1 • Love First Is… An Idea

At the heart of everything I’ve devoted my life to, this unyielding idea cannot be stopped.

Today the Elements come together.

Today the dots become connected.

Today I “Cut through organizational impediments and get some real work done.” (Geez, alright already, fortune cookie!)

The idea of Love First came to me in a vision, a spiritual awakening of sort. This trance connected me with the infinite Love of the Universe, lifting me from the darkest, deepest depression of my life and launching me into the ether of endless possibilities.

Within moments of my lift-off, this idea evolved into a bigger picture: a philosophy, a way of life, a framework for understanding the world in new ways. Then it transformed into concrete tangibles, forming pieces of the puzzle that was my life. Where before it had been in shambles, my soul sitting dimly in my life’s rock bottom, here now appeared before me a brilliant picture of the life I could live. A life that mattered. A life made with love, first.

All my passions, all my ideas and interests and desires to make a better world, they all converged into this one idea:

Love can be understood like a cosmic force: its presence felt yet never seen, its powers real yet immaterial.

We can harness this Universal kind of Love by understanding its properties as practices that cultivate it, allowing us to shape its power to enrich and benefit our lives. And not just our own—everyone else’s, too. A bridge across all divides. A tool to improve all tools. A weapon to undo all weapons.

I looked back across the entirety of my life and I saw this Love reflected in all of my best experiences: my deepest moments of love, my most beautiful connections, my greatest achievements. I saw the fabric of Love and recognized how its practices wove different but powerful strands of beauty, hope, success, and connection into everything.

And if I can see how these practices cultivated Love into my life, then so too can others.

The Beatles sang “All You Need Is Love.”

Rumi lavished the world with thoughts on love, like “Let your teacher be love itself.”

And recently, during a grief ritual in which I let go of someone I love and have loved like no other, someone whispered into my ear: “You only lose love when you forget that you are love.”

I invite you to join me on a journey into the very essence of Love itself. A journey into the love that we are, the love we share between us, the love we can have for our world, and the love that is all around us. This great cosmic force I call Universal Love.

Welcome to Going Love First.

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