Just last Sunday everyone who is anyone was celebrating the day of love. Everywhere you looked there was red. Posters and roses as far as the eye could see. Advertisement after advertisement of lunches and dinners and breakfasts and every other mealtime to share with your sweetheart. World over there were people wishing each other a Happy Valentine’s Day and the air was heavy with that amazing emotion of love. As fast as it came it went by too and life went back to normal the very next day. Each year the 14th of February is waited for with bated breath and once it arrives a number of individuals jump on the bandwagon that cupid is chauffeur of. Looking at the current scenario however, the question I ask is ‘Where exactly is the Love?’ Is love just to be shared and preached about on a predetermined day and forgotten about the very next?
Love is one of the most beautiful emotions and we are lucky enough to be able to experience it. The sad part is, there is too much of the opposite emotion going around. India is one of the most romantic countries in the world. The celebration of love is clear from the fact that one of the most beautiful representations of love ‘The Taj Mahal’ lies in our very own backyard but, we are plagued by a section of society that actually fights in the name of tradition to sweep one of the most automatic responses under the rug. Besides those who have been trying to ban Valentine’s Day there are also those who have made it their life’s mission to destroy peace and spread hate. The intolerance, the injustice and the corruption have already taken tradition and made it extinct. The political system has left our country with very little tolerance let alone love.
Love is much more than sharing special romantic moments with a special someone, it is a universal emotion and is applicable to everyone and every relationship.
Love is and love is and these are words by which we can build a better tomorrow. Patience and kindness are two basic values that we all have the capacity to inculcate. Why then is it such a task? Why do we find it so very difficult to just be kind? Using kind words and actions is not rocket science, nor is it too much to ask. I once heard a businessman say that ‘you have to be cruel to be kind’ however, an entrepreneur, in the same context said ‘a little kindness never hurt anyone, in fact, being more humane gets work done with smiles and perseverance.’ Kindness breathes kindness and the opposite also rings true. We currently live in a world where the race to the top preoccupies most of our thought processes. When we are filled with thoughts of how to defeat another, we leave no space for the positive emotions to take over, and there is no denying that we really need some more of that.
The challenge for us is to actually stop and decide what we really want. What kind of world do we want to leave behind for our children? Based on our answer to that question, the changes we need to bring about in our own dealings will be crystal clear. Every religion unanimously speaks the language of love and yet we have somehow been able to turn something as pure into a cesspool of hate and intolerance.
Another thing we tend to do is forget about the now. We are constantly running from pillar to post trying to do our work, trying to get things done. We are all in this crazy search for something. Always looking, but for what? we seldom know. In this search, we also miss out on what is right there in front of us. We spend our lives looking for the one, for that thing, that career, those achievements and in that search for what’s to come we overlook the here and now, the current, the what and who we already have. Before long, we look back with regrets of if only I had and if I could turn back time for a few hours. Why put ourselves through regret? What we really need is to slow down and let life take the rout it is meant to. We are given one life to live and one life to love. There is no end to how much we can build with this crazy little thing called love. Let’s not tear down the world by giving into the antonym.
