When the Lights Go Out, Love Lights the Way

Last night, after yet another long day without power, I went to the community center to charge my phone.

Hurricane Milton had left a trail of destruction, and weariness was setting in. Empty shelves, debris everywhere, and the endless search for gas had taken their toll.

As I waited for my phone to charge, I struck up a conversation with Donna, a new neighbor. 

One of the strange blessings of disasters is that they push us to connect.

Normally, we nod and smile, then move on with our lives. But when everything around you is falling apart, those surface-level pleasantries drop away. Instead of a perfunctory, “How are you?”, you ask with sincerity, stopping to really listen.

When Donna learned I was without power, she offered me a place to stay for the night—her cool, air-conditioned apartment a welcome reprieve for my weary body. Here was a woman I had never met before, opening her home to me.

As I thanked her, she simply said, “We’re all one, right?” 

That stopped me in my tracks.

As someone who has dedicated my life to unity consciousness, it’s one thing to talk about it and another to experience it, especially when I need the reminder the most.

This is what it means to love your neighbor as yourself. When you hurt, I hurt. When you thrive, I thrive. We are all connected. 

Love your neighbor *because* we are one. 

This is unity in action.

Donna shared that the day before, a stranger had extended a similar kindness to her—offering her a ride when gas was scarce. Now, she was paying it forward. 

Love, it turns out, is a virtuous cycle.

Love flows when we allow ourselves to receive and then offer that generosity to others. It transforms us when we let it move to us, through us, from us. Love isn’t an abstract concept; it’s an energetic force that moves through people and communities. 

When we participate in that flow, we make love tangible and oneness real.

After two hurricanes in two weeks, I can feel a shift within me.

The survival-mode stress is giving way to softness, and I sense something new blossoming. While I don’t yet have the words for it, I do know this: moments of upheaval crack open our hardened shells, and vulnerability is how the Light gets in. 

This is how transformation happens.

Soon, the debris will clear, houses will be repaired, and life will tempt us to fall back into our separate routines. But we don’t need a crisis to remind us that we belong to each other.

What would it look like to live this truth every day? 

Maybe it starts small: looking your neighbor in the eye, offering help when it’s inconvenient, letting love move through you even when you’re tired or afraid.

This is the world I am committed to creating—a world where love isn’t an emergency response, but a way of life.

Will you join me?