“A Love Letter” – an authentic perspective on Love

Paramahamsa Yogananda was described by his beloved disciple Rajarsi Janakananda as the Premavatar, or “the embodiment of divine love.” In the following lines, written in 1936, Paramahamsaji speaks first of his own search for divine love, and then of his unity with “God present as Love.”

“I have sought love in many lives.
I shed bitter tears and suffered to know what love is.
I sacrificed everything, all attachment and delusion, to finally learn that I am in love with Love – only with God.

Then I drank from the love present in all my hearts. We have seen that He is the One Cosmic Beloved, the One Fragrance that blossoms and permeates the infinite variety of loves present in the garden of life.

Many souls wonder helplessly why love jumps from one heart to another; but awakened souls realize that it is not the heart that is capricious and wants to love other hearts, but it is love that seeks the one God-Love present in all hearts.

God whispers to you eternally silently:
I’m Love. But in order to express the bestowal and reception of love, I have divided myself into three: the beloved, the beloved, and the love. My love is wonderful, beautiful, pure, eternally beatific; and I taste it in many ways, through many forms.
Being a father , I drink from the reverential love that springs from the heart of the child.
As a Mother, I sip from the cup of the baby’s soul the nectar of his unconditional love.
As a child , I imbib myself with the reasoned love of my father.
As a baby, I taste pure love from the holy chalice of maternal attraction.
As master, they drink from the sympathetic love of the servant’s attention.
As a servant, I sip from the master’s respectful and appreciative love.
As a guru, I delight in the pure and clear love that springs from the total devotion of the disciple.
As a friend,I drink from the fountains of spontaneous love.
And as a divine friend,I get drunk with the crystal clear waters of cosmic love resulting from the reservoir of hearts that worship God.

I love only Love, but I like to delude myself that, being a father or mother, I think and feel love only for the child; when, as a lover, I am only interested in the girlfriend; when, as a servant, I live only for my master.

And because they essentially love only Love, they ultimately destroy the illusion that they exist as myriads of separate human souls.

For this reason I transfer the father to the astral world, when he forgets that it is my love, not his, that protects the child. I take the baby from the mother’s womb so that she realizes that she has adored in him only My love. I distance the beloved from the lover who imagines that he loves only her and not My love who responds through the beloved.

My Love plays hide and seek in all human hearts, so that each one can learn to discover and venerate not the human receptacles of My love, but Love itself, dancing and jumping from one heart to another.

Human beings demand of one another: “Love me alone” – and I freeze their lips and seal them forever, so that they will never speak this truth again. Since they are all My children, I desire that they may know and speak the ultimate truth: “Love the one Love in us all.”

Telling someone “I love you” is false, if you don’t realize the truth: “God, as love in me, is in a loving relationship with His love, present in you.”

The Moon laughs out loud at the millions of well-meaning beings who have unconsciously lied to their loved ones: “I will love you forever.” Their skulls are shattered along the sands of eternity. They can neither remember nor keep their promise to love each other forever.
Without saying a word, I’ve always loved you. Only I can truly say to you, “I love you”—because I loved you even before you were born. My love gives you life and sustains you moment by moment; and only I can love you after you have entered through the gate of death and are locked in the realm where no one, not even the being who loved you most in the world, can reach.

I am the love that moves the human puppets hanging on the strings of emotions and instincts, to make them dance and play the song of love on the stage of life. My love is wonderful and eternal when you love only her; But the line of life and joy is cut as soon as you become shackled by human attachment and emotion. Realize, My children, all of you the Truth and seek only My love!

Those who love Me as one person, or who love Me imperfectly in the form of a being, do not know what Love is. Only those who love Me wisely, righteously, completely, surrendered, and totally given can know love—who love Me equally in everything, and who love Me perfectly and equally as All.”