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Be recklessly generous and relentlessly kind.

Therapists tell us that until we root out the deep, dark recesses of our unconscious minds, it’s impossible to reach self-fulfillment. A fully-realized person, they insist, must dig for hidden secrets that make him feel unworthy, must dive for past cruelties inflicted by her parents.

But what I want to know is, “While we were down there with flashlights, why didn’t we look for our souls?”

We’ve spent 20 years excavating the darkness, when right under the next rock is a world of wonder and brilliance. Yes, I’m talking about our spiritual side, that transcendent force at the center of our very being. This light (again, just waiting for our discovery) is the most potent force in the universe. It’s Spiderman, Superman and Oprah all rolled into one.

Love is the cosmic electricity, the condition that allows us to dream of bigger playing fields. The voice that constantly whispers, “You could be more.”

Most of us have a tendency to ignore that voice. We listen instead to the voice that says, “This is all there is.” We get so preoccupied with things that don’t matter that we lose sight of things that do.

As long as we put our emphasis on material things, believe it’s more important to look good than to “be good,” we are destined to live small. When we send love to stand out in the cold and tell ourselves that face lifts and Land Cruisers and jobs with long titles are what we’re here for, we miss the whole point.

We are spiritual beings with no other purpose than to love this world back to wholeness. That’s all we have to do.

And we CAN do it.

The main problem is we think love is something for a Valentine’s card. Or a chick flick. Yes, it’s appropriate conversation for husband and wife. But not for a government and its people. Love’s okay in the bedroom. But, for heaven’s sake, keep it out of the boardroom.

Dr. Griffith Banning, in a study of 800 Canadian kids, discovered that lack of love in a child’s life does far more damage than disease and all other factors combined.

Wouldn’t you think something this important should be our main curriculum? Wouldn’t you think something this big should be emphasized every day in school, in business, on Capitol Hill?

When are we going to invite love back from exile?

People speak of the real world, the practical world, as if it were somehow more sensible than the spiritual universe. But I’d venture to say that most of our problems come from underestimating the practical importance, the mighty power of love.

Looking for love is a lifestyle choice. Sure you can continue to fill your mind with the meaningless stimuli of a world preoccupied with meaningless things. But you can also decide to cast your rod into the bottomless mystery of your own soul. You can tap the deep subterranean impulse that recognizes magic and repairs defects.

Ultimately, it’s the only thing that matters.

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Pam Grout is a hopeless romantic who still believes the world is a beautiful place, that people are noble and that anything is possible.

For a living (and she always wonders why people think that's such an important question), she writes books and articles for such magazines as People, Huffington Post and Travel.CNN. She also enjoy writing stories for her grandkids, but that's more about making a life than a living. She's keenly aware there's a huge difference.

In making a life, she has traveled to all the world's continents, learned 59 ways to make a fort out of sofa cushions, perfected a mean tennis forehand and volunteered at a women's prison and a free health clinic.

Find out more about Pam and her out-of-the-box take on life at her sometimes-updated website at pamgrout.com.

For more information, please visit pamgrout.com

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