The Sweetness of Love

“Love is not about someone else – it’s about you. Because of the sweetness of emotion within you, your life becomes beautiful. Whatever may happen, success or failure, your life will be sweet.”

—Sadhguru

On this Spot, Sadhguru gives a different perspective on love and shares his new poem, equally titled “Love,” with us. “Love is not just a bond / But a balloon that buoys / you to the borders of Boundlessness.” We also have a slideshow of Sadhguru’s recent Inner Engineering program in Tampa, Florida.
Love is a beautiful thing. It’s the best thing you can do with your emotion. Your emotions should always be in the sweetest possible way. But you must understand its limitations. However much someone loves you, there are conditions. Whether they are your friend, your husband or wife, your parents, or your children – for everyone, there is a line. If you cross that line, the love is gone. It is conditional, and there is nothing wrong with that. Love has to be conducted with responsibility, otherwise it won’t stay. Love is like a flower. If you have a flower in your hand, you must move carefully. A lot of conditions need to be fulfilled for love to stay alive.
Right now, you cannot look at anything lovingly unless it belongs to you in some way. The longing to possess something comes from a sense of inadequacy. You need something to belong to you – otherwise, you feel depressed. Only if you possess something, are your emotions sweet. If you knew how to keep your emotions sweet every moment of your life, it would be a higher way of being. If someone is around, you can share the sweetness. If no one is there, you can still be loving. The core of your emotion can be love. Don’t think the core of the universe is love. Only people who are deprived of love imagine that God is love, or that the core of the universe is love. It is not.
Love is a human emotion. In a moment when human beings are unprejudiced and open, they will look at anyone lovingly. Most human beings are conceited, most of the time. For them to experience love, they have to identify with the one who is in front of them. It has to be their father, their mother, their child, or someone else they identify with in some way. I’m not trying to make love look ugly. Love is a beautiful thing when it happens within you. What other people do for you in the name of love is beautiful for them. You can appreciate that. The important thing is not that people love you but that you are loving. Even if someone just walks around in a loving way, that’s fantastic. I see people strut around boastfully, but the moment they see me, they suddenly bow down subserviently. That’s no good. That is what has to change within you.
If you bow down in devotion to everything, then something fantastic has happened to you. Otherwise, you are just prejudiced, looking at one thing as high and another thing as low. Inevitably, love and hate are two sides of the coin. If it falls one way, it is a love affair. If it falls the other way, it becomes hate. If you become loving, it’s fantastic for you. And it’s wonderful for everyone around you, because being with you will be a beautiful experience for them too. They may also catch the infection. If you become loving, whatever you do, those who are with you will take it well. Somewhere, they will know it comes from the right context within you. Otherwise, even the so-called good things you do will turn out bad for you.
Love is not what you do. Love is the way you are. That means a sweetness of emotion has come into you. If you pick up a vessel, you do so lovingly. If you touch another person, you do so lovingly. Even if there is no one else around, you sit there lovingly. You need to change your concept of love. Love is not about someone else – it’s about you. Because of the sweetness of emotion within you, your life becomes beautiful. Whatever may happen, success or failure, your life will be sweet.
Love
Love as many think
is not just an emotion
But a rail that guides
Our thought and emotion
from the barrenness of
exclusion to the harvest
of inclusive existence.
Love is not just a bond
But a balloon that buoys
you to the borders of Boundlessness.
Love & Grace,
Sadhguru