Relationships give us some of our best moments . . . and also our worst. It’s no wonder we’re so preoccupied with them—whether that’s fantasizing about your ideal partner or trying to save a marriage, pacifying a difficult colleague or struggling to control a rebellious child. There are thousands of books promising to reveal the secret of how to improve your relationships. But what if relationship problems had nothing to do with the specific people involved, their personalities or their life stories? What if instead they resulted from a mistaken understanding about what a relationship is for? What is its true purpose?
Typically, relationships are special arrangements made between two people. A Course in Miracles takes a radically different approach. It teaches that relationships are the classrooms in which we learn to awaken to our true nature, which is only love. They are crucibles for enlightenment. Seen in this way:
• We don’t “get” love from a partner nor do we have to give up anything in order to get it.
• We don’t search for it out there in the world.
• The love comes first, from within, then infuses all of our relationships.
• To be open to this love, we release our judgments and grievances about others—what the Course calls “forgiveness”understanding that by freeing them, we free ourselves.
From Loving One to One Love is not another how-to-fix-it guide to relationships. By applying the Course’s principles, we can achieve an experience of love that is beyond anything we can imagine: a universal love that’s not limited to any one special person or group, but shines on all alike. We learn to see each other anewnot as separate individuals with competing needs and agendas, but through the eyes of love. We learn to love as God loves.
