LOVE

I have recently got an invitation to the International Conference on Love. Lord Mumusa sponsored it. It was held for 10 days to deliberate on themes and issues related to love across the world. I presented a paper titled “Challenges and Opportunities to Lovers in the Contemporary World – An Overview”. Miss Jisa requested me to permit her to publish this paper in her international research journal Lovopaedia. I did not agree to it considering the critical and sensitive issues I discussed in it. All readers may not understand critical aspects of an issue from the perspective we expect. If they misinterpret our viewpoints on a sensitive issue of the world, the consequences may be severe. Lovers of various strata attended this event. They came from about 178 countries. Every member had to enter this venue with their respective sweethearts. Ms. Komali Menvis of mixed origin from Lolapa Sukarthi requested me to accompany her as her beloved till the end of this conference for the formality of the event. I readily agreed to it as I went there alone to participate in it. Ms. Komali was so sensitive and beautiful that she never liked to talk with anybody there for some practical reasons. If she mingled with somebody for the courtesy of the occasion, it would have led to generation of a network of relationships there. She never likes to text or send an email also to anybody for courtesy also after the end of any event like this. She talked very little with me also. Ms. Alapana Divinol, the correspondent of Love Today weekly, observed our ideal movements in this conference. She believed that we were great love couple. She interviewed me to publish it in their weekly. Ms. Komali Menvis sat calmly beside me acting the best way as my beloved during this time.

Alapana Divinol: Could you please tell me how you married her with love and personal choice?

I: She is so sensitive that she took a promise from me that I would never tell the story of our love and marriage to anybody. I believe love starts and continues when we make and keep our promises.

Divinol: What do you mean by love?

I: I believe love cannot be imagined without attraction, passion, admiration, infatuation, lovesickness, homesickness, helplessness, instincts and intuition. Attraction between opposite genders is the primary factor facilitating a variety of relationships and attachments between males and females across the world. Lesbians and gays are also there but they are minority compared to this lot. So, I would focus on these creatures only. Everybody craves identification and appreciation from others; more so from the creatures of opposite gender. Love is a strong or passive feeling and attachment of emotions and imaginations. It is mostly caused by physical attraction towards the other. The great or special qualities in others also make us love them. Love need not be physically oriented always. I may love a particular act of a person in a context. It is purely psychological. I don’t love him or her physically in the derogative sense of this term. Metaphysical love is also pervasive.

Divinol: Is love selfish?

I: Mostly it is. Lovers have certainly expectations from others. I expect such manners and culture from the other, which I think to be right from my perspective. What I take as right or wrong largely depends on my upbringing, tradition, culture and religion. Even if I don’t like doing something, I have to do so to satisfy the other. It is a give and take relationship. I have to change partly or fully to satisfy the interests and expectations of the other. She too must do so. Compromise is the guiding force of love. If we stick to our notions and practices, we cannot attract anybody into our life. Moreover, when I feel possessive and selfish about somebody I like, I think, plan and do a lot for her. In fact, she is expecting this sense of care and concern only from me. That is the primary objective of her love towards me. So, being selfish is essential in love. It is enough if we don’t hurt others due to our selfish love. We should not commit sins or crimes to materialize or continue our relationship of love with the other. We should avoid nasty culture.

Divinol: What do girls and boys do to attract others?

I: It depends on their physical features and psychological growth. An exceptionally beautiful, rich and intelligent girl may fall in love with a poor, ordinary and innocent boy at times. He may not try to woo her at all. She might have loved him for such reason, which we take as nonsensical and illogical as outsiders. Many boys struggle a lot to somehow attract girls. They tell lies, show off and do such many other things which we cannot imagine. In orthodox societies, it is mostly boys that entrap girls through many gimmicks and strategies. Girls mostly depend on their beauty or special qualities to attract others. I think girls don’t think as creatively and cunningly as boys do to attract boys. They believe that boys simply fall in love with girls and so there is no much need to try specially for them. Over the decades, we see boys and men running after girls and women but not the other way. Tradition and culture suppressed girls and women psychologically for ages. They are coming out of these shackles slowly now. With the rise of use of technology for oral and written communication, the ways and means of interaction have increased tremendously for all. This freedom leads to more and more love relationships among many.

