Don't you want somebody to love? This is a line from a hit song in the 1960s. It's also one of the most obvious facts of human existence.

In personal relationships, we often have a conflict between wanting somebody to love and not wanting anyone to tell us what to do. The same conflict exists in spirituality. Many lightworkers have little use for religion because they don't want to submit to someone telling them what to do. That's okay, but the problem is that we may end up not having anyone of cosmic importance to love.

The cosmos doesn't seem to care what we believe. Life treats us all in more or less the same way. Our freedom is in choosing how we respond to the treatment. Having somebody to love on both levels, human and cosmic, makes a big difference in our ability to deal with the pain, struggle and limitation of being human.

Lightworkers put a lot of value on loving each other. Sometimes we are teased for being a "love-and-light" mutual admiration society. The love-and-light ethic doesn't really make it easier for us to live with ourselves or get along with each other; but it helps to visualize a world in which such universal and unconditional love is full and complete. Still, when you're struggling, hurting and wondering if you're fooling yourself about the whole thing, you might appreciate having more than lightfriends who says "I know just how you feel." Don't you want somebody to love who's cosmic, powerful and can fix you just like that? You have to admit, there are times when that would be nice!

Devotion is mystical love. It is the love of St. Francis for Jesus, the love of Rumi for Shams E-Tabriz, the love of any Indian saint for his/her guru, and so on. There is an entire branch of yoga devoted to devotion: bhakti yoga. In Hinduism there is great devotion to Lord Krishna. It's interesting to hear what he has to say about it. In the Bhagavad Gita, Krishna says to Arjuna, "Worship me not in the highest form that you can conceive, but in the highest form that you can love."

Krishna is saying that you can't love a concept. Not enlightenment, self-realization, liberation, salvation, ascension, world peace, environmental stewardship, universal brotherhood, the golden age, or any other idea. A concept can't return your love. A concept can't help you when you're feeling miserable. You are a being and you can love only another being. So where and how do you find that cosmic being to love with true devotion?

You can start with all the well-known figures from established religions and discover them in your own way, without the baggage of dogmas and doctrines. That's really what mysticism is all about. You don't want stories from scriptures. You want direct personal experience. It's risky, because there are a million ways the mind can trick and fool you, but many have done it, and so can you.

You also might notice that the Universe, Nature, the Light, or whatever capital-letter word you prefer, is sentient and interactive. It knows you're here and responds to you. However, to love it enough to depend on it in tough times, you have to personalize it. That's what attracts some people to pagan and shamanistic traditions.

Being a lightworker isn't about being different, knowing metaphysics and prophecies, or having UFO stories to tell. It isn't about asserting beliefs like "I am one with the Higher Self" and so on. Being a lightworker means being able to hold on to your connection and intunement to powerful energies from the other side when you really want to freak out and scream, "Get me out of here!" To do that, you need devotion, and a lot of it. No one can tell you where to find it, but I strongly advise you to look for it.

After all, don't you really want somebody to love?