THE MYSTERY OF LOVE

It is a mystery why we fall in love. It is a mystery how it happens.
It is a mystery when it comes. It is a mystery when some loves grow,
and its a mystery why some loves fail. You can analyze this mystery
and look for reasons and causes, but you will never do any more than
take the life out of the experience.

Love is more than the sum of the
interests, attractions, and commodities that two people share. And just
as life itself is a gift that comes and goes in its time, the coming of love
must be taken as an unfathomable gift that cannot be questioned in its
way.

Too often, when love comes to people, they try to grasp the love
and hold it to themselves, refusing to see that it is a gift freely given
and a gift that just so freely moves away. When they fall out of love,
or the person they love feels the spirit of love leaning, they try desperately
to reclaim the love that is lost rather than accepting the gift for what it was.

They want answers where there are no answers. They want to know what is
wrong with them, or they try to get their lover to change, thinking that if
some small thing were different love would bloom again. They blame their
circumstances. They blame each other. They try anything to give meaning to
what has happened. But there is no meaning beyond the love itself, and until
they accept its own mysterious ways they live in a sea of misery.

You need to treat what love brings you with kindness. If you find yourself in
love with someone who does not love you, be gentle with yourself. There is
nothing wrong with you. Love just didn't choose to rest in the other person's
heart.

If you find someone else in love with you toward whom you feel no
love, feel honored that love came and called at your door, but gently refuse
the gift you cannot return. Don't take advantage and don't cause pain. How
you deal with love is how love will deal with you, and all our hearts feel the
same pains and joys, even if our lives and ways are very different.

If you fall
in love with another who falls in love with you, and then love chooses to
leave, do not try to reclaim it or to assess blame. Let it go. There is a reason
and there is a meaning. You will know it in time, but time itself will choose
the moment. Remember this and keep it in your heart -- you don't choose
love. Love chooses you.

All you can really do is accept it for all its mystery.
When it comes into your life. Feel the way it fills you to overflowing, then
reach out and give it away. Give it back to the person who brought it to you.
Give it to others who seem poor in spirit. Give it to the world around you in
any way you can. Love has its own time, its own season, and its own reasons
for coming and going.

You cannot bribe it, or coerce it, or reason it into
staying. If it chooses to leave, from your heart or from the heart of your
lover, there is nothing you can do and nothing you should do. Be glad that
it came to live for a moment in your life. If you keep your heart open,
it will surely come again.