Have you ever read those accounts about little kids who remember past lives? Or stories about the wisdom children have before we teach it out of them?
Last year I was playing with my three year old grandson who was learning numbers. He said, “I love you one hundred!” I told him, “I love you one thousand!” He said, “I love you one million!” and I said, “I love you one billion!”
And then he paused. Very thoughtfully and very seriously he said,
“I love everybody – all the numbers.”
Maybe he paused because he didn’t know what comes after one billion, but it was not the first time he’d said that.
Ever since he was able to talk, whenever we would tell him how loved he was and say something to him like, “Your friend Susie loves you,” expecting him to say, “I love Susie,” we found that’s not what he would say. Instead he would respond, “I love everybody.“ And the way he would say it was always very serious and matter-of-fact, like truth. Never would he single out one person for his love.
The main message of the Course is that we are One – One with our Source, One with all others. “You are One Self … united with your brothers in this Self, united with your Father in His Will.” (OrEd.WkBk.95.17) Our insistence on creating and preserving “specialness“ and “special love“ drives a wedge through that oneness.
And so, in the little guy’s refusal to say he loves one person separately over all others – even Mommy or Daddy, or even Grandma Deb – is the wisdom of the Course brought to life, by a three-year-old, before we’ve had a chance to teach it out of him.
Sending you love … all the numbers.