Unexpected Freedom

Unexpected Freedomfullness, an incomparable aliveness directly related to thequality of attention involved. However, as important as thecultivation of this unified inner state may be, this evening’squestion is about the same undivided heart-quality directedoutwards, towards another person.It’s natural that we want to know the truth about love. Itis such a mysterious and unfathomable experience, and yetour hearts yearn to fathom it. Various objects and situationscan draw us into this state of being undivided. If we’veconsciously experienced our ability to offer such attention,we know how it feels in the company of another individual,but we might also have experienced it unexpectedly on amountaintop or alone out on the ocean. There might alsohave been occasions when we felt lifted into an altogetherdifferent reality through proximity to a particular individualwho has fully realised the heart’s capacity for being loving.Simply being in their company might have induced us into astate of love that we had not known before. In these variousways it happens that conditions sometimes conspire to freeus from fear; and when fear ceases, when for some magicalreason fear is not happening, love is.Having become aware through personal experience ofthis tremendous quality of undivided attention, it becomespossible for us to enquire into how, where and whenattention becomes divided. Our attention is usually divided,and we soon recognise how difficult it is not to be divided –not to be taking sides for and against our experience. It’s noteasy to make ourselves be loving; in fact we can’t do it; ‘I’can’t make myself be loving. Being loving happens.However, we can, through developing an interest, directourselves towards an awareness of the divided state; we caninvestigate it and become familiar with its dynamic. As wemake this investigation, we start to find that we can undo the54