Insight of the Week: “Love your Enemy” – But Who is your Enemy?

Christian religions teach us to love our enemies, and this is considered the highest and most difficult of love.  Based on this teaching the next question is: Who is your enemy if we are all one??

This would mean that the enemy is you. What, you say? Can I be my own enemy?  And the answer is yes.  We sabotage and punish ourselves subconsciously more often, than not.  We crucify ourselves more than anyone outside of us ever would.  It’s time to take ourselves down from the cross and learn to love ourselves unconditionally.  This is called self-love.

We create our lives based on our choices.  Our choices stem from our belief systems and from whatever subconscious programming is running in the background, just like the back end of a computer.  What is your programming? Where did it come from? Mostly it is made up from all your internalized messages from your childhood. These messages gave you the code for what is and isn’t acceptable, along with your individual coping skills and defense mechanisms. They made up the part of you that is called the false ego. The part of you that only identifies with the material world and your human identity, solely, and not your spiritual identity.  There is your true self (spirit origin and authenticity) and your false idealized self- image or false ego. Your false ego runs on the premise of fear and an illusionary sense of self- protection. Your ego is the gatekeeper between these two guided by your free will choices.

To learn self-love means we must practice radical honesty with ourselves, we must learn to love ourselves unconditionally despite all our faults and shortcomings, we must learn to look at all our wounds and forgive ourselves for the behaviors we have enacted based on these wounds. This is no easy task.  However, this is the road to true healing. No-one outside of you will ever give you more love, honesty, respect, and forgiveness than you are willing to give yourself.  This is the mirror teaching, this is Universal Law of Correspondence – as within, so without.  When you learn to love and forgive yourself you will be able to do so for others as well. It all starts with you. So, if you want to learn to love your enemies, learn to love yourself and you will see there are no enemies standing before you.  It was just a wounded reflection of yourself.  This is the teaching.