Love your neighbor

When you think of your neighbor, you typically think of the person who lives next door to you. In actuality your neighbor is every other human being who shares the planet with you. It is easy to love another person who believes what you believe. It becomes more of a challenge to love someone who does not think or act as you would. These are the people we tend to categorize as "those" people. We create an artificial barrier to withhold the love that we would give them. Ask yourself, "What aspect or quality of this person am I finding to be unlovable?" Now look within at that aspect of yourself and see how it might resonate with what you dislike in others. Perhaps you don't like their intolerance. In what ways does intolerance show up in your own life? Perhaps you lack information about the lives that others lead. What would happen if you learned more about who they are and what influences their lives? When we break down these barriers we find that we are more alike than we are different. We learn to love our neighbors unconditionally just as we would do for ourselves. Which of your neighbors do you find difficult to love and what would it take for you to make a shift in demonstrating love to others?