About Love
“If you wished to be loved, love.”
~ Seneca
Love.
This word is overused. The true meaning behind this word, whatever it was in ancient times, has faded away. Nowadays there are as many definitions of love as there are people on Earth and that makes love a very abstract thing to talk about.
Abstractions are impractical. They don’t give us guidance on how to live our lives. They don’t present us a real insight into how to keep our relationships harmonious and balanced. They do not provide us with explicit instructions on how to convey love or how to accept it. Empty rhetoric about love is meaningless. Love has to be put into action.
So, is there any way to transform the most high-souled of our feelings into something actionable? There is a way and it is called:
Service.
Selfless service is what makes a family unbreakable. A family where each member serves each other with a whole-hearted devotion is a stronghold. Just like love, service is unconditional. It claims nothing and wishes nothing in return. Yet it is tangible which makes it something that can be readily put into practice.
Seeing dirty dishes in the sink and washing them without mentioning. Spending sleepless nights taking care of your ill spouse. Staying patient and calm while educating your children. Spoon-feeding your old mother when she becomes too old to eat by herself. What are these? Plain acts of service or exemplification of love? Well, the real question is: “Can you tell the difference?”
The path to a great love might be elusive but the steps to a great love are concrete and realizable. And that’s what the mindset of service is all about. It shifts the paradigm of love from the ethereal spiritual reality to the perceptible material world.
We struggle to find a definition of love, and maybe, just maybe, we do not need a definition at all. All we need is to keep growing upon the path of self-sacrificing and self-denying. We must keep growing in service and believe that that alone is enough to live a good life.
Thank you for reading my book “Meditations of the Millennial”.
If you want to support me on my mission, please, share this book with someone you love. Maybe they will find what they seek on its pages.