Divinol: Does sex play a key role in love?

I: Yes. Let us take a hypothesis. There are four sexually attractive girls and four spiritually and intellectually influential girls in an orphanage. Many boys have been invited to choose any four girls from them for marriage. Beautiful girls would be chosen by all but not the other lot. Sex is a basic instinct. Intelligence is something which we have to improve struggling a lot for gaining and retaining knowledge about many things around us. If we keep a boy and a girl in a room for a night, telling them that we would pay them a lot of money if they discuss quite burning issues of their lives and come to a conclusion, they may go inside with that idea but cannot regulate themselves from indulging in what is not desired by us as outsiders. Bodies are fires of that compelling basic instinct. If we apply that instinct in the right manner, controlling our senses, we remain as admirable ones. If we become slaves and victims to that intense feeling and force, we become brutes. In 90% of human relationships, which develop on the basis of love, that sense of belongingness and mutual attraction fail and fade earlier than expected because it is physical love. Bodies cannot retain their strength and beauty for long. Love too decreases as bodies become ordinary or ugly as we grow. Nowadays many are interpreting physical attraction as love. In fact, you are not in love with that body but those reproductive organs. A relationship of love, that evolved due to many virtues in the other, apart from physical attraction, lasts longer than a relationship that grew exclusively to satisfy the physical need. We are all in love with reproductive organs now but nothing else. We are calling this lust love. We had better spend with any number of prostitutes in a right way instead of calling many of our frivolous relationships and acts love. Unfortunately humanity has not grown to this ideal state of mind and body till now. When we are in such love with the other, we don’t take sex as a highly considerable and reliable criterion to initiate or continue a relationship. We offer more and expect little from the other. We sacrifice more for the comfort and happiness of the other. Now we cannot see many such relationships of love in our materialistic societies and religions. Love has become a superficial word and a matter of tentative relationship. This is why the present-day lovers have no much value in any society. They are taking lovers as creatures of lust, who have passion for bodies but not psychological refinement and visionary approach towards their lives. Lovers should regulate their senses first.

Divinol: In orthodox societies, honour killings are taking place against lovers. Is it fair?

I: It is not at all fair. No parent has moral authority to beat or kill their children on any ground. Parents are agents chosen by God to cause the birth of a creature using their bodies as the facilitating tools. God is the creator of all life forms in this planet. Only He has ultimate authority to end any life in any manner. All parents in this world are just role players. We bring up our children expecting a lot from them. There is no certainty that they accept and fulfill our desires and demands in course of time. We should not harm them if they go against our wishes, hopes and plans centered on them. We feel a lot of pain when our children don’t live according to our expectations but we should bear with it. If we are really concerned about the tradition and culture of our region, we should kill ourselves but not our children. A hero dies for others but does not kill them. When they kill their children, they become villains in our minds. We should trace and punish any criminal in our society to save others from their threats and crimes. Similarly, we should punish cruel parents of girls and boys also severely in every region. No sibling or others related to a boy or girl has moral authority to kill them. Life is more valuable than honour. A billionaire may become a pauper for various reasons but he should not kill himself for the sake of his honour. He should live rest of his life as a pauper because God imposed that role intentionally upon him. God does different mysterious things towards us just to reform and transform us towards the better. Lovers are innocent and helpless creatures compared to the manipulative and cruel societies around us. We may not be able to help and guide desperate lovers but at least we should not harm them. This is the favour we can do them. They chose that path of love knowingly or unknowingly. They live and die according to their Karma. Why should we attach evil and sin to our records of soul suppressing them brutally or killing them cruelly? 

Divinol: What should lovers do to live happily for long?

I: Remember that Karma is the strongest force as far as our existence in this world as a creature is concerned. Be it a lover or a priest, everybody dies one day or the other, after his soul experiences all the results of its previous births. Lovers, whom we take as ideal and admirable ones, may die earlier than expected by us. Love cannot decide the lifespan of a creature but divine will. For any relationship to be stronger and longer, qualities are very important. Those with great qualities can continue and enjoy their lives of love and marriage better than those who have inferior qualities and low standards of life. We should build a strong and ideal character with intended efforts and practice. When lovers love each other ideally and serve each other selflessly, such relationship can last longer, despite hardships on the way. It is a process of mutual understanding, cooperation and struggle.

