Odille Rault's Blog - Posts Tagged "can-t-feel-love"
Love the Fact that You Can't Feel Love
It sounds like a paradox, but there's an explanation and a way of doing this - and it's a powerful tool for getting out of the darkness. ;)
I wrote the following as a reply to someone earlier today, who wanted to know what I meant when I advised "When you can't feeeel love, love that! Love the fact that you can't feel it" And of course, it does sound absurd, so I thought others may benefit from the explanation....
When you start out, love is an emotion. It's something you feel when you look at or think of something - or someone - you love. It's a reaction to something or someone. I think of _________ and I feel love.
The exercises in the Superpower chapter of "Beyond the Magic Pill" are designed to develop the ability to use love as a power - which means using it actively, rather than feeling it reactively. Those exercises help develop the ability to feel love on demand - without needing to see or think of specific things. Once you master that, you can then use love as a tool, aiming it at things you want to change.
So, in the beginning, looking at something you love and feeling love for it is only a reference - it's only to take note of the feeeeeling you're aiming for. Then it becomes intellectual - a mental thing. The exercises require you to use thinking in order to get the feeling - to use thinking as the catalyst instead of a thing or person you love.
When I say love the fact that you can't love - I mean use that intellectual process. In other words: if you can't feel love right now, make that okay by deciding it's okay. Use the conscious mind to decide that it's okay to not be able to feel love, and use the conscious mind to decide that you love yourself anyway. Even though you don't feel it.
The point is: if you're not able to feel it, you're not able to feel it, and any judgement, criticism or any other negative view of the fact that you can't feel it is only going to add more darkness to the darkness.
Although the aim and the power is in feeeeeling love, loving intellectually (in other words deciding you love yourself anyway even without the feeling) is still infinitely better than those negative emotions - because whatever you're feeeeeling is what you're creating more of; and if you're feeeeeling negative emotions, and you use your thinking (I love myself anyway - I love that I can't feel love) to make the situation "ok" at least in your head... you're going to reduce those negative feelings. And the feeeeeling of love will come back later. Maybe tomorrow, or in a couple of days even. But whatever it is, whenever it is, deciding to love it intellectually at least, is always better than feeling the negative alternatives.
Think of yourself for a moment as a room. And not being able to feel love is darkness. And feeling love is light. The room is currently full of darkness, and you can't find the light switch. You feel along the walls, but you can't feel the switch. If you were to start feeling despondent, or frustrated or angry - or even just critical of the fact that you can't find the switch, it's not going to help you find it - all you're doing is stumbling around in the dark, feeling ... dark. In your pocket you have a tiny penlight torch. But you think: "It's not strong enough, it's only a penlight, it's not going to light up the room." ... But, even though it's only a tiny pin-spot of light, it's still better than being in complete darkness - AND.... while you're walking around with that tiny pinspot of light, you're more likely to find the light switch than if you were to keep groping around feeling whatever negative feelings you were feeling before.
The penlight is your thought. Your intellectual decision that you love yourself, even without the feeling. Now, yes, it's never going to light up the room (you need the feeling for that), but it's better than staggering around in the dark. ;)
Hope this makes sense and helps.
Love and Light and Magic xxx
I wrote the following as a reply to someone earlier today, who wanted to know what I meant when I advised "When you can't feeeel love, love that! Love the fact that you can't feel it" And of course, it does sound absurd, so I thought others may benefit from the explanation....
When you start out, love is an emotion. It's something you feel when you look at or think of something - or someone - you love. It's a reaction to something or someone. I think of _________ and I feel love.
The exercises in the Superpower chapter of "Beyond the Magic Pill" are designed to develop the ability to use love as a power - which means using it actively, rather than feeling it reactively. Those exercises help develop the ability to feel love on demand - without needing to see or think of specific things. Once you master that, you can then use love as a tool, aiming it at things you want to change.
So, in the beginning, looking at something you love and feeling love for it is only a reference - it's only to take note of the feeeeeling you're aiming for. Then it becomes intellectual - a mental thing. The exercises require you to use thinking in order to get the feeling - to use thinking as the catalyst instead of a thing or person you love.
When I say love the fact that you can't love - I mean use that intellectual process. In other words: if you can't feel love right now, make that okay by deciding it's okay. Use the conscious mind to decide that it's okay to not be able to feel love, and use the conscious mind to decide that you love yourself anyway. Even though you don't feel it.
The point is: if you're not able to feel it, you're not able to feel it, and any judgement, criticism or any other negative view of the fact that you can't feel it is only going to add more darkness to the darkness.
Although the aim and the power is in feeeeeling love, loving intellectually (in other words deciding you love yourself anyway even without the feeling) is still infinitely better than those negative emotions - because whatever you're feeeeeling is what you're creating more of; and if you're feeeeeling negative emotions, and you use your thinking (I love myself anyway - I love that I can't feel love) to make the situation "ok" at least in your head... you're going to reduce those negative feelings. And the feeeeeling of love will come back later. Maybe tomorrow, or in a couple of days even. But whatever it is, whenever it is, deciding to love it intellectually at least, is always better than feeling the negative alternatives.
Think of yourself for a moment as a room. And not being able to feel love is darkness. And feeling love is light. The room is currently full of darkness, and you can't find the light switch. You feel along the walls, but you can't feel the switch. If you were to start feeling despondent, or frustrated or angry - or even just critical of the fact that you can't find the switch, it's not going to help you find it - all you're doing is stumbling around in the dark, feeling ... dark. In your pocket you have a tiny penlight torch. But you think: "It's not strong enough, it's only a penlight, it's not going to light up the room." ... But, even though it's only a tiny pin-spot of light, it's still better than being in complete darkness - AND.... while you're walking around with that tiny pinspot of light, you're more likely to find the light switch than if you were to keep groping around feeling whatever negative feelings you were feeling before.
The penlight is your thought. Your intellectual decision that you love yourself, even without the feeling. Now, yes, it's never going to light up the room (you need the feeling for that), but it's better than staggering around in the dark. ;)
Hope this makes sense and helps.
Love and Light and Magic xxx
