Love is simple, isn’t it? Just be “nice”, do “good” things for others, perhaps even throw in an occassional smile, and you are the black-belt guru of love! This might come as a surprise, but that will not quite cut it.

Even if you expand my rather simplistic view, and incorporate a lot more complexity, there is one missing ingredient that I have found, and I call it by a rather special, memorable, and actionable name: “Being On Their Side” or “BOTS” for short.

Imagine a computer game, something like World Of Warcraft, Skyrim or Witcher (This shows my age, I guess). In these games you have, what is known in the gaming industry as NPC’s, or non-player characters. They are ‘people’ (or monsters, or spirits) in the game, that are hard-coded by the developers. They have only a certain limited number of possible actions that they can take, and they can only reply to your conversation in a few different ways. They are limited in their programming. Sure, this is going to change with the advanceds in AI, and you will get much more lively NPC’s in games, but let’s assume the old-school view of NPC’s for now.

This means, that they only do what they were programmed to do, or in other words - they only do that which they (and their programmers) want to do. These entities, have no capacity to be on your side, because they do not really know what your ‘side’ really is. Perhaps you do not want to continue the quest of figuring out exactly what the Defias Brotherhood (World of Warcraft) is up to, and instead, you want to take the ‘quest giver’ and go on a spiritual journey to Moonglade together, get married and have kids. They can’t do that. They see only one path (sometimes two, or three) for you - you must explore the Defias Brotherhood, and eventually end-up at ‘The Deadmines’. They do not have the capacity to truly have your best interest at heart, because they are NPC’s, robots, or BOTS. Bots can’t be on your side. Most people, are bots, and most likely, so are you.

But, do not take offense, or immediately jump to the conclusion that you are an NPC in a simulated universe. That is unlikely, since if you are experiencing reading this book, most likely you are a real player in this simulation, and hence, you simply have not heard of this concept of “Being On Their Side”, and have not been practicing it.

ENOUGH! I hear you scream, silently, within yourself. Surely, I know how to be on someone’s side, your mind wants to argue. We shall see, for I have seen truly caring people, fail at this ‘simple’ task quite spectacularly.

Being On Someone’s Side, so you are not acting as bots, has three main componenets to it (That I have discovered, so far):

1. Actually knowing what their side is. (Understanding)
2. Taking action in order to help them go where they want to go. (Letting Go Of Ego)
3. Taking care of your own state of being. ()