Divinol: Why is the phenomenon of love increasing rapidly in the present world?

I: When there is freedom to think and act as we like, we do what anybody does due to the influence of basic instincts. When we are hungry, we look for something to eat. When we are poor, we grab any opportunity that helps us become rich. We fall in love with millions of creatures and phenomena in this world if we have access to all of them because God made them that beautifully and enticingly. Similarly, all humans, made by God, are attractive to our eyes. So, we fall in love with them. When sources of communication and physical togetherness increase, basic instincts in all creatures surface and exert pressure on them. They force us to meet, talk and do something with the creature of the opposite gender in any country at any time. We love many for this reason because we were born with these qualities. Love is a basic instinct installed by God. We cannot get away from that feeling and relationship towards others despite our best efforts. We should not swim against the tide. God punishes us if we do so cruelly.  

Divinol: Lovers are committing suicides and indulging in many such extreme things now. Why?

I: The portrayal and discussion of the themes and issues related to love have increased tremendously during the last 50 years. There have been hundreds of feature films, dramas, books and public events associated with love and lovers of various kinds. When young, energetic and passionate youth are exposed to these many varieties of love in theory and action, they naturally wish to play such adventurous and fantastic roles in their real lives also. They started attributing some great qualities to lovers. A true lover should be ready to do anything for his beloved. He should sacrifice many things for her. At times, they are sacrificing their lives also for the sake of their love. It is a bad and sad social trend. Life is more valuable than love. We can love any number of girls or boys because it is that easy. We cannot bring life into a dead body because life is a gift of God. When superficial and vulnerable youth fail to realize this fact, they resort to extreme acts and decisions of their lives. Love and lovers is an indispensable theme for many artists in this world. They cannot make a work of fiction absorbing without portraying this basic instinct and vital trait of humanity. Youth should regulate their bodies and minds. They should accord more value to their lives than matters and issues of love. If a girl commits suicide out of love failure, her parents, relatives, friends and well-wishers suffer a lot. It means her sacrifice is causing pain to many. Her life might be painful beyond the association of her beloved but she should continue such life to bring happiness in the lives of those who love her a lot. What we do must make and keep others happy. This must be our goal in life. At times, we have to burn like a candle to bring light in the lives of others. When youth understand this essence of great human life, they refrain themselves from these extreme thoughts and acts of love.

Divinol: What factors and forces compel us to fall in love with others?

I:  Vulnerability and helplessness often make us fall in love with others. It could be extreme poverty, haunting loneliness, homesickness, lovesickness and pains of various kinds. Those who get pure and reliable love from their parents, grandparents, friends and well-wishers seldom fall in love with others. Each creature craves love and appreciation from those with whom it is spending mostly. When they don’t feel and get such affection, care, love, warmth, possessiveness, belongingness and attachment from those close to them, they search and get it from those they find interesting and attractive outside. Those, who are very busy in life, don’t get attracted towards love but pleasure and happiness only. If one is getting attracted towards one creature particularly, it means even one creature in this world is not offering his expected love. Since man is a social being, he often desires identification and appreciation from that society. Some cannot attract the entire society through their thoughts and acts. So, they focus on one girl or woman only. They do something to attract her. Once deep into a relationship, she does something special for him only. He gets more attracted towards her because she is satisfying his innermost desires better than others. It means love from others fills the void in our psyche. It makes us feel and believe that there is worth to our existence. Falling in love with somebody deeply means we are indirectly beseeching them to identify and appreciate our unique existence in this world. Being neglected and insulted by others bothers us much. In such vulnerable conditions, even a beggar that talks kindly with us looks like God to us. We like to spend with empathetic creatures much because they share our joys and pains. Love is like an ointment to the wound of psychological pain one is carrying silently. Those, who are in such state of anxiety, agony and solitude internally, fall in love with others very fast. They are desperately waiting for solace from others. They love those, who offer such psychological treatment to them through their physical intimacy, kind words and behaviour. So, if we keep our dear ones in a zone of abundant love from all, they don’t love anybody particularly much. We struggle and acquire that, which we want badly.

