Smoke and Pure Flame – The Economic Times

As long as we possess, we shall never love. We know love as sensation, do we not? When we say we love, we know jealousy, we know fear, we know anxiety. When you say you love someone, all that is implied: envy, the desire to possess, the desire to own, to dominate, the fear of loss and so on. All this we call love, and we do not know love without fear, without envy, without possession; we merely verbalise that state of love that is without fear, we call it impersonal, pure, divine, or God knows what else; but the fact is that we are jealous, we are dominating, possessive. We shall know that state of love only when jealousy, envy, possessiveness, domination, come to an end; as long as we possess, we shall never love….

When do you think about the person you love? You think about her when she is gone…. So, you miss the person whom you say you love only when you are disturbed, when you are in suffering; and as long as you possess that person, you do not have to think about that person, because, in possession, there is no disturbance….

Surely, love is not a thing of the mind; and because the things of the mind have filled our hearts, we have no love. The things of the mind are jealousy, envy, ambition, the desire to be somebody, to achieve success. These things of the mind fill your hearts, and then you say you love; but how can you love when you have confusing elements in you? When there is smoke, how can there be a pure flame?

Courtesy: KFI