Brother Richard

we can acknowledge what we find in them that is lovable.

But we can also ask, is our love of those people, those beings, a deliberate choice or a reaction to circumstances?

And if we wish, we can center ourselves on the intention of choosing to love.

Choosing to love.

Choosing to love.

And gently then expanding our circle of awareness a little further,

we can bring to mind, perhaps, the people who are still within our life, but whom we would not characterize necessarily as beloved.

Allow their faces, their names, their images to pass in front of your mind's eye without grasping, without judging.

And ask yourself then, what would happen if I chose to love these people?

What would happen if I chose to persist in a loving attitude towards these people?

There may be some who arise within us who have done us harm, who have hurt us.

And if we find it difficult or even seemingly impossible to generate love towards them, that is okay.

We persist in the truth always of how we are.

But we can at least love the part of us that has been hurt.

We can choose to love back into fullness and wholeness the part of us that has been hurt.

We do not have to wait to deserve love.

Love is our fundamental nature.

And dwelling in that fundamental nature, we can at least hope and invite the intention that even those who have hurt us may grow themselves in love so much that they would understand what they have done

and so far as they can, make amends.

This is an intention we can carry when we find it difficult to generate love.