Life is unpredictable. Sometimes when you think you have it figured out, you are smacked in the face by something that came out of nowhere. Like the pain it inflicts, it also jolts your perspective of life. Suddenly a different outlook of life is made visible. What it did was, it just threw all else out of the priority list, replaced by a new prescribed importance. So is Love. A lot of time, it comes as it pleases. We are not the one who get to choose when and with whom we share it with.
Love has been a mystery for millennia. From the first lovebirds of our great ancestors, Adam and Hawa (Eve), to the current times of you and me. We fall in love in mysterious ways. From love at first sight to emotional and even intellectual attraction, to growing in love over a distant time, souls somehow connect. Out of millions or billions of people, there are souls that connect and disconnects. From immediate attractions to those that grows on you. In contrast there those that have immediate disgust or repulse at another.
Love often feels like the emotional core of life – whether it’s romantic, platonic or even self-love. Love can come at you when you least expected it. The attraction that transcends reasoning. The longing and missing of ones lover. The timing of meeting the love of your life, can be sometimes unexpected. Love gives Life meaning, depth, and a lot of times chaos. Love can also be overwhelming, fragile and consuming. The highest of high and the lowest of low.
The Beautiful Sadness that Love brings.
Where do I even begin to describe what love is. It is a complicated topic. Some pour their heart and soul unto others as an expression of love. Selfless and ever willing to sacrifice for the benefit of the other. Whilst others centered on their self love as a basis. Neither are right nor wrong. What ties the bonds of humans with one another? Is it the outward attraction or inner personality that translate into love?
Love alone without Life is just an idea. Where life without love can feel empty. Adam had it all at his whims in Paradise, yet he still require a lovelife to share and navigate through.
We cautioned, “O Adam! Live with your wife in Paradise and eat as freely as you please, but do not approach this tree, or else you will be wrongdoers.” (2:35)
Life, in a way, is the canvas – full of experiences, struggles, beauty and mystery.
That leads to the important question, do love and life correlate? Or can it be seen as a parallel timeline. Or perhaps something else need to tie the two elements together?
The world has become so distant from religion that when religion is mentioned, it is mostly frowned upon. Religion, for many, offers a framework for understanding both Life and Love. Both Life and Love would require a compass to steer it into the right direction. A compass guiding us to whats moral and sacred and even how to treat our love outlook and life hurdles. It gives a sense of purpose to life and comfort to the uncertainty of love.
Religion nurtures Love,
Love gives Life Beauty,
Life provides the Journey to attain both.Love sometimes can challange Religion rules,
Religion can restrict Life’s freedom,
And Life can shake our belief in both.
All three elements are intertwined and not just connected, but interdependant.
Religion is required to be put in its place as the epicenter of those elements. Then Love become more than an emotion that’s dictated by desire or mere lust. Rather, it will become a devotion, an act rooted in purpose. And Life, rather than being just a series of events or motion, becomes a journey with direction, values and goal-driven purpose.
Its like Religion becomes the root, grounding that transcends time, while Life and Love grows and benefits from it – branching outwards, reaching and enriching others, always rooted and connected to a firm root.
Idris Mahzan
2025
THE PONDERER 