How can I express my love for God today?
(Amar Mann © Copyright)

The mind cannot comprehend God or about God. It is by loving we can know him/her (God being genderless) intuitively. Then our daily question on spiritual path should be how can I express my love for God today? What good I can do today?

When our loving obliterates the gap between lover and beloved that means between doer and to be done, we can know God. That is why it is written in Sikh scriptures that he/she himself makes us love him and ultimately unites us. It also implies that God is the doer. The gap between lover, beloved and love needs to go. Who can tell whether Guru Nanak loved God or God loved Guru Nanak? And where was the love, when Guru Nanak's whole life was love? When he talked he talked from the love center, when he eat he thanked God in gratitude for food, whatever came it was good for him, it was blessed from God, it was will of God. For him it was, Thine, Thine, yours and yours. It also takes away mind's duality, which always separates. The mind often turns us into doer and something needs to be achieved. Instead we need to open our hearts and use them throughout the day. Not just for some person for some time in return to their goodness. And we need to put our mind, the calculator, aside after using it for some purposeful reason. Otherwise it just calculates and turns our whole life into calculations; we give some affection back in return to some one's affection. We give gift to someone of the same amount after receiving the gift from that person, otherwise expects the gift in return. We abuse if someone else does. Are not we living just like 2+2 = 4, with calculations, without using our hearts?

To live our loving, we need to express our love for God daily, every moment. It is love for God, by God and from God. In order to achieve this I grouped spirituality into four terms. These are just terms to remind us, point us in the right direction, please do not get attached to them.

Hands-on-Spirituality
By this I mean, let's use our hands to clean some park, as nature also belongs to God. Paint some one's house who cannot afford it. By this we are out there in community trying to take care and in touch with God's nature and God's humanity.

Psychological Spirituality
By this I mean to practice different methods to strengthen our psyche and weaken our mind. To practice not saying 'no' for a day. To spend a day in silence, to resist arguments, listen more often, not to complain etc. By this way we are taking care of mind's clutter.

Religious Spirituality
By this I mean to sing God's praises, meditate and contemplate on God and God's name. To pray and reflect upon divinity. By this way we are awakening the divine within us.

Social Spirituality
By this I mean to be compassionate with family, friends and colleagues with whom we spend most of our day. To be kind, humble, honest at work and home. Not to live selfishly, always try to help and take care of our daily social needs rather than putting on others. By this we are acknowledging divinity of others also.

So knowing God requires a continuum loving, which we need to live and breathe daily. There are no separate compartments, the above classification reminds us the different places to look into to be whole and unite with the whole. As Hippocrates emphasized to physicians that 'First do no harm'. The same implies in our lives and is very important thing. Our mind has enough negativity then we combine negativity from history which is centuries old to kill and harm others. The centuries old fights are still fought today, like prosecution of one religious group by other, killing millions of people. So walking on this path, please do remember also, 'First do no harm'.