Have you ever noticed how you keep having the same relationship over and over? Sure, the faces change, but it keeps ending up the same. Time and again we bump up against the same issue, our issue. Each time we have the opportunity to do it differently. We could choose to change the belief by doing the inner work that would allow the Love to flow once again, but often we go the other way.

The first encounter is usually mild, but unmistakably uncomfortable. It doesn’t feel good to us, but with the first encounter it’s not so bad when we jump to blame the other, soothing our self temporarily. “Ah well,” we think, “next time I won’t do that again!”

The next love encounter goes really well right up until we bump into that same, unexamined unconscious, limiting belief, again. “Ouch!” we yell, “that really hurts!” Of course it does, because that issue has now become a 2x4 and has hit us pretty hard.

In the first couple incidents the pain is usually emotional, which is agonizing enough. However, left unaddressed, it gets bigger because of the Law of Attraction. The longer this belief is left unconsciously operating; the 2x4 will become a 4x4. The 4x4 will becomes a 6x6 ad infinitum until we finally pay attention to the discomfiture and understand that it is our information and guidance. If we follow it, it will set us free.

This “issue” that we cart around in our subconscious is an old decision, a belief, and therefore, a habit of thought that we made or adopted long ago. It could have been made when we were old enough to remember it; or perhaps it was made preverbal, before we even had language to speak. It matters not how or when this decision was made, but you can be certain that it was a decision resulting in the closing of your heart. It is an operating belief that bends, blocks, twist and distorts the Flow of Source through you.

We travel though our lives crippled by these beliefs year after year, never connecting the symptomatic dots: troubled relationships, career failures, headaches, stomach aches, more prescriptions, less fun, more serious and incapacitating illnesses, etc. Until one day one of two things happens: we are hit by a Cosmic Goose or we are Love Struck.

A Cosmic Goose is an event so big and serious that we can no longer duck and hide, such as a serious illness, accident, divorce, job loss, etc. It is usually experienced as a complete shock. Naturally, we never saw it coming, because we weren’t focused properly. We were looking “out there” rather than “in here”. The Goose, however, will not go away without our full and complete attention. And because we want this pain to go away, and the suffering to cease, we come to an awakening that the issue is within us, and always has been.  We, alone, have been the only common denominator. So, by the back door, we want to feel the Love within our self, again. So it is the desire to feel Good, to feel Love, that will make us cross that scary rope bridge back to Self.

The other way we come to It, is by being stunned by the magnificent feeling of Love breaking through to us. It, too, is a shock; but this one is a Good Shock, of such breath taking joy and magnitude and so fleeting, that it leaves us longing to feel that feeling just one more time. Once again, it is only Love that will stop us in our mundane, dreary tracks and ignite our desire to feel It fully. Only the desire to feel Love motivates us to do our spiritual work, to clear the obstacles to our Oneness.

Recently I had occasion to witness a father, of a 35 year-old son, stop his emotional running and turn to face his own stuff. Why now? Because his beloved son was in very serious worldly trouble; and there seemed to be no apparent way though and out of this human drama. Someone had to take the entire issue into higher consciousness and unwaveringly hold the space of Well Being – Love - without blinking.  Not only does Love inspire us to do the emotional clearing, but It also does the healing. The Nature of Love is free, dynamic and flowing. It is kinetic energy, the energy of Source in motion. When we dam it up or block the Energy of Love within our physical body because of our unconscious thoughts, Love is distorted and hurts.

But the nature of humans is Love, Itself.  It is Who We Really Are. We naturally love, it is our Way. When human-mind beliefs tell us to hide It, meter It, block It, save It, disguise It, or bury It, this is our human mind leading us contrary to our Divine Nature. Take this to the bank: this always, always feels bad. Distorted Love will eventually blow up your life, in order for you to see it and choose again. Really, it is quite simple. We feel good when we are allowing Love to flow through us. It is irrelevant what we hold as our object of adoration: a person, a sunset, an idea, a pet, our Self – just as long as we Love, Adore, Admire and Appreciate. When we do, we are flowing our Spirit, our very Self through us and creating wondrous Good.

Likewise, when we are feeling anything less than Good, we are blocking the Flow of Love through us, because of some limiting belief lodged in our wee human mind. We are creating, but now we are creating wondrous ICK. Powerful, aren’t we? Many techniques and methods have been devised and taught over time in the effort to dislodge a limiting belief, to change it, to erase it, to stamp it out. The rub is there is no way to think your way out of it, for in focusing on that very thought, you make it bigger. Forget trying to figure out who, what, why, when and where. That’s more of your human mind dragging you off into the bushes. Who cares? What matters is you know what the belief is. You start there.

The Way of Love is just that: Love. We start where we start, aware of this belief and acknowledge that this is what I have held as true in the past. Then, like charting a trip, we decide where we want to go with it. For example, I might have held the belief that love meant the loss of my freedom, therefore, I wouldn’t get too close. Now, recognizing this as my starting platform, I begin. I ask for assistance from whatever nonphysical Source I trust: angels, guides, Higher Self, God, Mickey Mouse.  I feel my willingness and desire to expand and open my heart. I talk to my human-mind. I tell it that Love and Freedom are not oxymorons, but rather aspects of the same Energy and surely they fit together elegantly, like pieces of a puzzle. I know I can come to see this. I’ve changed my ideas in the past; I can change this one too. And easily at that!  My prayer becomes, “Show me the Way” and “Give me a new perspective.” Then, I imagine being in love and being free at the same time. I wonder how that would work. I wonder what that might look like. I play with that in my mind, rolling it over and over. I adjust. I tweak. I feel. I toy with this new idea until I am feeling the fun of it, the realness of it, and finally the probability and certainty of it. My old belief is behind me, now; and this new, better, higher one has taken its place, stable and pleasing. How do I know? Because it feels Good to me.

There is nothing that Love cannot change. There is no self-defense against Love. Like water, It whittles away at closed hearts, seeping into the smallest chinks and into every nook and cranny, ever-widening the cracks until It Flows unimpeded. Our only struggle is with the surrender. The surrender is to Love, which is Who We Are. The good news: there is absolutely no downside. Do it now or do it later; do it the easy way or do it the hard way, but each of us will return to Love. It is Law.

Kathy Kirk is the author and found of Applied Spirituality TM. She has a BS degree in hotel and restaurant management from Cornell University. She has authored two books, Well Done, available on her website at http://www.appliedspirituality.com and The Earthling’s Quick Start Guide scheduled to be released Spring 2009. Her blog, A New View, is athttp://www.appliedspirituality.blogspot.com . She can be reached at support@appliedspirituality.com. Kathy is an accomplished inspirational speaker and teaches classes and seminars in Applied Spirituality TM.