Loving What's Unloveable

Transcript

Jim: 0:00

Hello, and welcome to this episode of Decide on Joy, a podcast coming to you from Harmony Spiritual Center in Fort Worth, Texas. My name is Jim Kova.

Pjae: 0:11

And I'm Reverend Dr. PJ Stanley. And welcome aboard

Jim: 0:15

This episode is titled, loving. What's unlovable? a, A useful skill for sure. It's quite useful. And why do we find some things unlovable

Pjae: 0:29

that's it that's a you know what this this Exactly was talking with some other ministers that I know and there's just things that we that go against our Values that go against what we believe is, right? That go against how we think society should be, how we should treat each other. And so rather than looking at the behavior, we look at the person, and it's hard for us to love them. We, you know, we, we separate different kinds of love, like agape love is supposed to be spiritual high love, and there's romantic love. But the bottom line to me is that no matter what you call it, if there's not unconditional love, it's going to go away. It's going to go away. And so learning how to love unconditionally helps with everything you do, with your partnerships, whether it's business or whether it's romance or whatever, understanding what unconditional love means, and that you have the power to do that. It's not, it's not dependent upon what someone else does. You love them because of who you are.

Jim: 1:27

Right. So, how do you get to that place? It's because We just automatically respond to some people negatively, I think. We do. We do. And it's just, it may not have anything to do with their values or what they're actually doing. It does not. It's just their,

Pjae: 1:45

their

Jim: 1:45

vibration. There's something going

Pjae: 1:47

on there. Correct. You know, you're immediately like,

Jim: 1:49

no, no. Yeah. Completely. So, how do you get From that, to what we're calling about unconditional love, what is, how do you get there?

Pjae: 1:59

Yeah, so, and that's a very good question and it's a decision like anything else. It's a decision you decide to do so, and why would you decide to do so? The reason why I decided to do so is because I think everyone comes to the planet lovable. I think we come as babies. You think about a baby, they're, and so it ends up being their circumstances. Maybe it's something going on with the way that they think, the way that their brain works. It's not that they come here not to be loved. They come, we all come here to be loved. And so, I believe. And so So I make a decision, a choice, to, to love people regardless of how they're showing up. But the question is, how do you do that? Once you make the decision, then what happens? And you have to notice, this is a word, this is a phrase that I'm starting to use now. I really like it a lot. You have to notice what you are noticing. Like you see things, but you don't pay attention to it. So you have to start noticing what you are noticing. And if you are noticing something negative about somebody, you have to stop yourself and say, well, what's that about? So you, in each case, you decide on how to get past whatever it is you're feeling that's negative, that makes you feel like you, they're unlovable. And so you have to, you have to ask yourself, what's this about?

Jim: 3:10

So you, you can make that conscious choice and still perhaps not want to have an extended, Absolutely. Connection with them. Absolutely correct.

Pjae: 3:21

Yes. Being, loving someone unconditionally is not the same as having a relationship with someone. It just means, when you look at someone and you look at them with unconditional love, then there's forgiveness, there's compassion, there's a, a, a desire to understand and not judge. So that's what that's about. I, there's a real quick story, when I used to be at living in Los Angeles, I was a peace officer. There was a gentleman that would, that I was working with. And every time he would step into the office, I would just look at him and be completely upset. It's like, oh, I don't, and it showed in how he was behaving. And he even said to me one time, he goes, what in the world have I done to you? And I thought, what, what in the world has he done to me? And I finally, I just looked at it, I just thought about him, and I thought, what is it? He reminded me of my father.

Jim: 4:09

Ah.

Pjae: 4:11

And I finally, I told him, I said, listen, it is not your fault. It is, this is all me. It's all me. You have done nothing wrong. But as long as you look like my dad, I'm not gonna be able to be in relationship with you. And unless you get a plastic surgery, I think it's over for us, And so he understood that and so he understood what I was telling him. I apologize for that. I, is that your fault? Mm-Hmm. But it's just the way it is, right? So you haven't done anything wrong. Don't worry about it. It just is what It's, don't worry. And I took, I took ownership of, of what was happening, right? Yeah. Right. Without me,

Jim: 4:41

and. You could perhaps unconditionally love him, but not when you were in his presence. From afar. From afar. It's

Pjae: 4:49

okay. I say that to people, they think I'm joking, but it's, it's sometimes it just, you just love people from afar. You know that I have a brother. He's still my brother even though he passed away. And he was more, more times homeless than he was in the home. And he was someone that gave me a bridge to understanding Transcribed by https: otter. ai And maybe not all homesick, but he was gave me a bridge to be able to see homelessness and not think it towards, why are they out there? There's so many choices. You know, all the judgments that we give, but my brother had a lot of choices. He had people who loved him. He had a wife who loved him, children who loved him, sisters who loved him. He didn't want to be in the home. It was a choice he made to be out on the street. He was more comfortable there, no matter how much we loved him. And so so, so loving someone who was doing something unlovable. Or seemingly unlovable gave me a bridge to start to understand some things. And so I think that's what you have to kind of look for. What's the bridge between you and that person? How are you going to, and again, I'm not advocating relationship. I'm just saying understanding and lack of judgment and care and concern so that we do a a homeless we feed the homeless once a year in honor of my brother that never would have happened had my brother not been a homeless person. So someone that I loved. Made me, made me care more about what was going on.

