Loving Much, Loving Not

The other day I unexpectedly bumped into a friend whom I had not seen in quite a long time. Ramon looked very different. He had shrunk considerably, grown his beard and hair long that I didn’t recognize him until he snatched my hand.

“How are you?” I asked rather cautiously, since he certainly didn’t look okay to me. I was on an important errand at the time, but didn’t mind forgoing with it in favor of an old friend. We went for coffee.

I wanted to ask about Cynthia, his wife. But it occurred to me to better let him volunteer information about her. It was somewhat unusual to see Ramon alone, without Cynthia. The last time I’d seen them, they were inseparable.

She was younger than him by about twelve years. She was a “good catch” for him, our friends would say, not only because she was bright and very sociable but also because she was really pretty. They met when Cynthia was an intern in the company where Ramon was a section head.

The two then slipped into a world all their own, a world Ramon created for just the two of them, under his close watch. Cynthia was soon losing her old friends, one after the other, especially the men. Ramon was so possessive of her that even her own male relatives soon began to keep their distance.

“She mistook my love for cruelty,” Ramon opened up. I knew what he meant but wanted to hear more. “How could I be cruel to someone who means the whole world to me?” He felt it utterly unfair when he gave so much of himself and yet was faulted for being selfish.

There’s a story about a monkey who found a jar of cherries. He quickly stuck his hand in the jar and grabbed a handful of fruit. But when he tried to withdraw his fistful of cherries, his filled fist no longer fit through the opening of the jar. 

The only way out of the trap was for the monkey to release the cherries and then remove his hand. But the poor monkey wanted the cherries so much and didn’t want to let go. His intense desire for the fruit had closed the monkey’s mind from considering other, wiser options.

What a tricky situation it was! The monkey wanted the cherries so much that he couldn’t let go of the sweet fruit in his hand. Ironically, holding on to the cherries was the very thing that made it impossible for him to have them.

The monkey could have easily pulled his empty hand out of the jar. Now with both hands available, he could have turned the jar over and let the cherries pour out. But he kept his hand in the jar, holding fast to the cherries but never tasted them.

Another story is told of a small boy who had caught a bird and asked an old sage about it. “Wise man,” the boy said, “I want to know if this bird is mine.” The sage beckoned the boy to come closer. Then, he shared his wisdom with the young one.

“Open your hand,” the old sage softly whispered. The boy hesitated, fearing that the bird he was holding might fly away. Sensing the boy’s reluctance, the old man clasped the tense little hand. “My boy, if you really want to know, set it free.”

“Let it go,” the sage repeated. “If it comes back to you, you’ll know it’s really yours. If it doesn’t, then it never was.” The boy’s face lightened. Slowly he opened his hand.

Sometimes we are so obsessed with something that we even seek it by force. Maybe it’s our need to be in control. We think that by our own initiative we can get whatever we want, and that there’s no better proof of power than conquest.

Indeed, it runs against human reason to let go of something we so much want to have. But sometimes our most valued acquisition is our torment. We constantly worry that we might lose our cherished possession, especially when it’s uncertain whether what we have is truly ours.

We can love so much and yet appear like we love not. With true love, what matters most is the happiness of the beloved. The kind of affection that seeks its own rewards will not pass for true love. It might be, in fact, merely a sick fascination.

We can be addicted to people in the same way we can be addicted to things. And no addiction is healthy, in that it overrides our sense of self-control. When addiction afflicts a human relationship, there are only losers; both the oppressed and the unwitting oppressor suffer. A loving hug, when overdone, can choke.

On the other hand, selfless love heals. We often feel material abundance when we share with others what little we have. Similarly, a practical antidote to feeling lonely and unloved is to go outside of ourselves to be friendly and loving to others.

Ramon related to me his sad story in portions, in between heavy sighs and tearful eyes. It was obvious how much he missed his wife. Cynthia had left him, without a trace. She was not happy, she complained often. Perhaps she got suffocated by his love.

It is said that our only true possessions are those things which we are willing to lose or to give away. And yet we can never possess people, we can only love them and hope to earn their loyalty. If they love us back, that’s an extra luck. If they do not, then the very joy we derive from loving is reward enough.

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