What comes to mind when you think of love? Perhaps a young gentleman on one knee, offering a beautiful ring to a stunning young lady. She accepts, and they live happily ever after — a classic happy-ending love story. Or maybe the lady declines, leaving the gentleman heartbroken, sparking a series of heartbreak storylines. And let’s not forget Gen Z’s favorite genre — the breakup storylines. Something along those lines, right? These narratives capture only a fraction of what love truly represents. In reality, love transcends these scenarios, offering lessons and opportunities for growth.
To understand this deeper essence of love, let us reflect on the words of renowned spiritual leader Acharya Prashant:
Love is not a matter of choice! If it is true love, it will be beyond your control. Any love that you can accept or reject is nothing but an illusion.
The essence of love lies in its ability to take us beyond ourselves — beyond our old, ingrained habits and natural instincts. Love compels us to fall for someone who exists beyond the boundaries of our own world, inspiring us to push our limits and strive for personal growth. However, love is not limited to the relationship between a man and a woman. It is a much broader concept that, while encompassing such relationships, extends far beyond them.
Now, let’s focus on love within the context of a man-woman relationship. The first question that arises is: how can we determine whether love truly exists in a relationship? — Let’s elaborate this in detail.
If you have the choice to say Yes or No, it might be a relationship, attachment, attraction, care, romance, or emotion — but it is not love. These all origin from the realm of the mind (ego). Love, however, exists beyond the confines of the ego. It emerges from a place where choices cease to exist, where arguments hold no significance, and where customs and traditions lose their grip — a realm accessible only through complete surrender of the ego.
The question that naturally arises is: if love offers no choice, how do people so easily part ways through mutual agreement? The answer is simple — love never truly existed in such relationships.
When two people come together merely to fulfill each other’s needs, it becomes a transactional agreement, not love. Agreements create obligations, while love liberates.
But people expect love out of such relationships which isn’t there in the first place. These are merely transactional agreements to provide psychological and physical pleasure to one another. Naturally, love cannot be found in such arrangements. When their expectations of love go unmet, it leads to disappointment, ultimately causing the end of the relationship.
Another question that arises is: are pleasures not a part of life? What’s wrong with entering into an arrangement to provide pleasure to one another? The answer is — there’s nothing wrong, as long as the foundation of the arrangement is not the pleasure itself. In a relationship, pleasure should be like the tail of an elephant — a small and secondary part. When the foundation of a relationship is based on needs and desires, unfulfilled expectations will inevitably lead to its end.
Ask yourself: is there something in a relationship that transcends needs and desires? Something whose presence can sustain the relationship even through the darkest times? There is, I assure you. Seek that deeper essence. That deeper essence would be love.
However, the mind won’t let choose that deeper essence. To understand this, consider a pig that loves rolling in the mud — it would never choose someone who tries to pull it out of the mud but would instead prefer someone who joins it there. The mind works like that only. If it gets a chance, it will always choose someone who rather than encouraging us to rise above our flaws, accept or even embrace them. This is why “ACCEPT ME THE WAY I AM” is on trend these days. Due to the absence of love in relationships!!
The above example holds good in all forms of love. Love has the power to break our deeply ingrained habits and elevate our character. It serves as the ultimate motivation for personal growth, making change not only possible but also bearable. As the saying goes:
If everything fails in changing you, try love!!
With this, I conclude my blog. I hope I’ve shed light on why love is not merely a choice but a necessity, and how it empowers us to overcome our flaws. There is much more to explore about love, and I look forward to sharing those insights in my future blogs.
Thank you for joining me on this journey!
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