Jim: 6:08

Right and, Is that something that we think the person on the other end of it can feel that?

Pjae: 6:19

I believe, now you think about this, that's a very good question, and I keep saying their questions are good, but they really are, because this is the interesting thing. We ask that question, but then we know when someone is looking at us and doesn't like us, We feel it from someone when they say that they like you, but you know that they don't. You know, the words coming out of their mouth does not match what's happening with their heart. We know this. So, yes, so they know it too. They're human beings. They know it too. They don't, they don't address it. They don't come back at you because it's not what they do. But they absolutely feel the judgment. They absolutely feel the lack of love and compassion. We all feel it.

Jim: 6:54

Do they feel the opposite? Do they feel the positive? Do they feel the unconditional love?

Pjae: 6:59

I believe that they do. When we go and do the feeding of the homeless, it's not the food. They hang around and talk with us and chitchat and seem to feel very comfortable around us. Even when we finish passing, there's no more food left. They're still hanging out to talk with us. So I think they do feel the love. Feel that love from us. And sometimes there are, you know, people are homeless for different reasons and sometimes there's a mental capacity or incapacity that I can't, I don't know. But I think, I believe that unconditional love bridges a lot of things. And coming at them with that, I think, passes, passes through a lot of portals.

Jim: 7:33

I'm probably, I mean, I don't exactly know the context there, but it may be also that they're glad to have somebody talking to them without judgment, and who isn't preaching to them, because that frequently goes with that sort of food delivery. It

Pjae: 7:48

absolutely does. There is no condition, again, unconditional, there's no condition on us passing out the food. We're doing it because we love our brother, and because we have a better understanding now of homelessness, and simply want to help. And there's no, you come up with the way you want to come up. The way you want to come up, you do have to be respectful. We're not going to allow any, you know, talking and, you know, all this sort of thing. We're not going to allow bad behavior. That's a different story. But, But yeah, I, you know I believe that they feel it from us I feel it from them as well. It's, it's actually, and that's why I encourage a lot of people to just come and just be with us and you'll see that it's a, it's a beautiful and joyous day and time. They're funny, they can, they can joke, I mean they joke, they just don't, they're human beings and they act like human beings. When you when you look at them as if they're human beings. Yeah, I mean,

Jim: 8:34

I actually, PJ knows this, but I actually live in the midst of the You do. What you might describe as the homeless district in Fort Worth. Not in a shelter or anything other than an apartment, but I am right smack in the middle of that. And so I do see them, and yeah, they're no, yeah. They're

Pjae: 8:50

just human beings, and you just give them the respect that they deserve for being a human being.

Jim: 8:56

And, and very few of them are actively dangerous, sometimes, sometimes, because there is a lot of mental illness and stuff there, but, and, and, that's a place where you do have to, it's not exactly judging, but it's perceiving things like, okay, this person, I may be loving them unconditionally, but I really need to be at some distance from them, because, No, this

Pjae: 9:18

is, this is, this is, you know protecting yourself and being aware of danger, and that's a, that's a real thing. I'm concerned, as a woman, you know, I'm, I'm always looking when I, I don't go to places where it's dark. I don't get into my, you know what I mean? I park under the, you know, all the things that women do. And men too, I'm assuming. To just not to accidentally stumble upon a, a dangerous place. So that's, that's a, that's a good judgment. That's not about judging the situation. Right. It's about making sure you're safe wherever you go. Right. I do that all over the world. I do that all over the world. Yeah. I don't know. So, you know, when you, when you, when you begin to, to take that on, I think as unconditional love, it helps everything. And I think particularly in a, in a, in a relationship and marriage, we, we get into marriage because of romantic love. We're just romantically loved, sexually attached to people. But if you're going to be in that relationship, if you've committed to being there your whole life, then unconditional love is going to really come in handy. It's gonna be very helpful for the two of you when you love them, when they're not the same person that you married. Because, because how can they be?

Jim: 10:29

Well, no, no, no one. How can

Pjae: 10:30

any, no one is, no one is. And to be constantly reaching back and saying, well, you're not that person. Well, I should hope not. I should hope not. Yeah. You know, and so, so you're not constantly judging and saying, and thinking about, well, what you've lost. When you're looking at someone with unconditional love, you're looking at what is beautiful now. What is great now? And that's what it does for you. It opens those doors. So I, I just recommend thinking about what it looks like and how your heart can open to that. And how you can just love somebody beyond the behavior and into who they are, which is a divine being. They're just, we're divine beings. And I know people think that sounds very, I, I don't know. I don't know what the word people want to, it doesn't make any difference. But that is what it is for me. Is understanding that we're all spiritual beings, that we're all actually divine beings. And that's what I'm looking at. When I'm looking at people, I'm looking at the divine. I'm not looking at the behavior.

Jim: 11:25

Right, right, right. Maybe that's a good place to stop for this one. I think it is. It was a shortish episode, but I think we may have covered it. I think we did. Okay. Alright. Thanks for being here, and we'll see you next time.

Pjae: 11:38

Absolutely.

11:39

Bye.