The ‘letting go’ love..!
Robert Clements
Monday, April 02, 2012 - It saddens me to hear about acid attacks and other assaults attempted by lovers who don’t want to give up their love. It’s as if they are saying “If I can’t have you, no one else will!” Here’s a first person account from someone who fell in love with a girl and found her refreshingly different: “I knew love when it bit me. And it must have bit her, too, because a few weeks later she asked me to marry her! Before long, though, I began to notice something “peculiar” about her love. She sometimes said, “I love you too much to hold on to you.” And she said, “I want you to be happy...even if that means we won’t be together.”
Another time she said, “I love you so much I want to let you go. Don’t feel tied to me.” Talk like that sounded peculiar to me. You see, my love was a little different. “I love you so much I want to always keep you with me,” better described my kind of love. “I love you too much to ever let you go,” was more typical of how I felt. My love was a hanging-on kind of love. Hers was a letting-go kind of love. My love worried about what it might do to me if I lost her. Her love worried about what it might do to us if she hung on too tightly.
One day she returned from a doctor’s appointment distraught. “He told me I can’t have babies,” she said. Her swollen eyes overflowed. “I know you want children. I’ll understand if you don’t want to marry,” she continued. “I love you too much to keep you.” There again — that peculiar letting-go kind of love. All of this happened many years ago and, in the meantime, I have learned something about love. Love can sometimes be about hanging on. But it can also be about letting go. It is as simple and as difficult as that.
And I learned something else, too. The doctor was wrong about the babies! That’s real love isn’t it? When you love enough to want the other person to be happy even if the happiness doesn’t include you. But I don’t see much of it. I see lover’s committing suicide, because in that death the other person is also made to feel guilty. I see lovers accusing their ex of breach of promise: Come on, if the person doesn’t love you anymore, what promise are you talking about? You want him to get married to you and regret throughout his life. You want to live together with his or her unhappiness? Let go, when the other person wants to go, that’s real love. Think about it. Is your love one of hanging on, or of letting go?
—Email:bobsbanter@gmail.com
Another time she said, “I love you so much I want to let you go. Don’t feel tied to me.” Talk like that sounded peculiar to me. You see, my love was a little different. “I love you so much I want to always keep you with me,” better described my kind of love. “I love you too much to ever let you go,” was more typical of how I felt. My love was a hanging-on kind of love. Hers was a letting-go kind of love. My love worried about what it might do to me if I lost her. Her love worried about what it might do to us if she hung on too tightly.
One day she returned from a doctor’s appointment distraught. “He told me I can’t have babies,” she said. Her swollen eyes overflowed. “I know you want children. I’ll understand if you don’t want to marry,” she continued. “I love you too much to keep you.” There again — that peculiar letting-go kind of love. All of this happened many years ago and, in the meantime, I have learned something about love. Love can sometimes be about hanging on. But it can also be about letting go. It is as simple and as difficult as that.
And I learned something else, too. The doctor was wrong about the babies! That’s real love isn’t it? When you love enough to want the other person to be happy even if the happiness doesn’t include you. But I don’t see much of it. I see lover’s committing suicide, because in that death the other person is also made to feel guilty. I see lovers accusing their ex of breach of promise: Come on, if the person doesn’t love you anymore, what promise are you talking about? You want him to get married to you and regret throughout his life. You want to live together with his or her unhappiness? Let go, when the other person wants to go, that’s real love. Think about it. Is your love one of hanging on, or of letting go?
—Email:bobsbanter@gmail.com
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