Love

We need not understand from Shakespeare's Romeo & Juliet or Twelfth Night what is love. There is no drought of love stories. They are there from time immemorial . We come across countless love stories in our life itself . Some of them become novels and some of them not.There is more disagreement than agreement in love stories. Love marriage is breaking of tradition.Every love story is a battle.Sometimes the battle is won and sometimes the battle is lost.Yet,every love story is interesting. The number of love marriages are on increase in the modern world day by day. But love between a man and a woman is not on the increase. There are more number of divorces in the present day world. Conservatives do not appreciate love marriages. They do not change with the time. A youth and a maiden must only choose discreetly their life partner not anyone else. The haste,no proper thinking and numerous other factors are mostly responsible for failure of marriages these days .

Everyone does not love in same fashion. Love differs from individual to individual. Love is imaginary . It is a much deeper emotion . It is a calmer, more mature feeling . It is mutual attraction or liking for one another. It cannot be fully described. It is something that one cannot write in words. It is difficult to find apt words to describe true love. Love always begins in friendship.It said to be emerging from the bottom of one’s heart. Different meanings have been given to it from time immemorial. It has innumerable characteristics. Love is described as meeting of two souls. Love is compared to meeting of two holy rivers and deemed to be sacred. Love is said to be blind. Some proclaim love as God. Some mistake affection as love. Love may need several sacrifices to be made at one or another stage of life by anyone or both involved in it. Lovers feel that though they have separate bodies they are one and they breathe simultaneously.Love cannot be one sided. In it one cares for another. Love is always give and take. Unless two hands join there cannot be a clap .The way of thinking, way of living, way of understanding between two must be almost similar or they should have adjustable nature for the love to take place. In love both see one another's image in their respective eyes. Love is always a sweet memory.

Love is great.It is an ocean. Majority of people do not know what is love. Love is not a temporary phenomenon. It is sacred. Without love life is barren .Even animals love one another. Love does not always run smooth. Many hurdles come in its way. It is a great weapon. It can conquer anything and everything. Nothing could improve a relationship stronger and better than love.Nothing is more beautiful than the love that has weathered the storms of life. The Love of the young for the young, that is the beginning of life. It is love that makes one forget the world..It is hard to find true love now a days.Without love it's impossible to live happily in this world .As such questions What is love? Where is love? confront many Some say love is everywhere. Some say love is nowhere. Love is in us only. Love should be always unconditional . Those who love everyone don't know what's hate at all, God loves everyone.

Anybody who has independent thinking would have many likes and dislikes; they give priority to every aspect of personality. They anticipate similar thinking, likes and dislikes; and understanding from their likely partner. Most important thing in love is that one should know and understand one another fully well in all respects and have mutual interest too. Love needs always courage. In the west there is what is known as wooing, courtship, betrothal, marriage, honeymoon, married life or divorce and remarriage. There is ample opportunity to know one another, develop intimacy,and love. Their culture is such.

Celluloid world influences modern world a lot. Innumerable love stories have been screened. Censors do not use their scissors properly. All ugly undesirable scenes are screened and a young mind is adversely affected as a result. Their passion is kindled. Teenagers experiment their cinema experience in real life. Many of them experiment all types of love as in cinema. It is not true love. Lovers should honor one another’s feeling. They should not act in anyway whereby either’s prestige, feelings, and interest is affected. Lovers should always share their thoughts and feelings. Otherwise there could be discord and the love may end in divorce. Love could not be thrust on one another. It should blossom or develop between any two individuals. True love is a knot which cannot be untied. Whereas, if a love is not true, nobody need break it, it itself gets broken. True love is neither more nor less. It is uniform. True love is always more within. True love is found more in deeds than in words. In true love whatever that one does appears alright to another. True lovers carry same opinion. They do not disagree on any matter. They overlook faults of one another. They adjust and correct one another. They are made for each other.

