When I write or talk about learning to love ‘what is’ I seem to find a lot of resistance. People hear me say that and they imagine themselves doormats to life, just lying down and letting whatever comes roll right over them. That is not what loving ‘what is’ means to me. It does not mean that I am not going to change what is mine to change; it simply means that I am not going to spend energy fighting and resisting what already is.

People have a hard time understanding this because they project the way they live their lives, always looking to the future, onto this idea and hear me say that they are not supposed to do anything.

Loving ‘what is’ sets us free of the pain born in resisting that which we have no power over. Loving something which has occurred does not imply that one welcome’s what has happened; it means that one loves peace more than the chaos which is created when we react in pain, anger, or shock.

Oftentimes we have no apparent control over what life brings. Loving ‘what is’ reclaims the power we have over how we react to life happening. It is a conscious way of living which, in essence, says: “O.k. life has happened. I had no power over that. If I deny, resist, or react to what has happened I am not choosing peace; therefore, I accept that what has happened is already in the past, and right here, right now I choose to respond in Love.”

That is quite different from loving what occurred. When I love ‘what is’ I am choosing to love myself, to love life, and to love my peaceful, joyous experience of life. From this center I can take whatever action the situation needs in a calm and compassionate manner.

One of the greatest secrets to living in peace is learning to love ‘what is.’  

In closing I will leave you to consider Henry Miller’s wise words:

We invent nothing truly
We borrow and re-create

We uncover and discover..
All has been given.

As the mystics say:

We have only to ‘open’
our ‘eyes’ and ‘hearts’

To become ‘one’..
with ‘that which Is’

         ~ Henry Miller ~