This is episode 1,715. Welcome to the Daily Meditation podcast. I'm Mary Macley and I welcome you to a happy

Valentine's Day. If you are living in the United States and maybe if you're living somewhere else, you also celebrate Valentine's Day.

This is a day of feeling connected to others in love.

And as you think about your day today,

think about what love really means to you,

what provides you with that deep sense of peace? You might be thinking more of love spent with a

loved one today on Valentine's Day as being exciting and thrilling. But that wears off. That kind of novelty can wear off and it takes some work to

cultivate it. And we have been following along with the work of C.S. Lewis from his book, The Four Loves in this week's series.

So when you think about the love in your life, you may not be romantically involved with anyone.

You may have recently broken off a relationship and so you could be feeling lonely or

depressed today.

Well, if you take a few moments, regardless of whether or not you're spending the day feeling connected and

romantic with someone, or you are focusing on love in your life that applies to many

different people, not just romantic love.

You can still tap into a sense of inner peace.

And when you think about feeling at peace with loved ones, It may have taken you a while to feel this sense of peace

because it's more often that when we meet someone, especially someone we are interested in romantically, but also when we meet

friends or reunite with people we haven't seen in a while. There's a sense of excitement.

It's thrilling. And this can be how you expect to feel pretty much all the time.

And when you don't, because that kind of feeling is just not always sustainable. You'd be

exhausted if you had to feel excited and thrilled when you

were with loved ones. But that is often what happens. We become disappointed that we don't feel

...