Love Never Fails
Emotions are the boon to the living world. Man is even more blessed to experience the wide range of emotions and express oneself to make most of one’s life. Love, among various emotions has always interested one and all, irrespective of age, class, creed, gender. Love is sought by each one or rather it engulfs everyone with its all-encompassing wide arms. Love is truly universal when it is been felt and reciprocated by various living companions of man in nature such as plants, birds and animals.Be it a young infant who smells its mother or the man who hurriedly runs to save a kid on the road, each one is not taught anything of love, but it is from within, it is instantaneous. It is expressed as a casual interaction between two beings to serious intimate relationship for years together. Being in love is being in ecstasy, a heavenly feeling.
But today’s materialistic understanding of life has conditioned the mankind to seek love as well as happiness always from the external world. Love is the most abused word as it is always been associated to be a sort of worldly human transaction and sexuality. Sexual expression of love is a minute part on a larger canvas called love, which has unduly gained unwanted importance which is nothing but lust. Love has always been an obstacle at various phases of human life, it has also been convicted of being hindrance for one’s growth and development in life. Seriously, the entanglement within these emotions would deprive one out of sanity, pushes one into depression and can lead to grave conditions both physically and mentally.
Swami Vivekananda vividly explains, “All love is expansion, all selfishness is contraction. Love is therefore the only law of life. He who loves lives, he who is selfish is dying. Therefore love for love's sake, because it is the only law of life, just as you breathe to live.”(1)
When in love, everything seem so beautiful, ecstatic and blissful. Time would have passed unaware of the several moments gathering sweet memories, negativity whatsoever would have not been felt, giving away anything was so instantaneous and totally losing oneself to the grandeur of love itself. Love would have led to unfettering bonding,relationships. But all of a sudden, same love turns to be a bondage, love loses its aroma and one wants to hop out of such connection completely. Why so? Is it love at fault?
Maharshi (महर्षि) Narada, explains the reason behind, in his work, Narada Bhakti Sutra,
तत् तु र्िषयत्यागात् सङ्गत्यागात् च । (2)
Love (प्रेम) is made possible only by giving up the objective reality of the world as it appears
to the ego centric intellect and senses and the consequent renunciation of attachment.
He is very clear, if love has to happen even at the slightest of the moment, ego has to be
shunned. The moment “I” gains importance, essence of love is lost and burden of
maintaining a relationship hangs on. This ego is the sole responsibility for a relationship
to turn into a bondage whose knots are supposedly loosened.
Also, when one attaches “I” in love, it merely pushes one from the higher state of feeling
to just a materialistic attachment (काम). This even Maharshi (महर्षि) Patanjali explains it as
attachment or likings (राग).
अर्िद्या अर्ममता राग द्वेष अर्िर्ििेशााः क्लेशााः । (3)
These obstacles- the causes of man’s sufferings- are ignorance, egoism, attachment, aversion
and the desire to cling to life.
He explains such attachment is also one of the obstacle (क्लेशाः) or cause of the suffering.
Sri Krishna, in Bhagavad Gita explains the causal track of how one gets into distress and
disappointment in love as well.
ध्यायतो र्िषयान्ुंसु : सङ् गमतेष्ू जायते |
सङ्गात्सञ्जायते काम: कामात्रोधोऽर्िजायते || (4)
While contemplating on the objects of the senses, one develops attachment to them.
Attachment leads to desire, and from desire arises anger.
रोधाद्भिर्त सम्मोह: सम्मोहात्ममर्ृ तर्िभ्रम: |
ममर्ृ तभ्रशुं ाद ् बर्ु ििाशो बर्ु ििाशात्प्रणश्यर्त || (5)
Anger leads to clouding of judgment, which results in bewilderment of the memory. When
the memory is bewildered, the intellect gets destroyed; and when the intellect is destroyed,
one is ruined.
Hence one has to be careful, as there is fine distinction between love (प्रेम) and attachment
(काम). This “I” if, it is cautiously taken care off when in love, automatically, love (प्रेम) is
promoted to be purest form of love called bhakti (िर्ि) or devotion. That is what Swami
Vivekananda said as “love for love’s sake.” The external world becomes immaterial, just
love remains.
Maharshi (महर्षि) Narada, defines bhakti as,
सा त्िर्ममि् ्रमप्रेमरू्ा । (6)
That verily is of the nature of supreme love of God.
He explains that love (प्रेम) which is already within, the higher state of it is bhakti.
When one is encompassed with the sense of feeling of such love, to all the beings of the
universe, isn’t it just a token of appreciation towards the creator only remains. This is the
same when Isa Upanishad says, ईशािामयर्मदुं सििम् (7). This entire universe is pervaded by the
Divinity.
For such a man who has been established in such higher state of love, Maharshi (महर्षि)
Narada further describes him as,
यत् प्राप्य ि र्कर्ञ्चत् िाञ्छर्त ि शोचर्त ि द्वेर्ि ि रमते िोत्साही ििर्त। (8)
Attaining that, man has no more desire for anything; he is free from grief and hatred; he
does not rejoice over anything; he does not exert himself in furtherance of self-interest.
When one remains in that ecstatic state of pure love, one does not want anything for
oneself from the world. When the world as it is, is only a place for appreciation where
does any complaints against anything or anyone arise? Hence there would be no
complaints, no wanting, no grief, no hatred and not even rejoicing over anything when
one in such state of love. One is in that blessed state of bliss. One attains pinnacle of human
existence. This what Swami Vivekananda explains the goal of life to be free from within,
“Each soul is potentially divine. The goal is to manifest this divinity by controlling
nature, external and internal. Do this either by work, or worship, or psychic
control, or philosophy - by one, or more, or all of these - and be free. This is the
whole of religion. Doctrines, or dogmas, or rituals, or books, or temples, or forms,
are but secondary details”
.
It is left to one’s own discretion whether to fall in love or rise. Well, all great men have
lived to say “Love never fails”.
- Dr. Vidya D. B.N.Y.S.; Yoga Bharati
References:
1) Letters of Swami Vivekananda, Swami Vivekananda.
2) Swami Tyagishananda. Narada Bhakti Sutra, 35. Sri Ramakrishna Math, Chennai,
2016.
3) Swami Prabhavananda. Patanjali Yoga Sutras, 2 (3). Sri Ramakrishna Math, Chennai
2003.
4) Srimad Bhagavad Gita, 2 (62). Gita press, Gorakhpur, 2009.
5) Srimad Bhagavad Gita, 2 (63). Gita press, Gorakhpur, 2009.
6) Swami Tyagishananda. Narada Bhakti Sutra, 2. Sri Ramakrishna Math, Chennai, 2016.
7) Isha Upanishad. 1.
8) Swami Tyagishananda. Narada Bhakti Sutra, 5. Sri Ramakrishna Math, Chennai, 2016.
9) The complete works of Swami Vivekananda. Vol 1; Advaita Ashrama, Kolkata, 2007.