What is the relation between love and kids || Acharya Prashant, with youth (2013)
Speaker : The first question asked in today’s session was, “Why do people have kids?” The second one, which is very funnily related was “What is love?” So my question to you is, “What is the relation between love and kids?”
Listener 1 : Kids are born out of love.
(Laughter)
Speaker : Mohit, what is the relation between love and kids?
Listener 2 (named Mohit) : Sir, I don’t find any relation.
Speaker : You did not find any relation, but the whole world finds the relation. The entire world finds the relation. “A Child is the outcome of our love,” that’s what they say.
What is the relation between love and kids? First of all, get this out of your mind that there is a relation. You know it is very easy to theoretically put this, that there is no relationship. But when you look at the relationship people have with their parents, then you realize that most of us actually think that there is a relation between love and procreation, between love and reproduction. There is no relation at all. Please!
Love is one thing, and having kids, procreation, is an entirely physical thing. Entirely physical. We have spoken about that a lot already. Love is a different matter altogether. They are as different as chalk and cheese. They are as different as brain and intelligence. We can say that it is the insecurity of the brain which urges to procreate.
Love is not an urge of the brain.
Now what is love?
Love is not an urge of the brain. Love is not your physical conditioning. Then what is love?
Alright. Write down so that we have something to start with.
Statement 1 : Love is my own state of mind in which I am very joyful. This joy has a nature of overflowing.
Statement 2 : This joy has the nature of overflowing. Its nature is to radiate, just as when the sun is bright, its radiation reaches others as well. So this love has the nature of overflowing, which means reaching others.
Statement 3 : “In all my relationships, this joy reaches to others,” this is called, ‘love’. “I am able to give joy to others,” this is love. So ‘love’ is the giving of ‘joy’. When can I give joy? Only when my own mind is joyful. Now do you know what love is? When the Sun radiates its brightness, does it say that my photons will reach such and such person, or such and such place, or does it radiate universally? When the Sun radiates brightness, is it selective or does it give to all?
Listeners : All.
Speaker : Hence we have written that it shows in all my relationships. Have you written that?
Listeners : Yes.
Speaker : That all is very important. The usage of the word ‘all’ implies that love cannot be object-specific just as the brightness of the Sun is not object-specific. What does object-specific mean? That it is reserved for one person: “My love is for you only.”
This love will show up in all my relationships and ‘all my relationships’ means it will show up the way I relate with my gadgets, it will show up in the way I relate with my pen, it will show up in the way I relate to my friends, family, society, including my lover, my girlfriend.
Listener 2 : Sir, so do you mean that there is no relation between love and kids?
Speaker : Well, obviously not. Do you see the way we know reproduction? We know it as an entirely physical thing. At the most it becomes a thing of thought and action for us. But rarely does it become an act of love, real love.
Listener 3 : Not ‘real’ love but it is an act of love.
Speaker : For us, love is that emotional drama, and most kids are coming out of that love.
(Pointing to statements 1, 2, 3) Do you think kids come out of this love?
For us, love is just sentimentality, that possessiveness, right? Valentine’s Day, and gifts, right? Late night phone messages…
Listener 4 : Sir, but a person becomes possessive only when he loves something.
Speaker : Oh no! Please! Good that it has come up. What is your name?
Listener 5 : Nikhil.
Speaker : Nikhil says a person becomes possessive only when he loves somebody or something. (Pointing at his mobile phone) I am extremely possessive about this.
Listener 5 : You love your phone. And if I break it you will feel bad.
Speaker : Why am I possessive about it ? Because so much of my work gets done on it. The day I get a better gadget, would I still be possessive about it? The day it breaks down, would I still be possessive about it? In fact, possessiveness means that if I am possessive about a person I will never let him go. I will be dependent upon him. Even if he wants to go, I won’t let him go. So my will, my desire will always be more important to me than his will. Possessiveness is cruelty. Possessiveness is dependency. How can it be love?
Listener 3 : Do you mean that possessiveness is wrong?
Speaker : I do not know whether it is ‘right’ or ‘wrong’. All I say is that it is cruel and inhuman. Now you decide whether being cruel is wrong. If I am possessive of a loved one and the loved one wants to go in this particular direction, would I allow him to? Now whose interest am I seeking: mine or his?
Listeners: Mine
Speaker : Mine. This is selfish, self-centered, egoistic behavior of the worst kind. That is what possessiveness is, and a really independent man can never be possessive. You become possessive only when you are dependent upon somebody, because that somebody fulfills some of your need. Please understand! Only a slave wants to possess. A really free man doesn’t want to possess.
Why do I need to possess? Because my needs are fulfilled by this gadget or by this person. So I want to possess it. Yes! Are we one on this?
Listeners : Yes, Sir.
