Focusing on Love

Louisa Ikena reflects on keeping our focus on Love instead of distraction, and she explores finding a glimpse of heaven on earth. 

What am I focusing on? In this world, filled with distractions, am I really focusing on what is most important? The world is so complex, and the world is so beautiful. Do I take the time to focus on the beauty? Or do I focus on fears and bothers? Do I take the time to notice and laser-beam focus in on what is good? Or do I let the evil things in the world discourage me or scatter my attention? 

What I focus on always seems to get bigger, more magnified. So why do I find, over and over again, that it is difficult to focus on love? 

Heaven on Earth? 

I believe focusing on love is exactly what heaven will be like. There is no more sorrow, no more pain, and we will be in the very Presence of Love surrounding us, embracing us, and so real that there is nothing else to focus on. We will be in the arms of our Creator, our Redeemer, our Sanctifier. We will be in the arms of the One who has never and will never let us go. So now a question naturally arises: How can we have a glimpse of heaven on earth? 

Surely an answer to that question is to focus on love. When I focus on all my faults, failures, and character defects, I feel discouraged and, many times, defeated. When I focus on God’s love, something very different happens. I can move to a place of self-acceptance, self-care, and self-forgiveness. I might even be able to laugh at myself. This grace stands in sharp contrast to the concupiscence Saint Paul describes in his Letter to the Romans:

What I do, I do not understand. For I do not do what I want, but I do what I hate. (Romans 7:15)

Yet our Lord does not leave us alone in that state. That is not the end of the story. We have been redeemed. We have been forgiven. We are being loved. Every nanosecond of every day, we are being loved. No matter what we say, do, think, or experience, we are, indeed, being loved. 

Totally and Completely Loved 

It has been a profound spiritual awakening in my life to realize that even in my worst moments — my worst moments of sin, shame, and fear — I am totally and completely loved. God cannot love me more and chooses not to love me less. This moment in time: God totally and completely loves me. My worst moments in my history: God totally and completely loves me. Every moment to come: God totally and completely loves me.

When I get a glimpse of wrapping my mind around the unconditional love of God, that’s when I get a glimpse of heaven. There’s freedom here. There’s freedom to be unapologetically me. I can be ”really real,” and I can be fully present no matter what comes. In this moment, I breathe in the miracle of God’s Love and breathe out anything that is not of God. There is joy in the journey, indeed, when I focus on Love.  

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Copyright 2025 Louisa Ann Irene Ikena
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