Love and Spirituality

Love is often seen as the heart of spirituality. Yet it is not the starting point, but a consequence. By distinguishing emotional love from the state of bliss, and by recognizing the fundamental harmony (Rita) at work within, it becomes clear that what we try to produce actually arises when obstacles fall away.

A couple meditates in the lotus position face-to-face.

Home / The Satsang blog/ The Revelation

Love and Spirituality

What is sought, and what reveals itself

Summary: Love is often seen as the heart of spirituality. Yet it is not the starting point, but a consequence. By distinguishing emotional love from the state of bliss, and by recognizing the fundamental harmony (Rita) at work within, it becomes clear that what we try to produce actually arises when obstacles fall away.

Text

Love is often presented as the highest expression of spirituality. To love, to open one’s heart, to embrace the world—this seems self-evident, as if nothing more needed to be said. And yet, when we look more closely, this apparent truth calls for clarification.

A common confusion

Spiritual traditions do not all place love at the beginning. They speak of liberation, knowledge, discernment, and the ending of suffering.

In early Buddhism, for example, the aim is not to love the world, but to free oneself from the cycle of rebirth. The Karaniya Metta Sutta, often presented as a hymn to universal love, actually describes a state of benevolence, an inner disposition free from hatred and craving.

Depending on the translation, the word “love” may appear—or not. A single passage may evoke boundless goodwill or be rendered as a call to love all beings. This subtle shift deeply shapes understanding.

Thus, what we call love is not always what the texts are pointing to.

What we call love

In ordinary experience, love is a feeling. It connects, attaches, draws closer. We love our loved ones, our ideas, our habits—even trivial things. This movement belongs to human life.

But is this the heart of spirituality?

When awareness settles into fundamental harmony, whether through deep meditation or through service, something opens in the chest. It is not an emotion that arises, but an opening, a space unfolding, accompanied by an inner smile, without cause.

It is felt in the heart area—some refer to the thymus—and it naturally brings to mind love. Yet what is present is not a feeling directed toward someone. It is a state, stable, without object, independent of anything. It does not need to be maintained. It is simply there.

Some call it bliss, others speak of bhakti.

Cause or consequence

From there, the question arises naturally: must we love in order to grow spiritually, or does love appear when something within has become clear?

Many try to cultivate love, to produce it, even to impose it against their own inner state. Others observe that when confusion settles, when the mind (citta) becomes still and the false ego loses its grip, a new quality emerges on its own.

In spiritual traditions, one is not asked to love emotionally. One is asked not to harm, to be sincere, just, and self-controlled. It is not about producing a feeling, but about aligning one’s conduct and clarifying one’s perception.

Then something takes place effortlessly.

Love is no longer pursued. It becomes what reveals itself.

An individual matter

Spirituality does not begin with the world, but with the one who perceives it.

We come into this world alone, and we leave it alone. Between these two moments, there are roles, relationships, and commitments. But what is at stake concerns the soul, in its own journey.

Politics, sociology, and human systems address the collective. Spirituality unfolds in direct experience. Only from there can something be expressed in relationship with others.

Love as Grace

Love, whether in human relationships or attributed to God, is always experienced as something that comes. It cannot be manufactured. It appears as a gift.

Looking more closely, this movement arises from fundamental harmony itself—not as a construction, but as an inherent order, a silent perfection that naturally calls forth our response.

What we call love emerges from this recognition. It does not come from us. It moves through us.

It is not a matter of loving others as a principle, but of allowing God to love through us, in a movement where we step aside. One may speak here of Grace, or, in other traditions, of the virtue of the Tao.

What remains

This is not about rejecting love. In human life, it is precious. It softens, connects, and illuminates. But from a spiritual perspective, it is not the starting point. It cannot be commanded or produced.

It appears when what stands in the way falls away. And if the word love matters to you, you may keep it—but allow it to deepen, until it no longer refers only to a feeling, but to that which silently sustains and pervades all things.

This text has a continuation : Loving Is Not the Goal

If you have any questions, please write here:

madhyama.marga@gmail.com

#love, #spirituality, #English, #Meditation, #yoga, #Orignal Yoga, #The Path, #Hans Yoganand