Q: Some people say that love for ordinary people is a wasting feeling, some people say that it is some kind of sacrifice. What do you think exactly it is?

Sh: Love is love. You cannot give any other name to it. It is not a sacrifice. It is not anything else. It is purely love. But then another point, people often mistake lust and possessiveness for the feeling of love. Very rarely a person is fortunate enough to experience what love is. It’s a rare phenomenon and I am sure the person who is actually experiencing the real love is very near to God. I have absolutely no doubt about it.

Q: But what are marks of real love?

Sh: You will be very happy if you are in love and no matter that you may not be feeling lust also. You may not be feeling possessing that particular person also because love is beyond that. When being a human so many different emotions will come but love will remain supreme.

Q: So if a person is happy…

Sh: Only then it is love.

Q: And if a person is unhappy about something?

Sh: That means there is no feeling. There might be a feeling of love but feeling of possession is more. So when that loved person is acting in a different manner you feel unhappy.

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If you love somebody don’t always keep him like this. He will run away after some time. I don’t think they always understand the real feeling or real emotion about love. They want to possess the object of love and from there the suffering begins. If you love somebody you should be happy in his or her happiness — not want to possess him or her all the time or to change his or her life because you love him or her. When the feeling of possession comes, the suffering also begins. Love I think is a very refine and subtle thing. If you can realize love you have already realized God. There is not much difference — this is what Indians believe.

They want to possess when they are taking, mistaking attraction for love. There is difference. Attraction is one thing and falling in love is another. And this misunderstanding brings suffering.

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Yet it is given by nature because only by possessing the person you may be able to save him — by carrying forward his genetic record, by giving him a child. But family is a social phenomena and love is I think beyond society or social phenomena or family.

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And genuine love is a very rare thing to find in this world.

Q: Do love of a woman to a man or а mother to a child or of a student to his or her guru have the same nature, or these are different sorts of love?

Sh: I would rather say these are different expressions of love. Love is a very big term and it is being expressed in different ways. And I have heard that love is God and it could be true also.

It is I think a very natural expectation: if you love somebody he should love you back. But if you are truly in love then you will feel happiness in the happiness of the person who you love and you may not like to possess that person.

***

Love is beyond all logics. When you love somebody there is no logic behind it. You just love. I will tell you another thing also: love is absolutely an individual feeling. A person, he or she, may bring out that emotion inside you, so you begin to like that person, but the love is coming from inside your heart. It is your own feeling. That reaction came because of somebody — so we begin to like that person. And love basically is between man and woman.

Q: What is the difference between love between a man and a woman and between love between a disciple and a guru?

Sh: Between a disciple and a guru it’s much more deeper. But that is a different sort of love — this is spiritual love which is much more deeper already. I am happy for that because it is not everyday a person is loved. Most of the people are out to mock him or to criticize him.