In this article, we like to share with you our thoughts about spiritual love, the importance of it and how one can achieve it.
The four types of love
There are four main types of love
- Romantic love – between couples
- Family love – between members of a family
- Friendship love – between friends
- Spiritual love
What is Spiritual Love?
Like other types of love, spiritual love is also a feeling of connectedness but unlike other types of love, it is not limited to a specific subject but to all beings and even to the whole universe. The feeling of connectedness can also be described as oneness or seeing our self as part of a greater whole.
Most religions strive to attain spiritual love in the form of the love of God. This can easily be translated to the sense of connectedness described in the last paragraph. But you don’t have to believe in God or a creator to hold the belief that we are all connected. Even the simplest observation on our surroundings will reveal the existence of suffering and will allow us to develop compassion which is a key for developing spiritual love.
Why should you care?
We would like to suggest two simple reasons why you should care about spiritual love, each from a totally different perspective.
- Self-fulfillment – people who experience oneness tend to be significantly more fulfilled with their lives. So basically even from pure egocentric reasoning, it is worth taking the journey to spiritual love… (which paradoxically will transform egocentric life view).
- Social and environmental justice – spiritual love and the feeling of connectedness have the potential to become a foundation for better future societies.
The journey to spiritual love
There are many roads that lead to that sense of connectedness or oneness. Some examples are spiritual aspects of religions, meditation, movement, and martial art. In all practices, the common thread is the development of awareness and the understanding of the laws of nature that shows that we are not a separate entity but merely different depictions of the same one energy.
The secret ingredient that flare-up our sense of connectedness and turns it into a deep feeling is the development of compassion. Acknowledging the suffering of all beings is a powerful way to open up your heart and develop the willingness to do for others which in turn emanates a deep sense of spiritual love.
Here is a wonderful TED talk about science and spirituality that discuss that sense of oneness: