Falling In Love

It is a mystery why we fall in love.

It is a mystery how it happens. It is a mystery when it comes. It is a mystery why some love grows and it is a mystery why some love fails.

You can analyze this mystery and look for reasons and causes, but you will never do more than take the life out of the experience. Just as life itself is something more than the sum of the bones and muscles and electrical impulses  in the body. Love is something more than the sum of interests, attractions and commonalities that two people share. And just as life itself is a gift that comes and goes in its own time, so too, the coming of love must be taken as an unfathomable gift that cannot be questioned in its ways.

Sometimes, hopefully at least once in your life- the gift of love will come to you in full flower, and will take hold of it and celebrate it in all its inexpressible beauty. This is the dream we all share. More often, it will come and take hold of you, celebrate you for a brief moment, then move on.

When this happens to young people they often try to grasp the love and hold it to them, refusing to see that it is a gift given freely and a gift that just freely moves away. When they fall out of love, or the person they love feels the spirit of love leaving, they try desperately to reclaim the love that is lost rather than accepting the gift for what it was, then moving on.

They want answers when there are no answers. They want to know what is wrong with them that makes the other person no longer love them, or they try their lover to change, thinking that if some small things were different, love would bloom again. They blame their circumstances and say that if they start something new together, their love will grow.

They try anything to give meaning to what has happened. But there is no meaning beyond the love itself and until they accept its mysterious ways they live in a sea of misery.

You need to know this about love, and accept it. You need to treat what it brings you with kindness. If you find yourself in love with someone who does not love you, be gentle with yourself. There is nothing wrong with you. Love just didn't choose to rest in the other person's heart.

If you someone else in love with you and you don't love him or her, feel honored that love came and called at your door, but gently refuse the gift that you cannot return. Do not take advantage, do not cause pain. How you deal with love is how love will deal with yo, and all our hearst feel the same pains and joys, even if our lives and ways are different.

If you fall in love with another and he or she falls in love with you, and then chooses to leave, do not try to reclaim it or to assess the blame. Let it go. There is a reason and there is a meaning. You will know it in time but time itself will choose the moment.

Remember that you don't choose love. Love chooses you.

All you can really do is accept it for all its mystery when it comes into your life. Feel the way it fills you to overflowing then reach out and give it away. Give it back to the person who brought it alive in you. Give it to others who seem poor in spirit. Give it to the world around you in any way you can.

This is where many lovers go wrong. Having been so long without love, they understand love only as a need. They cease to be the someone who generates love instead become someone who seeks love. They forget that the secret of love is that it is a gift, and it can be made to grow only by giving it away.

Remember this, and keep it your heart. Love has its own time, its own reason, and its own reason for coming and going. You cannot bribe or coerce it or reason it into saying. You can only embrace it when it arrives and give it away when it comes to you. But if it chooses to leave, from your heart or from the heart of your lover, there is nothing you can do and nothing you should do. Love alwaya has been and alwaya will be a mystery. Be glad that it came to live for a moment in your life. If you keep your heart open, it will come again.

(From the book "Letters I Wrote to My Son". Binigay ni Ma'am Gae, Clinical Instructor kong emo tulad ng RLE Group namin. Haha. Habang papunta kami ng Tondo Medical Center, tumutugtog ang "Art of Letting Go" sa radyo ng sasakyan, biglang nag-open ng topic si Ma'am tungkol sa love. Haha. At sinabi nga niyang bibigyan niya kami ng copy nitong Literary Piece na ito. At ipopost ko na rin siya kasi natutuwa ako.)

Isa lang ang masasabi ko. I love the feeling of being in love.