Universal, unconditional love for Christmas

The following post doesn't start like a usual Christmas post, but believe me I will get there, too.

We have watched a couple of films recently that were about some conspiracy theories. I call them conspiracy theories because the 'proofs' the Zeitgeist movies come up with are hard to verify, or others have 'proved' the opposite of the statements in the movie (especially about Christianity). It's not really the alleged non-existence of Jesus Christ or the inside-job theory of 911 that I want to write about but there is one particular idea in both films (said clearly in the second) that I think is important to mention, even (and particularly) in an aikido blog, and particularly at Christmas.

Let's start with a question: What is it that greedy, selfish, merciless, controlling and profit-only people have in common? It's actually what they all lack: unconditional love. The first Zeitgeist movie says one thing that, for me, is the idea that I liked best in the films (and this is the link to the second film titled Zeitgeist - Addendum). This idea is the realisation of the huge difference between two things expressed with the same words, only in different order. It's the difference between "power of love" and "love of power". Another duality of life, as I see it. If you have one of these fully, you either can't have or don't even want/need the other.

If you only love the idea of having all the power, forget about loving anything/anyone else. If it's power only then even if you think you love someone or something it's just is self-justified lie, because you 'love' to gain more power, control over everything that is in any sense controllable. This reminds me of a quote from Star Wars: "The more you tighten your grip,Tarkin , the more star systems will slip through your fingers". Control everything and love - and many other things related to it - slip away.

On the other hand, love everything and power will not be needed. Love is a very complicated thing. For some people (including myself) it's not easy to love ourselves, although it is said that it's the basis of everything, every kind of love. Until you can accept and love yourself you won't be able to truly love others, not to mention loving everything (the Universe, so to say) that does or does not exist physically. Once you love yourself (the more fully the better) you will be able to love others, and let yourself be loved ('share love'). But what does sharing mean? To give up some of your own power, I guess. You have to let some control (i.e. power) go if you want more love. And by love I mean unconditional love, not the one that is 'for something' (e.g. 'I love you if you do this/don't do that/love me back' are not unconditional). Once you can share your love why not love everyone and everything? I heard a talk of someone who has much more unconditional love than I have: if you love someone truly, you have to love them even if they cheat on you. In addition, you should love the one who you have been cheated with! This should be tough and I don't want to try to test myself in a situation like this :). So what the speaker said was that 1. you have to love these two people even if something bad happens, but he added that 2. obviously you will do your best not to allow cheating to happen. So love can be a bit of an acceptance. If you can't do anything about things, accept them, love them because it feels much better than trying to change the unchangeable, change the past, even the future. If you can accept that there will be queues in the supermarket or shopping centre before the eve of Christmas and not be angry, frustrated, etc. about it then I guess you will have just experienced a kind of universal love (point 1 above). Obviously, you might want to manage your time and your Christmas shopping schedule to avoid the crowd (point 2). And what if all your days, weeks, years are spent in this acceptance of things? That's infinite love, isn't it? Still, you will plan things and do things consciously to your best, but you might want to love whatever comes because you can't change the unchangeable and you did your best. I guess that's why some people say that enlightenment is when you spend all your time consciously. I think enlightenment might be the experience coming with conscious actions/thoughts/spirit/etc. and universal acceptance, love.

I don't know for sure what universal love feels like. I don't know whether O'Sensei got enlightened (because I believe he did) over a long period of time or suddenly, in meditation. However, now I have an idea about what universal love is, and I understand a bit more about what we really should mean when we 'preach' in a training: be in harmony with yourself, with your training partners, and through these, with the whole Universe.

Does this make sense to you? Have you ever experienced unconditional love (even if it's not universal)? Are perhaps you experiencing it right now as well? If so, please teach me.

Nevertheless, I wish you and everyone who celebrates it a Merry Christmas, Happy Holidays to the others!