Dr. Paula Fellingham here! Through the years I’ve noticed that during this beautiful season – a time of giving and receiving – the most precious gifts cannot be wrapped. Indeed, the most magnificent of all gifts is love, given as part of our Divine birthright.

Something I teach worldwide is my belief that there is only one thing we need to learn in this life. That one thing is how to love… to love God, to love yourself, and to love others.

From love flow all the other virtues. For example, those who truly love others can forgive almost instantly. They do not covet, blame, resent, or criticize. Those who love themselves use uplifting self-talk and they get past the past by taking the best and discarding the rest.

Mother Teresa said, “Spread love wherever you go. First of all in your own home. Give love to your husband, your wife, your children, your next-door neighbor. Let no one ever come to you without leaving better and happier.”

I certainly don’t achieve a loving perspective in every situation in my own life. One thing I’m very clear about, however, is that when I do, life works beautifully. And when I don’t, I get stuck.

My sweet friend, Marianne Williamson, said, “The return to love is the return to who you really are. When Michelangelo was asked how he created a piece of sculpture, he answered that the statue already existed within the marble. God Himself had created the Pieta, David, Moses. Michelangelo’s job, as he saw it, was to get rid of the excess marble that surrounded God’s creation.

So it is with you. Love isn’t something you need to create, because God already created it. The perfect you is filled with love. Your job is to allow Him to remove the fearful thinking that surrounds your perfect self, just as excess marble surrounded Michelangelo’s perfect statue. To remember that you are part of God, that you are loved and lovable, is not arrogant. It’s humble. To think you are anything else is arrogant, because it implies you are something other than a creation of God.”

My friends, let us imagine a world in which everyone shows love to others. There would be no wars because we wouldn’t fight. There would be no hunger because we would feed each other. There would be no sorrow. There would be only peace on Earth.

And so, may we not only sing, “Let there be peace on Earth” but may we each do our part by giving the most glorious of all gifts – the gift of love.