While travelling this year, Carolyn and I have enjoyed meeting new friends and old. It's a nice mixture, each year greeting people whom you know, while new people come into your life. It never fails to amaze me just how many people feel so honoured to meet me! As a one-time dairy farmer, I never dreamed of the life that awaited me as a result of my spiritual search. It is only when a person is expressing their pleasure while wringing my hand that I actually embrace my reality of a spiritual teacher travelling the world. Mostly I just think of it as something I do, not so very different from working/being in my garden . . . sort of growing people instead of plants!

As I share my new message of unconditional Love with people during some of the evening talks, I have learned that most people have no idea of what I am actually talking about. By this, I mean the subject of Love.  People everywhere are familiar and comfortable with "personal" love, but few are aware of the huge leap in consciousness that is required to live within the framework of "unconditional" Love.  This could also be known as "universal" Love. When a person says to me, "Oh, I love myself," and they are smoking a cigarette, I have come to realise that they have no idea of the magnitude of "universal" Love.  It is not even a concept for them.  And this is okay; it is certainly no crime! For me, it has been a lesson in communication. Let me explain this: smoking is a personal choice, but you cannot express a higher Love for yourself while attacking your physical body. And smoking, like so many of our addictive habits, is a definite attack on yourself.  Repetitive self-criticism is also self-attack.  Smoking  introduces toxic substances into the body, while self-criticism creates toxic substances within the body.

When I have asked my audiences if there is anybody who never criticises themselves, not a single hand goes up. When I ask if it works, or if it helps, they smile and vigorously shake their heads. When I ask if anybody has stopped their self-criticism, knowing it does not work, nobody ever has. When I ask why they continue, knowing that it does not work . . . people look sad. All this can take place within "personal" love. Personal love embraces personal habits both in ourselves and other people . . . unless they become "personally" offensive. "Personal" love belongs to the everyday reality of everyday people, allowing us to get angry and even swear at people we claim to love. People often claim to love the person they abuse!

Universal Love is a very different state of consciousness. The Love for Self is of such a magnitude that there is no longer any self -criticism, no anger, no anxiety, no worry, no resentment, in fact, none of the negative expressions. You can dislike a person’s personal expression of self, but your Love embraces their soul Self. In the frame of "universal" Love, you cannot feel personal love for one person and dislike for another. Universal Love is a Love that is All embracing, actually recreating you in the perfect image of Love. Universal Love is a partnership, for as Love grows and reshapes you, so you grow and reshape Love.

In Love and Light . . . Michael