LOVE
By Giri Bahadur Sunar
When we think about
the topic of Love, suddenly impression of romance come in our mind but love
isn't simply about romance. Love is powerful energy but not permanent. It is
like a flower in the morning which blooms and by the evening it is gone. Sufferers
are those who cry for faded flower. The joy of love lies in risk and tragedy
otherwise there will not have been so much attraction.
From an evolutionary
perspective, love can be viewed as a survival tool which evolved to promote
long-term relationships, mutual defense, to promote feelings of safety and
security. Every one deserve love but we can truly love another being until and
unless we love ourselves, in order to care for others we need to be able to
care ourselves. The more love we can feel in our heart that much love we can
share to others. Love is a major purpose for living; that connection is
inherent in all that we do, and without love, we cannot survive.
Since the time
immemorial, there has been great attraction between opposite sex because they
are mysterious to each other. Life cannot exist even for a single moment
without the opposition. Love is not only about the opposite sex, it can be
possible with same sex, parents, children, animal, nature, country, things,
guru, god and goddess. People have different ways of showing their love, we
have to understand it. True love is accepting other’s as they are, not as we
want them to be, healthy love is steady understanding of who other people are.
True love is not only the capacity to give but also opening the heart to
receive. True love offers mutual support, a common vision and a freedom to grow
individually in support of each other.
Ordinary love is a
temporary madness; it erupts like volcanoes and then subsides. Frequently, we
talk about love being blind, in the sense that we have no control over it. We
cannot love without accepting that there is always a chance of loss or hurt
that is why love is so powerful, the stake is high, so the reward are higher.
Ordinary love is falling in love; such love usually involves possessiveness,
compromise, need and obligation. It’s a sense of hopelessly longing for someone
who can fill the emptiness. It can also be a desire to turn partner into a
parental substitute who can take care. A relationship based on need, fear of
loss or co-dependency reflects a false sense of security. Such conditions do
not foster healthy growth in a relationship.
We should not forget
the fact of unconditional and one-sided love of Rajput princess Meera Bai. There
is a big gap between the living of lord Krishna and Meera bai. It is said that
when Meera was just four years of age, she manifested her deep devotion to
Krishna. According to the story, Meera watched a marriage procession
in front of her residence when she was a child. She spotted the well-dressed
bridegroom, asked her mother innocently, "dear mother, who will be my
bridegroom?" Meera’s mother smiled, and half in jest and half in earnest,
pointed towards the image of lord Krishna and said, "My dear Meera, Lord
Krishna, this beautiful fellow is going to be your
bridegroom". Soon after, Meera’s mother passed away and Meera
grew up, her desire to be with her Krishna grown intensely and she believed
that Lord Krishna would come to marry her, if he could accept a cowherd Radha
as his dear consort. In due course of time, she became firmly convinced
that Krishna was to be her husband. Meera was in love with Krishna though he
was the lord of different age. Meera broke all norms and value of royal living,
left her family; bore scandalous blames to follow the path of devotion.
Meera’s unconditional,
selfless love and complete surrender to Krishna gave her sacred place in the
history of Hindu thought and culture for her deep and passionate religious
devotion. It is believed that she conquered Krishna through her love and
devotion. Her love poetry expresses intense passion and devotion for Krishna,
the odes and hymns are so rich, sweet and inspiring, not because of any high
rhetoric or dexterity of language, but because they are characterized by a
tenderness and simplicity of feeling as genuine outpourings of a heart
completely dedicated to lord Krishna. The relation of Meera and lord Krishna
became the dominate theme for poets, devotee, painters and artist to work on.
According to the
devotee of lord Krishna, “Krishna’s way of loving is different, it is eternal
and unbounded. Love to him and love for him is governed by clear heart, if our
mind is full of dirt with full of ambition and garbage than it is impossible to
connect with Krishna. A clean heart is the criterion to have love relation with
Krishna. One can love Krishna as the omniscient, omnipotent God, the loving
master, the dearest friend, the sweetest child and the supreme lover. Loving
Krishna with devotion is the easiest and simplest form of love where there is
no tragedy and pain of separation.”
The expectations and
desire for love from other is disempowering the true love for self and others. Love
is a risky game, giving love does not guarantee of receiving but we should have
courage of devotion without expectation as Meera did. Unconditional love is
like loving to our children and pet, where we have no desire to have in return.
It is like a running river, keeps on going toward ocean and never return via
same root. In such love there is no division of “you” and “I”, both body melt
and merge into oneness as river and ocean becomes one but our ordinary type of
love has existence of “you” and “I”, your daughter and my son, your country and
my country, your religion and my religion, your Krishna and my Allah. Real Love
is beyond the “I” and “you”. Our love is a relationship and when love is a
relationship, it creates misery. When love is state of being, it creates
bliss.
Osho says, “Just as
the body needs food, the soul needs love. It is the spiritual nourishment
without the food, air and water” Human being are perishable but love is
from the infinite, and will remain until eternity.
Falling in love is
romantic desperation while rising in love is romantic inspiration. Rising in
love is living in present, it is empowering, yet not controlling. Who can
freely give and receive unconditional love, can enter a holy relationship and
rise in love. It is opening up and surrendering to higher levels of love and
intimacy in relationship. When we have expectation of love from other than it
is conditional love. It is like a business. In losing love at times in life, we
must learn to appreciate and respect the beloved one, remembering those good
times which were shared together. True love can be felt in absence of beloved
one, the desire for meeting in every single moment and the feeling of
breathlessness.
Usually, lovers are
not able to figure out difference between sex and love, for them sex is love
and love is sex. Sex could be part of love but, sex could not be love for
lasting affairs because sex is temporary which come with the age and disappear
with the maturity. Sex is biology response, a play of hormone and process of reproduction.
Sex is equivalent to a desire for food; the body is always hankering for
something new unless something more than sexual relation arise, something
higher, something spiritual as the love of Meera and Krishna. Sex is lowest
step of ladder while love is on the highest. A real relationship can never
compete with a fantasy and sexual attraction. The physical excitement must turn
into spiritual excitement otherwise there will be always pain and tragedy.
The author is
martial artist, a meditation practitioner and a sociologist by profession
girithejorba@gmail.com
