then, dear heart, you are loving yourself.

Yes!

Ah. Well, in this context we are looking at the unity of duality and the non-dual nature of self and reality. We can approach that conceptually--which is the default--and go with the progressive and comforting dream of a higher force moving us back, or we can discern the direct nature of experience as it now. The stopping within the self that you mention is the crux of the matter in this sense. A separate self exists in relation to everything other than it. So, while we may appear to be moved by something out there to something we conceptualize as a goal in time, it can dawn on us along that route that any "thing" we get is composite and ephemeral, whereas, if love and light are the emanation or nature of reality itself, it actually cannot come and go, be obtained and attained, etc. It is only obscured, unrecognized and objectified, which can prove itself to be merely a veil over the immediate, direct effulgence, (absolute) that is not something to get. So, gradual is within appearances which are ultimately empty, (as per the language of Dharma) and sudden is always and only this as it is. They are one and the same, and that will confound the intellect and that's it also. Feeling, sense perceptions and intuition can be one doorway or opening for some. The separate self or egoic condition stands in front of its own light, or that higher force you mention, and casts a shadow of compelling infatuation with its projection while the light is always the source behind it.

​@@ernestweber5207Wonderfully put! :)

"what can ego know that is beyond the ego"? Dont try to grasp this mentally.You cant.

Why must there be a who and a why?