Preface
Extraordinary lives are filled with adventure. Most adventures have a
beginning, middle and an end; however, the adventure in this book has no
end. Asking the question what would love do right now? is useful at any time,
any place, with anyone, from now on. It is so easy to remember, because it is so
simple. The key is to remember to use it. Once you get started, it will become
so natural that you will find yourself telling those around you about it, or they
will say some form of, “You’re so much calmer these days. What are you doing
differently?” This is your opportunity to share how your life has improved by
asking this simple question.
The primary benefit of asking yourself what would love do right now? is
to create your life from the power of love, the real gold of life that makes
everything worthwhile.
This book is not for everyone. It is a workbook that requires your active
participation. You need to be willing to authentically look within yourself and
make changes. Doing a process, I call Inquiry to Resolution™ requires this
willingness. During the inquiry, you may come face to face with old hurts,
betrayals, humiliations, disappointments, and confusion—even abuse—that
you haven’t thought of for a long time or perhaps have buried deep within.
Now is the time to release these experiences to free yourself and be all that
you can be. The resolution comes by moving down into your heart where
compassion and letting go are available through forgiveness and making
amends.
During the twenty plus years I have spent coaching and counseling clients,
I have found there is no hope in avoidance. Going into the unknown parts of
yourself from your past may not be easy; however, it is necessary if you want
to live an extraordinary life.
May you have a sense of adventure and wonder as you are reading this
book, doing the inquiries, and implementing the question what would love
do right now? into your daily life. May your inquiry into love have a positive
impact on those you love and care about.
Thank you for the opportunity and privilege to make a difference in your
life and in the lives of those who are blessed to have you in their lives.
Love and blessings,
Victoria Benoit
What is Love? Chapter 1
There are many types of love: love of self, love of your work, love of your
parents who gave you life, love of your friends, love of your children, and love
of your pets. Then there is romantic love, love of country, and love of God.
Each has a different meaning and unique experience. Throughout history,
many have attempted to define love. There are biological theories, cultural
theories, and psychological theories about various types and styles of love.
You name it and someone has written about it. Throughout this book, the
word love will be used in the process of transforming many areas of your life.
The love I’m speaking about is a heart-centered love—the primal essence
of love that permeates all life. It is moving from your head to your heart,
surrendering your ego and moving into compassion, understanding, and a
deep sense of caring. Asking yourself, “What would love do right now?” from
this place, allows you to be more loving in all your interactions.
When two lovers are making love, looking into one another’s eyes and
relishing the moment of bliss, they are sharing their experience together so
completely that for them nothing else is happening in the entire world. They
are engaging in the primal essence of love, shutting out the outer world—
nothing intrudes. They are being present in the moment.
I hope you’ve had this experience. If not, maybe you’ve experienced the
pure essence of love with a puppy or a newborn baby. This is unconditional
love at its finest.
Now that you know the type of love I’m talking about, are you ready to
experience it again, or for the very first time? It’s really a choice.
You Are Love
Knowing that you ARE love can change the course of your life forever. You
can never separate yourself from love—ever! Nevertheless, it may seem as
though you’re separate. It is time to awaken to the love you are—to universal
love, the primal essence of love that permeates all life.
Sometimes we feel like love is missing and we look to others to provide it.
Actually, look no further, you have everything you need—you are love.
What would life be like if you were to wake up and love governed all of
your actions and decisions? What would you do, as love? You might start
your day by looking in the mirror and saying, “I love you.” Perhaps you would
meditate or journal in a sacred space. As love, you could jog, walk, or tend
your garden in the morning sunlight. You might take some time to go to
breakfast with friends or pick up chocolate-covered donuts on the way to
work. When you bring the love you are to all areas of your life throughout
your day, love is what you will experience moment by moment.
The Power of Love
“Getting gotten” and “being present” are essential to experiencing the
power of love. These concepts are defined here for clarity.
The experience of getting gotten occurs when another is so present with
you that you feel heard, seen, known, and understood for who you truly are,
and know that anything you say or do is accepted as an act of love.
Being present involves a conscious act of awareness—mindfulness. It
replaces automatic perceptions of situations with an actual experience of
living in the moment. Mindfulness is the art of living right in the center,
between past and future—it is living in the present.
Therefore, being present means being fully conscious of who you are,
where you are, what you are doing, and whom you are with at that exact
moment. No images of the past and no dreams of the future interrupt this
awareness. There are no distractions or other places you’d rather be. Nothing
else matters. Your body, mind, and heart are one.
The following excerpt from Buddhist literature is offered to illustrate
being fully present—what the Buddhists call mindfulness:
A man once asked the Buddha, “What are the teachings of you
and your disciples?”
Buddha answered, “We sit, we walk, and we eat.”
The man replied, “But, everyone sits, walks, and eats.”
The Buddha answered, “Yes, but when we sit, we know that we
are sitting. When we walk, we know that we are walking.
When we eat, we know that we are eating.”
There is nothing like the experience of being present, or the experience of
getting gotten! It is the primal essence of love that permeates all life. It is so
powerful it takes your breath away.
