This is the key indicator we use for assessing the state of our relationship and in this section I want to explain exactly what I mean by this so you can identify it in your relationship.

I first understood what this level of contact was about in my engagement with Enlightenment Intensives (EIs) (introduced in Our History). When someone has an enlightenment experience several things happen. First in order to have the shift in consciousness the person has to be completely open, and this openness will persist for a while after the experience has subsided. Second their energy state is changed. Internally this manifests as the person feeling blissful and overflowing with love, externally the person ‘glows’ – they look more youthful and they shine. Third they have a profound effect on anyone with whom they have contact – in fact they may induce a moment of Divine contact with their partner. In the context of an EI there is a high probability that the person they partner will also have an enlightenment experience. As a participant, and later as a Master, I enjoyed literally hundreds of moments of Divine contact with other people.

Most people experience this level of contact when they fall in love, and this was also when I first experienced it. When two people ‘fall in love’ they manifest the characteristics described above: they are completely open to each other, they feel blissful and overflowing with love and they ‘glow’. Most people enjoy seeing a couple in this state – it reminds them of their own capacity for this level of love and contact. Eva and I regularly receive feedback from strangers that they love seeing us being together for exactly this reason.

One of the reasons why falling in love is so amazing is that it is deeply satisfying to ‘see the divine’ in another person – and to be seen as a divine being oneself. However to retain access to this state the two people ‘in love’ will need to work hard in all the ways that we describe throughout this site. The loss of this state is also why relationships run into trouble ‘when the honeymoon is over’.

One of the difficulties of writing about this is that people will have very different experiences of loving and as a consequence will use the word love to denote different things. For my purpose here I want to use ‘love’ to denote a state of being, not something that is exchanged between couples. When I am in a love state
(a) the dominant emotions are gratitude, care for others, wonder and bliss
(b) I feel energised and have a heightened sense of presence
(c) my experience is uncomplicated and unconditional, there is a simple happiness that does not depend upon anything external

Many people experience this love state when they are with their children, especially babies and very young children. It is also quite common for people to be in a love state when they have a ‘peak’ experience, for example when bowled over by natural beauty. It is also fairly common when people use some drugs, particularly ecstasy, in a conscious way . So there are many different ways of accessing or entering a love state.

When two people are in Divine contact then they are both in a love state. As well as being in a love state, each person will see the Divine in the other; their partner will appear younger, more attractive and a lot more desirable. The contact between them adds an extra dimension to the love states they each experience. Most people find it difficult to tolerate this level of contact for more than a minute or two in the beginning.