Resolve to be more loving!

This year, why not resolve to be more loving to everyone, but especially to your mate. Love is a series of choices, not an overflow of emotion. In fact, the greatest and most meaningful acts of love come from sacrifice and self denial for the benefit of another. In the 1800's a wealthy man, Count Zinzendorf, actually dispersed his belongings and sold himself into slavery so he could share Christ with the slave community. This extravagant act of love was not built on emotion or convenience. It was a calculated series of choices made at great personal cost for the benefit of others. These are the kinds of things that amaze and inspire us. 

This year, resolve to inspire and overwhelm your mate with this kind of deep love.

Here are some ideas to start putting together a plan:

1. Determine where your love of self stops you from expressing love to your mate.
2. Plan to knock that barrier down and reach beyond it in your efforts to love your mate.
3. Determine what you can do that would be most meaningful and helpful to your mate. Engage your mate in conversation about his/her needs. Ask,"What do you need from me to truly feel loved and cherished?" This will probably involve things that are not too glamorous like helping with chores and child rearing tasks.It might involve cutting back on your hobby to help your mate enjoy theirs. It might mean rearranging your spending priorities. It will surely mean trimming something from your comfort zone to make him/her more comfortable.
4. It will involve a decision to be generous with your expressions of love. This could include generous offerings of time, kindness, thoughtfulness, and encouragement.
5. It will involve thought and planning. Generous, meaningful acts of love require thought, planning, and careful execution on a consistent basis. It is ridiculous to think that such a great endeavor could be successfully carried out on a whim.
6. The bottom line is that to be more loving we must choose to love our mate as much as we love ourselves and put our mate first as often as possible.
7. A key question needs to be "What does my mate need right now?" "How can I lift him/her up?"
8. The key question to minimize in our thinking is, "But, what about me?" "How can I get what I want?"

When we focus on lifting up self, love is imprisoned. When we focus on lifting up others, especially our mate, love is released. This year, I hope you will join me in resolving to release love. It is truly the only way to find fulfillment and joy!
Fear makes us hold onto love and put self first. Fear says,"But what if you lift up your mate and He/She does not return the love? You better keep it locked up to protect yourself." Love says, " Release me and I will grant my blessing to you." This year, overcome fear by releasing love and receive love's blessing!