Week 6 of the Master Keys Mastermind Alliance Experience (MKMMA) experience ushered in a new month, a new chapter in The Greatest Salesman in the World by Og Mandino, and a new scroll: The Scroll Marked II.
“I will greet this day with love in my heart. And most of all I will love myself.”
~ Og Mandino
We added in a nightly reading of Dale Wimbrow’s The Gal in the Glass. Each night, I read it out loud just before bed, look myself dead in the eye and see what the “Gal in the Glass” thinks of my efforts for the day. I finish the poem stating “I love you, Lori King!”
If you have never looked at yourself in the mirror, eye to eye and said I love you, I encourage you to do so today. With ENTHUSIASM! Self-love is GOOD love!
I’m reminded of the saying “put your own oxygen mask on first,” an airplane metaphor that basically means we cannot help, take care of, or love others if we don’t start by helping, taking care of, and loving our self.
Self-love is the act of taking care of yourself, which includes your body and your health. Self-love has respect for yourself and your own well-being. Self-love takes responsibility for your own happiness. Self-love accepts and embraces all of you: past, present and future. This kind of love goes beyond self-confidence and is truly beautiful, overflowing and spilling out onto everyone we encounter.
Self-love does not always come easy for me. I find I can be highly critical of myself, instead of offering myself grace and forgiveness.
And are not love and forgiveness intimately linked?
The Law of Forgiveness states that
To access the Divine and connect the subconscious to the Omnipotent, Omniscient and Omnipresent Creator we must forgive everyone and anyone to clear the channel. There can be no connection to the Divine mind where anger or resentment against a brother or sister, justified or not, exists.
The Bible says it this way:
But anyone who does not love does not know God, for God is love. (1 John 4:8)
“And you must love the LORD your God with all your heart, all your soul, all your mind, and all your strength. The second is equally important: ‘Love your neighbor as yourself. No other commandment is greater than these.” (Mark 12: 30-31)
This class has taught me to keep a dictionary and thesaurus close by. So often I skip over words that I don’t know or am not sure of. Now, I find myself looking words up. Even the ones I think I know like love:
Love:
~ strong affection for another arising out of kinship or personal ties
~ attraction based on sexual desire
~ affection based on admiration, benevolence, or common interests
~ warm attachment, enthusiasm, or devotion
~ unselfish loyal and benevolent concern for the good of another:
In the thesaurus we find a plethora of synonyms to include affection, appreciation, devotion, fondness, friendship, infatuation, lust, passion, respect, tenderness, allegiance, cherishing, delight, and enjoyment.
As I read through the Scroll Marked II, Mandino writes that with no other qualities but love, we can become great salesman. Without love, we will remain mere peddlers in the marketplace. And aren’t we all salesman in one way or another? (If you’ve ever been on a date, you are a salesman!)
Wimbrow writes
“For it isn’t your Father, or Mother, or Partner for life,
Who judgement upon you must pass.
The person whose verdict counts most in your life
Is the gal staring back from the glass.”
As a reformed people-pleaser, this one hit me square on the nose! At the end of the day, it doesn’t matter what others think. The person I must always be true to is ME! I honor the gal in the glass each day with love in my heart.
As I apply these readings and good habits to my life, I reinforce my focus and attention on love for God, mankind and myself. The more I think about love, the more it grows! And that’s the Law of Growth: whatever we think about grows. What we forget atrophies.
Imagine if every human on the planet did this! What a giant love fest of a world we could live in!
After all, it’s all about love!