Love at first sight is by and large a physical attraction. It is only true love that increases when we share it with others. Love is said to be sweet. But sometimes it turns out to be bitter too. If everything goes on well in love, it is okay but when love becomes hate what would be the consequence God only knows. Love should be gradual and deep rooted. There should be no room for selfishness in love. There should be no faultfinding in love. Love is mutual. There should be mutual trust between people in love. Love should be reflected in words, deeds and action. Love is not a fantasy in real life. Love should be everlasting. Unless intimacy grows love cannot develop. Generally proximity is needed so that intimacy could grow. Love is not a bolt from the blues. Love is happiness. Love seems to be rosy but is full of thorns. We in India are familiar with love stories of Shakuntala and Dushyanth, Salim and Anarkali, etc. Westerners always refer to Romeo and Juliet love story whenever anybody mentions about love and according to them without such a reference one could not know what true love is. Similarly, people in Middle East countries are of the opinion that without a reference to great love story of Laila and Majnu any attempt to know what true love would be futile. Love is the root cause of many tragedies that have taken place in this world. There are innumerable novels, stories, poems, written based on love. Likewise infinite numbers of movies have been created based on love stories or novels. One of the wonders of world namely Tajmahal was built as a token of love between emperor Shahajan and Mamtajmahal. Many emperors have built cities in loving memories of their wives. Thus love is behind many creations and destruction.

Similarly love gives birth to inspiration as well as to despise,disappointment, and disgust. Love is great. Some people are mad with love. By and large such a plight is nothing but lust. Such people would have multiple loves. True love has no religion, caste, or social status or that matter anything. Love should prevail not only in happy times but also in difficult times. Life has to be met by lovers as one. True lovers are ready to sacrifice their lives for the sake one another. They never suspect one another. They have complete faith in one another. Certainly, love to develop in this fashion needs more time. Love is very sensitive. If there is no response from the other side, disappointment will be in store for that individual. Even if two are in deep love and the two families are in discord means that it is either a failure or have to proceed against the will of members of two families. Lovers cannot retract their steps so easily. How the affair would end up under numerous intricacies none can predict. Thus love is nothing but an adventure. Love is a gradual process. Love is said to be blind but lovers should not be blind at least before making a plunge. It is a question of their life. It is choosing their life partner. We could always find difference between theory and practice. What all that could be preached could not be practiced totally. Even with regard to Love, in practice, all the dos and don’ts could not be followed in reality.

Perfection is always a rare phenomenon here too. Adolescence period is always a precarious period in one’s life. It is a period when only a few of us would be mature enough to face life. Majority of us need guidance in one or another respect. We do not have proper mindset. It is at this stage of life we commit a number of mistakes, which would definitely have bearing on our rest of life. It is during this period adults get affected by love. Because of immaturity wrong decisions, wrong judgments etc take place and entire future of concerned would be in jeopardy. Western culture and Indian culture are poles apart. In western culture love marriages are common. Marriages take place only through wooing, courtship, and betrothal. We in India are accustomed and mostly prefer arranged marriages according to various traditions prevailing here. Both western culture and our culture have advantages and disadvantages. Divorces are very common in western world. Marriage has its own sanctity in our culture.

Flirting is common now in modern world. Unemployed people, college students, such other people who are not otherwise fully engaged do what is known as flirting, or in other words they become road Romeo's and Juliet’s. Majority of them are not serious, they do not know what they are doing. It is the leisure time, company, opulence, and all playing their respective part in the sport. Most of them do not know the pros and cons and are not responsible too. As such a couple of people only among them may be truly in love. Flirting takes place under the garb of love. These filters do not have any love for their opposite sex whom they woo. Intention of many of them is cheating or exploiting weakness in their opposite sex through their ploys. Easily some fall a prey to such people because of their age and mind set. They do not realize their faults immediately. Appearances are generally deceptive. Generally it would be too late when they come to know the true colors of impostors. A man may smile and smile yet could be a villain. Lovers build ivory towers in the air. They are generally carried away by sweet words of love, dialogues by their so-called lovers. True genuine love for one another is in fact very less or may be counted by fingers. Mostly it is satisfaction of lust under the guise of love. Generally victims have no other go than to repent for their foolishness at a later date.

