3 Stages of Love

3. Stages of Love

When lust goes love appears; and out of love comes longing. In love there can never be satisfaction, for longing increases till it becomes an agony which ceases only in union. Nothing but union with the Beloved can satisfy the lover.

The way of love is a continual sacrifice; and what gets sacrificed
are the lover’s thoughts of ‘I’, until at last comes the time when the
lover says, ‘O Beloved! Will I ever become one with you and so
lose myself forever? But let this be only if it is your will.’ This is the
stage of love enlightened by obedience.

Now the lover continuously witnesses the glory of the Beloved’s
will; and in the witnessing does not even think of union. He
willingly surrenders his entire being to the Beloved, and has no
thought of self left. This is the stage when love is illumined by
surrender.

Out of millions, only one loves God; and out of millions of lovers,
only one succeeds in obeying, and, finally, in surrendering his
whole being to God the Beloved.

I am God personified. You who have the chance of being in my
living presence are fortunate and blessed.