LOVE WITH MINDFULNESS

Do you know what “Falling in Love” means?

It has a very direct and precise meaning, which is to literally “fall” in love.

And yes, when you love someone, you must fall 🙂

If two unfamiliar hearts suddenly encounter one another but are still 100% conscious and are still able to keep a distance while making sure questions about the other are under control, then maybe it is not love, right?

Once we begin to fall in love, to have vibrations and sobbing emotions for someone, we will definitely “plunge” into getting to know the other, intimately cuddling, following the flow of emotions, and sacrificing many things just to have a better understanding of the person you love, or at least the person you have feelings for.

And from there, gradually or quickly, we fall in love. Once we already fall in love, we begin to lose our balance as everything at this moment is only being focused on the love for each other and everything that is surrounding us seems to only be considered as “decorations” in your life.

Then, “Que sera sera”, whatever will be will be. Sulkings, misunderstandings, doubts, and fatigue start to appear in the love story. The cycle of “affection – anger – coaxing – making up for each other” continues until one day, one of them, or both of them, desperate to escape and to not get stuck anymore.

We suffer and acknowledge so much of our stupidity when we love someone. Some people find that putting in effort and sacrificing for that relationship is not worth it. Others think that they have fallen in love with a terrible person, or that person has changed as he or she was no longer the one we used to dream of. However, we also forget that it was also those very first moments of meeting that person that they seemed just perfect in your eyes, wasn’t it?

It is just that, throughout the whole love journey, experiencing a handful of events and challenges, we start to see each other under more different perspectives and begin to discover the different corners within them that have already existed for a long time. It is just that when our burst of loving emotions is new, we can see only all the goods but not the bads in them.

Yes, love is truly beautiful, yet how to not suffer or break down because of love?

Before answering this question, I will tell you a small story.

I know a young couple who have been dating for a few years. When they first fell in love, the man was the type of person who would love and spoil his girlfriend a lot. He would take care of her with every bite of food and every slumber to the point where the love he had for her was no different than the love for a family member. Besides working, the guy spent most of his free time with his girlfriend. Within the first year or two, both felt very happy and content with the relationship. However, after a while, things were no longer the same.

They got upset at each other more often and started to have more arguments about anything from work to life, from the little couple’s common and trivial issues to the bigger problems about career paths and the relationship’s future. The man realised that it was only him the whole time who carried the relationship going, who cared for, loved, and pampered her for so many years and everything about him was all about his girlfriend. As for her, she thought that it was common sense for the boyfriend to take care of her, and she somehow took his caring and love for granted. Even though she still loved and took care of him back, she was still the one to mostly decide upon everything between the two, even how their love was “soon to bloom, soon to wither” was also mainly dominated by her. Then whatever should happen, happened. The man got tired as he started to expand the distance between them to allow himself to “breathe easier”. As for the girl, after many years of being embraced and protected, when suddenly left by him, she became mentally unstable, broke down with wounds carved deep in her heart, and was precarious whenever thinking about her future.

I will not go any deeper into this story, because each character in it had truly “fallen” into love. I can see that the two of them had loved the other one with all of their hearts, yet they had forgotten to love themselves!

If you pay attention, you will see that the man was having a lack of balance in life just because of love. Most of his time was spent focusing on his girlfriend, and all of his thoughts and concerns have been invested in her. Perhaps, deep somewhere inside the man’s heart, he also wanted the same response and reciprocation from her, even if it was only a part of how much he had done for his girlfriend.

As for the girl, she also loved her boyfriend, but she was also unbalanced when she focused only on the concerns and attention of her boyfriend and gradually forgot that she should also have her own life apart from this relationship – such as having business meetings, hanging out with friends, or expanding social relationships at work, so that she could always develop and improve herself, and at the same time maintain the balance in her relationship with the man.

Both people in the story had truly “fallen” in love. They loved each other in their distinct way but lacked affection for themselves. Then once love begins to develop in that direction, of course, everything in life will become unbalanced. In the end, like how life will always go, all strong flows of emotions will eventually be broken and all love bonds will soon be shattered.

My dear friend,

In our world, not only have the two people in the story above “fallen” in love, but in fact, most of us will eventually fall into the swirl of misery just like them. Do you know why?

It is because we love blindly, and we love without being “mindful”.

If you love your partner and you love yourself too,

If you care about the other person’s feelings and also pay attention to yours,

If you know that after spending time together, it is necessary to make some time for yourself,

Then you would probably never feel disadvantaged nor would you want to blame your companion for all of your discomforts and miseries.

That is called “mindful love”. Once you fall in love while still maintaining mindfulness, you will know how to harmonise and balance the love for your partner and yourself. You will learn to build a strong inner self and inner guard for yourself, and make it your perfect and peaceful inner home; at the same time you can still cultivate the love for your other half so that whenever you encounter weariness or obstacles in life, the two can not only rely on each other but also rely on each one’s strong inner self as to continue finishing the challenging journeys ahead.

Mindfully loving is something you must do even when you are still in the first stages of love, or later when you two have been married and gone on “the same boat.” As such, when you are “sailing to the sea” together, you will always encounter dreadful waves and horrendous storms on your way, and harder challenges will definitely come with no exceptions, requiring both people to know ways to preserve love and promote both of your mindfulness in order to be able to “steadily hold the paddles” and “row” together.

Let us not deceive ourselves one thing: love with too much consciousness, love without “going for it all” like that, is quite similar to being insincere, or even a bit selfish.

However, my dear friend, if you are only constantly trying hard for others, sacrificing all your blood, sweat, tears, effort, time, and emotions for a certain person, you will always be the one to suffer if you are not truly mindful about how to love “correctly”.

In conclusion, in order to love without suffering, we need to be wise and mindful enough. Our hearts truly care about that one specific person, but being mindful will tell us whether our cards are being placed in the right people or not, whether we should continue doing certain things or not, and how we can happily love and at the same time feel peaceful when being with them.

I know that to love with mindfulness is a very difficult thing because it depends a lot on our emotions, which are also the most challenging things to control. Nevertheless, without mindfulness, you will always be stuck in the tangle of suffering with no way to escape from it.

Appreciate yourself and respect your companions.

Love gently, and take peace in your heart!

Much love,
Truly Inspired