All is not well even with arranged marriages too. Arranged marriages also fail but certainly less in number than love marriages. Arranged marriages have social backing. A few instances where there is possibility of development of true love could be illustrated. If two persons namely a lady and a gentleman work at an office, they meet every day in the office. Naturally, they become familiar to one another over a period of time depending upon their nature. Slowly, they may become friends. At times one of them may be in deep trouble and the other renders all the help at that time. This help brings them closer .The bond of friendship strengthens and leniency develops between the two. Another such incident brings them still closer. A sense of gratitude occurs in the recipient And it may transform their friendship into love. And gradually, it may culminate in marriage too. This is true love. Similarly, if two individuals grow up in the same surroundings, they come to know one another very well right from their childhood. Their schools might be same. They might have played together for years. Naturally intimacy develops between them. If they are of similar nature too, they start liking each other. It brings them closer. Gradually, it turns into love. In all possible terms this is true love or natural love.

If one attracted by a stranger after a couple of meetings due to coquettish behavior, it is certainly not love. It indicates that we do not have control over us. If we succumb to advances, we are really foolish. We have to pay a heavy price for it. Thus, it is evident that it is quite necessary that we should know fully well what is true love is before proceeding further in that matter. It is a decision, which affects one’s future life. Once we put a step forward, it is very difficult to retract. As such, it should never be a hasty decision. We should be very careful it is our age that spoils the sport. Sex no doubt brings one another close. It is claimed that love develops in sex. Sex is also claimed as either satisfaction of lust or passion only. All depends on one’s attitude and mentality. Marriage, birth of children, facing life together etc may develop relation between two individuals. Even then it need not be love, it may be a compulsion. Where there is beauty there is no doubt attraction, but beauty is not everything. It is only one of the factors for liking one another. One should not be carried away by beauty only. Often beauty misleads and causes many problems. Love consists of many factors. Beauty and physique may attract one another but it is more important that behavior ,nature , habits, character, talents, intelligence etc which altogether form inner beauty, should bring one another closer. Then only true love would develop. Sincerity and honesty are more important in love. As far as possible arguments should be avoided especially when two are in love for arguments generally lead to heated exchanges and discord. In love it is better to agree not to disagree

Here is an episode which pertains to years goneby. It took place somewhere around 1954 .The junior physical instructor of our school was known as Chitti Bella. Chitti Bella means a small sized jaggery. Why he was so nicknamed as chitti bella I do not remember. His real name also I do not remember now. It is nearly fifty years since I passed out of that school. He had never taken any classes for me. He had passed only matriculation and had undergone physical training course. He was my mere acquaintance. He was very handsome. He was in early twenties. He was a bachelor. Miss Hemalatha was my sister’s classmate. She was visiting almost daily our house. She had no mother; her father was bringing her up. She was a teen aged girl. She belonged to a goldsmith family. She was a little coquettish in nature. Chitti Bella used to inquire with one of my younger brothers whether she had come to our house. He used to leave a packet with kids to be delivered to her. It used to be like a dosa packet from opposite hotel Krishnananda Bhavan. We never suspected any foul play. How long he was leaving a packet in that manner , I cannot recollect now. It may not be for quite a long time. One fine evening accidentally, elders in the house came across one such packet. They opened the packet and to their surprise it was a love letter inside to Hemalatha by Chitti Bella where both of them had changed their names. We promptly stopped Hemalatha visiting our house. This incident was brought to the notice of her father. She failed in the class examination and was detained also. After, one more similar incident concerning some other person she was sent to Bombay to the care of her elder sister. Further, I do not know anything about her. This is a clear case of flirting. I passed out of that school. My brothers and sisters were continuing their studies in that school. In my college holidays, I used to come home. I used to enquire about Chitti Bella casually. One of our science teachers was a madam. She was a graduate in science and was having Bachelor of Education degree also. She was hailing from a respectable family .She was approaching thirties. Yet she was not married. Chitti Bella somehow was able to woo this teacher of mild nature. Both belonged to different castes. This time he had to tie a knot. This we cannot treat it as a true love story also. It is a marriage of convenience.