Divinol: What precautions should youth take to keep away from the effects of love?   

I: They must realize that God created a variety of creatures and things in this world to educate and entertain them. Creatures of opposite gender are just one variety of them. Except man, all other creatures and phenomena offer us unconditional love. A tree offers shade to a thief or saint alike. A bird’s twitter soothes anybody alike. Rule of law can be observed in many created and empowered by God. When we start thinking and deriving joy from these creations of God regularly, we stop focusing on matters and issues related to love. When we are disturbed and saddened, we should get away from those, which are causing them. Anything related to love causes us pain and suffering one day or the other as it is a relationship based on mutual understanding and need fulfilment. When we grow psychologically, we avoid narrow-minded thinking. Thinking that our life is worthless without a girl or boy reflects our shallow outlook. Reading great books, visiting inspiring places in our regions, spending with honest and ideal people, offering service to helpless and ideal creatures proactively, participating in fairs and festivals, mingling with talented and creative people…we can keep our mind and body engaged meaningfully.  Love is just a part of life. We should not misuse our valuable life, worrying about our trivial love.

Divinol: Are not noble acts of love are far better than words of love?

I: Absolutely. There is no use of saying or writing a hundred times that we love somebody. Words cannot bring much change in others but service. Giving 100 rupees to a poor boy on the spot, being affected by his dire poverty, is better than speaking on various daises that we are committed to eradication of poverty across the world. What we see now across the world is beautiful and unbelievable lies. Service through silence is preferable to frantic shouts of slogans for a movement or agitation. Similarly, lovers too should think on what service they can offer to the other but not always expecting something from the other. Being equipped and energized with abundant sense of service and sacrifice is the best foundation for love. Parasites can’t achieve anything. They just talk much, expecting others to do a lot for them always.

Divinol: Everybody enjoys witnessing love in others but not at home. Why?

I: Man became a victim of tradition and culture over the years. He is scared of the norms of the societies around him. He struggles to follow the customs established by his forefathers. He expects his children and grandchildren also to live like him. Youth, being encouraged and forced by contemporary changes and trends, on the other hand, don’t like to tread the path of discipline shown by their parents and elders. They consider them outdated. This is where friction arises between tradition and modernity. Sensitive and sincere love is really a great feeling. All relationships, filled with that essence, look admirable to us. We gratify this instinct in us watching love in films, reading books and observing the lives of lovers. We feel agitated if someone in our family enters this path. Love entails freedom and choice. Tradition imposes rules and regulations. Our parents and elders treat us as wrongdoers when we choose the path of freedom going against their wishes. This is how love becomes a burning issue in our families. We believe that our tradition is greater than the superficial love of our innocent children. They believe that their honest and ideal love is greater than our outdated tradition and culture. Clashes and detachments lead to pain. Human relationships get broken. Society observes and comments rudely. Unrest prevails.

Divinol: What is the difference between love once and what we are witnessing now across places?

I: It was more difficult and rare those days, considering the prevalence of orthodox lifestyles and policies of the governments. Very few dared love. Struggle, suffering and tragedies were there in majority of real love stories then. During the last few years, freedom and choice have become the way of life. Many are struggling and achieving freedom from familial, social, religious and national prejudices and norms. Youth of these days are luckier than them. Many are there to choose from for love or admiration. Then girls and women seldom came out into public space. Love among loyal and innocent folks of those days was purer and more reliable than the one among smart creatures of these days. Now many are breaking their love relationships for trivial reasons also.

Divinol: What is the most difficult aspect of interaction between lovers?

I: Expression of love is very difficult. There may be a multitude of thoughts, wishes and ideas to share with those whom we love but we cannot express it as easily as said. We call it proposal. We are not scared of God, our superiors or demons much but we feel uneasy and uncomfortable to express our sense of love to our sweetheart for the first time. We feel that others may take it negatively if we cannot handle it properly. In fact, we don’t know what ‘proper’ is in this regard. She may be averse to the idea of love; she might be already in love with somebody; we may not meet her expectations; our status may not match hers; her orientation of life might be quite different from ours; she may be a hard-core activist, who takes anything ‘male’ as detestable and avoidable…many thoughts block our expression. Many remain as one-side lovers just being unable to express their love to others. Lovers become admirers in this process in course of time. They don’t want physical nearness with them but just keep thinking and dreaming about them in their world of fantasy. Familial, social, cultural, religious and national taboos often impose restrictions on our minds when we wish to express our emotions. All lovers are victims of this predicament. When, how and where to break the silence is the issue.

