbolizes the pursuit of pleasurable physical engagement. To Abraham, it was all about building relationships and making this a better world, all about the Covenant.

Abraham showed us it can be done.

Now let’s go live life as it’s meant to be lived.