Love and loving

“It’s important that the distinction be made between the verb Love, which takes an object, and the Being which IS love. You are afraid that if you don’t try to Be Loving that you’ll be awful. But the fact is that behind loving and awfulness, we ARE. And where we are, IS love.” -Ram Dass

I have been contemplating the difference between doing and being. I’m a doer. I recognize a need or desire, I make a plan of how to get there from where I am (as well as six back up plans) and then I take action. In the past, it has been my pattern to always be in action. Just being, I was not so good at. It required patience. How does one just be? Who am I if I am not defined by what I do?

Growing up, I was taught by my community that love was not an emotion but an action. One demonstrated love, behaved loving. Love was “something that you do”, and therefore, it was something that you had to get right.

But if we are willing to lay that notion down, if we let go of the category — of labeling things as right or wrong — and move past it to what is, we can see that love, like yoga, is a state. It is not because of what we do that we are loving. We are loving, because of who we are. We are Love. Incarnate.

Bread and Yoga Weekly Blog Series – Each month we feature one of our amazing Bread and Yoga teachers sharing their thoughts or teachings from their class with you and our community. Today’s post is from May blogger and Hathavidya teacher Lisa Benner. Lisa will also be helping to lead our teacher training this fall! Come learn more at our Q&A on May 31st.