A Piece of Advice from Rumi

"Let yourself be silently drawn by the stronger pull of what you really love."
~Rumi

A lot of people have expressed their views on love. I do like a few of them (refer to Valentine's post with quotes from William Shakespeare and the Bible). However, recently, I came across a quote from a source I haven't read much of - Rumi. He wrote about love in a way that I can feel at this point in my life. And what I like most is that he doesn't try to analyze love, he simply tells you to let love guide you. So simple - yet so deep!

I have grown to realize the various forms of love. Of course we all initially think of relationships - what love has come to represent in our society. But love is so much more than that. Love goes beyond our human race, beyond anything materialistic, beyond the world we know. Love is this emotion, this feeling, this thought, this perception that is drenched in spirituality. Since the time I began exploring Buddhism I realized that it was love for which I live. That pure, innocent feeling that causes the lamp in my heart to stay alight. Sounds Romantic and poetisized doesn't it? But it really is not, how do I find the words to explain?

Remember the allegory of the cave? (See previous post) It feels something like that. The understanding of the nature of love, knowing how or what or why - it is impossible to go back to not knowing - it is so difficult to make the others see what causes that shadow! Love makes this world go round, and of this I am thoroughly convinced. Look at the qualities that are generally valued in people of our society today: kindness, generosity, patience, hard-working, trustworthy, etc. etc. Where do you think these qualities stem from? You guessed it, Love. How?? This is what I think:

Kindness is our sensitivity to the world around us - our intuition of how others are feeling and what would help them the most; but what produces this sensitivity, what allows us to be open in this way? Love - for ourself. We learn to love ourself, respect ourself, and be sensitive towards our own emotions. That is the path that leads to kindness towards others. You can't expect someone to be sensitive and kind to others without being kind to themselves first - and that can only happen with a respecting sort of love for oneself.

I could go into how the other qualities stem from love - different types of love. But I won't. This Blog was made with Soul Searching in mind - and somewhere I wandered from that path. But somehow, at every turn, at every point, I find my way back. Now, you make think this is unstable or troublesome - but in reality it's love that pulls me back. Stop. Think. Let it sink in. It is the love for spirituality, finding myself, knowing the intricacies of the world and life in general, and my path using Buddhism that always pulls me back towards it. What does Rumi say? "Let yourself be silently drawn by the stronger pull of what you really love."

Trust yourself. Listen to your inner voice.
It will never guide you wrong. It is what you really love. IT will pull you, no matter how much you wander, you are connected, I am connected, we are all connected. So, there is no need to fret, no need to stress, no need to be a busy person running around with no head, because what we love, what we really, truly love, is always there. That's right. We don't have to go looking for it, it pulls us towards it - it is always in our life, we just have to let it pull.. and stop resisting of course!