Divinol: Is there difference between males and females as far as expression of love is concerned?

I: In majority of the cases, it is boys and men that take the initiative to express love but not girls and women. We can observe this culture mostly in developing countries where customs and regional taboos restrict the free flow of expression from girls and women. In highly developed countries, where kissing and hugging are considered quite acceptable social behaviour, expression of love is not a difficult matter for females also. Girls and women have stronger physical urge to mingle with the creatures of opposite gender but they keep those passions and emotions suppressed until quite favourable conditions emerge. Males can’t wait that long. They feel tense and disturbed until their expression gets materialized. Females mostly wait for the males to express it first.

Divinol: What is the importance of dating in relationships of love?

I: Dating sounds like a business relationship to me. Checking the features and qualities of a person to ascertain whether he suits our interests and requirements in the long run or not looks logical but artificial. Anything we do out of our intuition and innocence seems purer than the one we do after careful analysis and inspection. We like those films in which a heroine falls in love with a hero out of innocence and helplessness rather than out of intelligence and planning. Love that happens unknowingly is more beautiful and enjoyable than the one that develops mechanically step by step. Innocence, stupidity and lack of vision are the qualities required by one to fall in love with anybody genuinely. If we think deeply about consequences of a love relationship with somebody, we cannot fall in love with anybody because love is always a dangerous and unpredictable game with fate. What looks attractive in the other today might turn unacceptable to us tomorrow. Our interests, priorities and fantasies keep changing time to time. Our lovers may not be able to change accordingly to meet our expectations because it expects them to be artificial and illogical. So, those who are impatient, lazy and crazy should not fall in love with others. Anybody can start a love relationship with the other but only some can continue it forever. Standards and values of the lovers involved play predominant role in keeping or breaking that relationship in the long run. Empathy and inclusive culture are needed for lovers but not ego, false prestige, short temper and frivolous attitude. Being loved honestly and purely by our life partner forever is not an ordinary thing. We should have extraordinary qualities to look and sound great to our beloved in the long run. We must make conscious efforts to understand and retain the beauty of our love relationship. Those that enter a marital relationship with somebody after checking many through multiple dates with several creatures may not be able to continue that relationship for long. How you entered a love relationship is not important but how best you are struggling and planning to keep your relationship intact with the other.

Divinol: Many fail in love and remain gloomy forever. Is it not tragic in this world?

I: It is really tragic. We love many and wish to be loved by many but we cannot know why many, whom we love blindly and directly, never love us even a little. Love does not seem beautiful when it evolves out of logic. It should happen like magic. From this perspective, we cannot blame anybody if they don’t love us in response to our deepest love for them. Everybody has moral authority to accept or reject our love for any reason. We must accept their response or reaction decently but it is not that easy to forget those whom we loved or admired deeply. Lovers are blind and deaf. We don’t know why they love some very deeply. They don’t listen to our advice and refrain from their dangerous love relationship with somebody. They struggle hard and fail one day. Many remain unmarried and depressed forever after failure in love. Lovesickness is a critical physical and psychological disorder. If there is nobody to love us deeply in this world or if we don’t find anybody suitable to deserve our love genuinely, we remain victims forever. Life without love is equal to death. We should love many. Many should love us. We should create and live in such network of relationships and attachments to make our life beautiful and meaningful. Passionate and ideal lovers live longer than depressed, intelligent and detached lovers. Solitude means pain. Togetherness means animated life with a variety of ideal relationships. God wants us to mingle with all and be happy.

Divinol: Live-in relationships are increasing across places now. How should we take them?

