Defying Gravity?

This is where I would normally apologize for not writing for so long and promise to be better, but that is not real life.  I am not going to fight it any more.  Life is busy, and the only reason I restarted this blog is because the Lord told me to, so I am now just going to trust in Him that when he wants me to devote time to it, He will let me know and provide the time for it.
Thank goodness we got that out of the way!

I have been pondering about laws lately.  My friend recently went to education week in Rexburg, Idaho, and one thing she brought back with her was this really cool concept about the law of gravity.  For years, human beings fought against gravity in order to try to fly.  They built all sorts of wings to make them bird-like, and other contraptions that would enable their body to all of a sudden trick gravity into thinking they weighed nothing so that they could fly.

It wasn't until they were obedient to the laws of gravity, in every measure, that they understood how the laws of gravity could provide the thrust and ability to fly.  They had to not just work with the laws of gravity, they had to be exactly obedient to them.

This understanding has allowed me to reflect on which laws I am exactly obedient to, which honestly, I am not sure I am exactly obedient to very many of them, and which ones I am fighting against, because I do not understand them, or because I think I am smarter or do not  trust in them.
Two major ones came to mind: the law of belief, and the law of love.  I will start with love, because I think this one can be a little easier to understand.
Love is a hard concept to grasp.  It is a very broad word that encompasses so many things and a variety of feelings.  As there is opposition in all things, love can be "used" for good, to  uplift, support, unify, strengthen and empower, and it can be "manipulated" to force, shame, hurt, disparage, and humiliate.  I use quotes here, because I think in many of these instances we think we are invoking love or what we understand it to be but what we are most often doing is using it the same way a child "fixes" a broken toy with their plastic tools, we believe we understand it and how it works, but we do not comprehend the complexity of what it would be like in real life terms.
I have always had a hard time with love.  I never felt worthy to receive love, and I felt that if I let anyone in to my heart to love me, that they would have the power to hurt me.  As a result, I built a huge wall to protect myself from that.
As I grew older, I realized a part of the law of love, that you have to give of yourself in order to qualify to be loved, otherwise the other person in the relationship gives until it is too painful to give any longer without receiving and then they may choose to walk away.  I realized my capacity to love was enormous and that people could benefit from my showing love to them.  I felt a joy and a peace come into my soul as I practiced this and truly felt love for those I was serving.  The problem was that I was still not allowing the love they were trying to reciprocate into my heart.  As I was trying to build relationships, I would listen, and support and help others, but I would hold back my own struggles and burdens and not allow them to comfort, uplift, and strengthen me.  I have "brushed off" the love others have tried to extend to me.  When they share their love with me, my mind says ,"I know," but my heart says, "nice try pal, but you're not breaching this defense".
Lately however, I have come to recognize something very profound.  The Savior teaches us in the scriptures,
"Herein is love, not that we loved God, but that he loved us, and sent his Son to be the propitiation for our sins.
"We love him, because he first loved us."-1 John 4:10,19 (emphasis added)
If we parallel this with gravity, my capacity to love others is like my capacity to obey the law of gravity to the extent that I walk around on solid ground with no problem and I throw a ball in the air and it comes back to me.  However, if I want to fly, I have to observe all of the law. The rest of this law being that I have to allow the love of God into my heart, to enlarge my heart, and to recognize the fact that when the law of love is truly observed there is no need for my "protective wall". Period. Allowing love into my heart, from God, or anyone who loves me, is not something I need protection from.  Love needs not defenses. Do the people we love and that love us sometimes hurt us, yes.  But those moments are moments of selfishness and pride, not love.  We tend to tie love up into a bundle with those other things, and they just don't belong together.  They couldn't be more separate if they tried.
We also learn in the scriptures from Moroni that he spoke with boldness to his people because he "fear[ed] not what man can to; for perfect love casteth out all fear."-Moroni 8:16 (emphasis and brackets added)
Love does not belong with any negative feeling, in fact it can cast out those negative feelings.  If we truly observe the law of love in its fulness, we can fly.
So, while I learned first how to serve, then how to give love, then how to share my burdens, I still am working on opening my heart to receive the love that others, and (most importantly) Heavenly Father, are trying to send to me.  I recognize this is the portion of the law that allows me to fly.  This is the portion of the law that is the power of the law, the upward thrust.  I don't know how to do that yet, but I believe that the Lord will teach me about this part of the law of love.  I believe now that I understand that the law of love expands farther than I had previously comprehended, this is a great start, and I know that as I pray for guidance and for the Lord to teach me these things, I will feel that love.

This post ended up being longer than I anticipated, so I will share more about my thoughts on the law of belief in a couple days.  In the mean time, if anyone has any thoughts about practically applying this idea of allowing the love of God, and those around us into our hearts, I would love to hear your thoughts!