Why love keeps changing?

It’s interesting to observe how we are absorbed in particular situations in our life. When we are in a particular situation which our heart feels the best, we feel – Oh I can’t live without it, this is what i am here for. 

Specifically, our most lovable object keeps changing in life, from childhood to youth to old age. When we are a small child, we are in love with our mother. Mother’s love is considered to be most selfless in this world. And we as a child cry only for one thing always – the love of our mother. We are fully dependent on our mother for everything - beginning with bodily needs like milk to emotional needs like affection. 

Gradually we grow up and we find our playmates as our lovable objects. We try to remain out of our home, and wish to play with them always. The same mother whom we loved the most now looks like an enemy as she does not allow us to play with our friends, and we just can't understand - Why she always call me back while playing?

Gradually we grow up and the feelings of attraction toward opposite sex develops. We leave our friends and start spending time with opposite sex in reality or in our mind. 

Gradually we have to get married and settle down with same person whom we loved before or with a newly arranged person (actually it does not matter in long term, but when we are in we feel it as a very big thing in life). We gradually start developing love for our spouse. Gradually when we have children, we start developing love for them, and many times fight with our spouse for them.

When children grow up and we start becoming old, we develop love for our grandchildren.  Grandparents love their grandchildren so much so that many times they fast when the grandchild is sad, even in his childishness due to his/her parents and then they scold the parents for not taking proper care of their grandchildren. Many times they even go to schools with their grandchildren to scold the teacher who scolded the grandchildren. They love their grandchildren so much that they can't even leave their bodies, unless they have their grandchildren in front of them.

All the while, we keep changing lovers. But when we are in love with a particular lover, we feel that I can’t live without him/her. But when we develop love for our next lover, we do not even know how we give up our previous lover, and many times previous lover become our enemy.

This is the law of this world, change is the only thing which is permanent here. Sometimes, we should try to observe our life with the telescope and not with the microscope, so that we are able to distinguish the reality from illusion. In microscope, small things look big, while in the telescope, big things look in the size understandable to us (smaller than their actual size). This sometimes create misery unnecessarily.

It is also important to mention here that microscopic view is also important to enjoy the moments in detail and feel the particular love and responsibility that is needed for the same. (suggested by my friend Abhishek@IITB.)

Our scriptures beautifully relate every incident of our life with the Supreme Spiritual Lover, and they also answer why love keeps changing in this world?

We love our mother, because she is representation of the selfless love of that Supreme Lover whom we are always dependent upon.

We love our friends, because that Supreme Lover is our best friend.

We love opposite sex, because the Supreme Lover is Supremely Beautiful and we seek for His beauty in others.

We love our children, because the Supreme Lover along with the Possessor of All Opulence, is Supremely Pure like a child.

We love our grandchildren because the Supreme Sweet Lover is our only hope in life when everyone else gives us up.

We keep changing our lover because we are not able to find the Real Lover of our life, who is sitting most close to us in our heart.

All the while we are seeking for the love of our Supreme Lover – Rasraaj : the best of all lovers. He is the Ocean of Love, from which all the rivers like mother, friends, spouse, children and grandchildren derive the loving waves of water, knowingly or unknowingly!

Like me on facebook page to get daily inspiration: https://www.facebook.com/RohitSalujaBhaarat/

Yours

Rohit Saluja

Ph.D. Student

IITB-Monash Research Academy