I: It is purely one’s intuition and passion to satisfy one’s physical needs in association with a creature of opposite gender with similar ideas and lifestyle. If a male and female of comparable age are living together for a period of time, it should be for carnal joys to a great extent but not for idealism. If a youngster is living with old people, it can be considered a matter of service and idealism. Togetherness and happiness beyond the idea of marriage is the fundamental objective of a live-in relationship. It may involve passionate love and physical intimacy. Orthodox families and conventional societies do not approve live-in relationships. Purity is the matter of concern here. If one enjoyed bodily pleasures with multiple partners over a period of time, as part of his modern culture, why should he crave relationship with one partner only ultimately, out of marriage, approved by elders and society? If marriage has value at all, we should honour it marrying and living with the one only chosen by us or others but not with multiple partners. From this perspective, live-in relationship is an ugly facet of modern culture. Those involved in these relationships can certainly choose like-minded ones to derive pleasure from such relationships but they should not advise others about what is good or bad as far as relationships beyond marriage are concerned. Marriage imposes certain moral responsibilities and legal obligations on us. We have to obey them. We must be ready for many sacrifices on the way. It is the right, strong and reliable foundation for ideal and legally appreciable societies around us. If marriage is like a temple, live-in relationship is like a pub. When there is unlimited freedom in a casual relationship, it does not continue for long. It is not a good social trend.

Divinol: How can we tackle physical attacks in the name of love?

I: Suffering increases when our desires and passions for creatures and phenomena in this world get intensified. We cannot possess and enjoy everything. We have to see and enjoy most of the things around us. Nobody should ever expect others to obey. We cannot grab love from others. We should offer more love to others to get it back from them. At times, others don’t reciprocate the kind of love we expect or deserve from them. A lover might spend one million dollars for his beloved directly or indirectly but she may not even acknowledge it. Offering love and service is what we can do but not demanding it from others. We should not hurt anybody just because they neglected us or rejected our proposal. We don’t know what helplessness made them decide, respond and react so towards us. Love means acceptance, empathy and unconditional service. When we resort to crime in the name of love, we suffer a lot. The related sins chase us for long. We should be scared of doing anything bad towards others because everybody and everything around us is a creation of God. When we insult or harm His valuable assets in this world, He teaches us unforgettable lessons soon. We should not subject ourselves to His wrath. Can a mosquito withstand the radiance of the sun? We are like a speck in the creation of God. We should control our wrong emotions.

Divinol: What should governments do to face the menace of cases related to love?

I: I believe in most of the countries now democratic governments have no much control on people. Governments cannot regulate the trends and culture of people in a nation. They often play the role of a passive spectator and neutral facilitator. They create opportunities for the growth of economy and happiness of their citizens through all practical and possible welfare measures. They may make some laws and try to reform societies to some extent but they cannot succeed much in this direction. People do what they like. If we interfere in their affairs, they complain to courts of law that their fundamental rights like freedom, equality and fraternity are at risk. This is why governments seldom play the roles of social reformers. Many ultra-modern human rights activists have coined the word ‘moral policing’ against all those talking about tradition and culture. They argue that nobody has authority to advise others regarding what is right or wrong. In this critical environment of various interest groups and regional movements against governments, it is up to the citizens of a nation to think and decide what is good or bad to them. Each should grow as an individual and cultivate virtues.

Divinol: Did you love girls in your life? What were your experiments and experiences?

I: Every healthy boy and girl falls in love with somebody if they are allowed to grow up in liberal social environment. I admired some girls but they could not reciprocate the kind of love I wanted from them. There are millions of love victims in this world. Marriage with the beloved is not possible in all cases. We should seek joy from the happiness of those whom we love. This much we can do. Every sincere lover suffers much in his life because those memories haunt him till the end of his life. Sincere love entails pain at some point of time.

Divinol: What is good for the modern youth: love or arranged marriage?

I: How we enter the institution of marriage is just a formality. Any kind of marriage is acceptable and appreciable as long as both the partners have great qualities. Bodies fade according to our age. So, we should not love somebody just being impressed by their physical beauty. Psychological refinement is necessary for all. We can live with a kind beggar happily for years but not with a cruel billionaire. Our character decides how long we live together after marriage. Everybody should grow psychologically. When we expect little and offer more to others, they like our company. We should be endearing to others.