Love is—the Only Answer
Love is the answer, always and in all ways. Love is all there is, there is
nothing else. Love is everywhere and all around us—self-love, love of others,
and love of life. You breathe it, see it, smell it, and taste it. Seeing lovers
kissing on a bridge; a mother holding her newborn; a teenager helping an
older person across the street; a father teaching his child how to ride a bike.
It’s about creating and experiencing life to the fullest in all its perfection and
disappointments.
May this book motivate you to look at your life and evaluate where you are
in relation to love and living from the essence of love. I believe that asking the
question what would love do right now?—in any circumstance—will expand
your experience of love. For example, when you are in a situation where you
feel so angry you want to explode, if you would just stop and ask yourself,
“What would love do right now?” you will usually do something more loving
than you would have done without asking the question. You may not do
what Mother Teresa would have done, but you will do something more in
alignment with who you really are. You will then be able to respond to life
rather than react to it.
Asking what would love do right now? does not mean you will become a
doormat and refrain from speaking up for yourself. In fact, just the opposite
will occur. As you live from your heart and love yourself deeply, you will
know when to stand up for yourself and perhaps say, “No, I won’t be doing
that for you anymore,” “That doesn’t work for me,” or “That’s unethical for
me. I won’t be joining you.” When you come from your natural essence, then
speaking your truth will become second nature.
The more you ask what would love do right now? the more it will set you
free to love again, to love completely, and to love from your heart without
holding back. You can then be an example or model for others on how life
can be extraordinary, fun, and expressive. Soon people may approach you
and say, “You are so different. You used to be so negative and crabby. How did
you do it?” They, and the people in their lives, will be so grateful if you take this
opportunity to share with them your experience of asking, in any situation,
“What would love do right now?”
When you feel love in your heart, you and everyone else benefits, because
you have so much more love to give. It’s all about making a real difference for
you, your loved ones, and all those in your life who are willing to live from a
powerful foundation of love.
As you use this book to evaluate your career, relationships, finances,
health, and other areas of your life, you will begin to BE LOVE, rather than
love being something toward which you are striving. Bring love to a situation
and notice how others around you change, because you are different.
May the wisdom inside you take you on a journey into your heart where
your greatness abides. Now, that’s living a heart-centered, extraordinary life!
What Would Love Do Right Now in Opening Your Heart? Chapter 2
Opening your heart fully may require courage to release resentment,
animosity, or guilt associated with the past. It’s really about accepting your
humanity and the humanity of others.
In the following chapters, you will be engaging in the Inquiry to Resolution
process as described in the Note to Reader section. When you complete each
worksheet, the actions you create may include forgiving others for behavior
that hurt you, or making amends to people you may have hurt. When taking
these actions be sure you’re in a safe situation before allowing yourself to be
vulnerable.
This chapter looks at many approaches to forgiveness and what is involved
in sincerely making amends.
Forgiveness
Freeing yourself from resentment and animosity toward others may be
accomplished through forgiveness. There are many interpretations of what it
is to forgive another.
My aha moment came when I read Doreen Virtue’s Forgiveness card. I
realized that forgiving someone doesn’t mean what they did is okay, it simply
means I’m no longer willing to hold onto any negative feelings in response to
what happened—I don’t have to forgive the action, just the person to be at peace.
In the PragerU.com video on forgiveness, Stephen Marmar explains that
forgiveness is a very complex concept. He reviews three types of forgiveness:
exoneration, forbearance, and release.
• Exoneration is when a person is truly sorry for hurting you and
takes full responsibility (without excuses) for what they did, as well
as assures you that they will not do it again—it wipes the slate entirely
clean and restores the relationship.
• Forbearance is when an offender makes an inauthentic apology,
or blames you somehow for causing them to behave badly. It leaves
you with a degree of watchfulness yet cautiously optimistic, like
forgive but not forget or trust but verify, and allows you to preserve
relationships with people who, while far from perfect, are still
important to you.
• Release is critically important for your well-being: it allows you to
let go of what’s weighing you down and eating away at your chance
for happiness. It does not require that you continue the relationship,
but like Doreen Virtue’s concept, it asks that you let go of your
bad feelings and preoccupation with the negative things that have
happened to you.
Stephen Marmar concludes with, “To forgive may be divine, but when we
understand its dimensions we find that it is within our ability to do it.”
If you need an apology to forgive someone you’re unable to locate, or who
is deceased, write a letter from them to you and mail it to yourself. When
you read it a few days later, imagine it’s coming from the other person, allow
yourself to receive the apology, and forgive them.
Forgiveness Specific to Child Abuse
Child abuse is one of the most difficult experiences to resolve, release, and
heal. Some people assume the guilt and try, for many years, to forgive their
abuser(s) without success, while others are determined not to forgive and are
left living with the ongoing shame, pain, and hate without relief.
