Soul's Reflections - Love

By: Shazia Yousuf

Love is, when a father gets angry at his daughter for forgetting to tell him that she’ll be late from work. He is not angry because she did not inform him, but because he is concerned for her out of love.

Love is, when a wife is upset with the husband when he forgets to take the lunch to work, that was so lovingly prepared for him in the morning. Not because she had to get up and go through the pains of preparing it, but because she is concerned about the health and the well being.

Love is, when a poor maid beats up her daughter for not working as hard as she does because she loves her and wants her to learn to earn her own living and not depend on anyone once she’s gone.

Love is, when a mother takes away a toy from the kids fighting over it. She’s doing it not to punish them, but out of love for both the children. She wants them to learn to share and care and to grow up learning to compromise.

I felt loved whenever I got that sweet reminder to have “a cup of milk” whenever I had that appetite loss.

It is not important to say ‘I Love you’ to actually love someone. It is an emotion that can only be felt and cherished. Sometimes, these three words when said may not convey the emotions that they are supposed to. At times ‘I hate you’ may actually convey true love. It is meaningless what is said. The energy released is what actually matters. Any form of positive energy depicts love.

Divine love can be felt in the pattering of the raindrops, the soft humming of the birds, the cool shade under an oak tree, in the smell of the freshly cut grass, the first rays of the rising sun, the waves thrashing the shores, in the blossoms on the trees, in fact in just anything that you see around you. This is God’s manifestation of love. 

According to Rumi, human love is but a pale reflection of the Divine love. It is also supposedly involved with pain and suffering. This is because of the human resistance to the Divine Call to abandon the self and become reabsorbed in the Divinity.

As Iqbal says: “Love solves all the mysteries of the world; it is at once an ailment and a matchless cure.”