True Love - Grasshopper

I have a Snoopy and Woodstock towel displayed in my bathroom – one where they’re hugging each other.

Now, to be clear, it’s one of those decorative towels. You know the kind – you’re apparently not allowed to touch it. It exists purely to look nice and lift your mood a little.

And every time I see it, it makes me think about true love.

I think in the purest sense TRUE LOVE is love for everyone. My friend Jerry Stocking defines love as “inclusion,” and honestly, that’s tough to argue with . . . and even tougher to practice.

The people who seem the most lovable are usually the ones giving love away freely. They include people. They make people feel seen. And somehow, that love finds its way back to them.

I’m sure you have someone in mind that fits that description.

The classic example is Mother Teresa – or Saint Teresa of Calcutta. But even she probably ran into people who were difficult to love. That doesn’t make her less saintly. It makes her human.


We all do it.

But when I catch myself going down that road, I make an effort to pause and look a little deeper instead of writing the person off completely.

And more often than not, I discover there’s more there than I first saw.

Who can’t love a cuddly puppy or a purring kitten?

That warm feeling you naturally have toward them – try mentally extending a little of that toward someone who’s a challenge for you to love.


And when you do that, something shifts.

You may not end up with “true love” in the storybook sense . . . but it sure beats the heck out of carrying around resentment or hate.

And these days, that feels like a pretty good place to start.