According to Bert Hellinger’s philosophy of forgiveness—relative to
children who have been psychologically, physically, or sexually abused—if a
child forgives the abuser, in addition to the abuse the child suffered, the child
will assume the guilt and responsibility for the abuser’s behavior. Therefore,
he insists that the child must not forgive the abuser. Based on Hellinger’s
philosophy, Magui Block’s book, Healing the Family, presents a process through
which abused children can heal themselves from the pain they’ve endured by
giving the guilt and responsibility for the abusive behavior back to the abuser.
Four Steps to Making Amends
Making amends is about others and restoring those relationships that
you have broken or damaged. The desire to make amends arises when you’re
willing to take responsibility for what happened and the impact it had on those
involved. It’s not suitable for everyday mishaps—it’s
best used for significant incidents that warrant extra consideration and may
simply depend on the importance of the relationship.
When you harm others and make no effort to repair the relationship, you
tend to avoid those people and large areas of your life become closed off.
When you begin making amends, you have the opportunity to restore your
relationships and have those areas open up again.
Seeking to mend a relationship involves forgiving yourself, offering a
sincere apology, making necessary restitution, and accepting responsibility
by taking steps to avoid making the same mistake in the future.
Step 1: Forgiving Yourself
Being able to make amends to others starts with forgiving yourself.
In his tiny buddha® blog Michael Davidson says, “Forgiving yourself
is far more challenging than forgiving someone else, because you must
live with yourself and your thoughts 24/7.”
When you’ve done something you consider wrong, the
accompanying emotion registers in your nervous system. For
example, you may feel guilty if you mistreated someone; or you may
feel sad, if you made a mistake that cost you a friendship. When these
emotions register, they usually contribute to negative thoughts and
limiting beliefs you have about yourself, like “I can’t do anything
right,” or “I’m a bad person.”
More than anything else, forgiving yourself requires that you
acknowledge your actions have consequences for yourself and others.
However, any attempt to forgive yourself—before letting go of the
negative emotions and beliefs—won’t work. You’ll just continue to
berate yourself, because your nervous system is in control.
I recommend using the Inquiry to Resolution process in this book
to identify and release the limiting beliefs and negative emotions
attached to the incident you want to heal in order to forgive yourself.
Step 2: Offering a Sincere Apology
In order for an apology to be effective, it must be genuine and go to
the heart of the matter for the person you wronged. Consider carefully
what you’re going to say. Be accountable—don’t make excuses or
deflect blame. Be sure to include the crucial words, I’m sorry.
• State what happened.
“I’m sorry I didn’t pay you back when I promised I would.”
• Acknowledge the impact your actions had on the other person
to show that you fully understand.
“I know it was my fault that you had to cancel your vacation.”
• Express your desire to restore this relationship.
“Our relationship means a lot to me.”
Step 3: Making Restitution
Whether you’ve robbed someone of time, money, property, trust,
attention, dignity, or well-being, it’s important to do what you can to
restore that which you’ve taken.
The essence of restitution is finding out what the other person
needs and determining if, and when, you can provide that. It starts
with an inquiry.
• Ask what the person needs from you to restore the relationship.
“How can I make it up to you?”
Then, let the other person respond. Just listen. If the request is
ethical and you’re willing to fulfill on it, you have two options:
• Agree to their request and time frame.
“I can do that when I get paid on Friday.”
• Suggest an alternative if you’re unable to comply.
“I can’t pay you in full now, but I will make weekly payments.”
Step 4: Accepting Responsibility
Accepting responsibility is about making a genuine change in
your behavior and taking on a whole new way of living.
Everyone has made mistakes, but the only mistakes that will
undermine your happiness are the ones you’re unwilling to admit.
Be honest in expressing what you’ve learned from this mistake.
This helps the other person trust that you’re sincerely making amends
for your past behavior. Describe the ways in which you’re making
changes in your life to refrain from repeating the wrongdoing.
• Admit your transgression.
“I was wrong to take your money and not honor my agreement.”
• Tell what you’ve learned.
“I’ve learned that I’ve been totally unreliable about money.”
• Declare any action(s) you’re taking.
“I’m participating in a debt management course, and I’m having
10% of my paycheck directly deposited into a savings account.”
Keep it simple. A long apology will start to lose its power. Make your
points clearly and effectively.
Give the other person time to respond. Grant them the space, time, and
freedom to vent, if necessary. Be willing to listen without judgment and
accept their point of view, even if some of their perceptions of the situation
seem inaccurate. They have every right to feel the way they feel.
Keep in mind, although making amends can free you, it doesn’t always
mean that the relationship will be restored—or that the process will be
sufficient for the other person to forgive you.
In the Alcoholics Anonymous’ 12-Step program, Step 9 states, “Make
direct amends to those people you have harmed wherever possible, except when
to do so would injure them or others.” When direct amends are not possible or
appropriate, there are many ways to complete the four-step process without
personal contact. For example: you could write the person a letter; you could
imagine yourself having a conversation with the other person; you could
create a collage. Your mind does not know the difference between what is real
and imagined, which is why visualization is so powerful.
You will be amazed how clean the slate becomes by making amends.
Remember to be gentle with yourself throughout the process.
If someone is making amends to you, let them. Be generous and be
gracious. Refrain from making the restitution you request out of proportion
to what they did.
