Buddha Quotes

Bonus Chapter: On Love

In Buddhism, there are four elements of true love. This love pertains to all kinds of love, whether love to oneself, to your parents, or even to your spouse and children.

1. Metta - friendliness, loving-kindness

2. Karuna - compassion

3. Mudita - joy, appreciation of good qualities of other people

4. Upekkha - equanimity

It is okay to love yourself and others, but it doesn't mean that you have to be attached to them, or else you will be blind. For instance, a parent loves his child so much and he is attached to his son. But his son did something harmful or bad, and the parent pretends that it didn't happen, or "my child couldn't do that". He doesn't want to "punish" his son or teach him a lesson, but we could see that he is attached and ignorant. I know someone who tolerates her partner's bad actions, and she pretends that he is doing only good things.

Like in my previous chapter, the highest act of kindness is to lead people to their best path without being attached to them. True love is everywhere and it doesn't not happen only once in every century. If you hate another person, you hate a part of yourself. You must also forgive those who hurt you, for they too are suffering, and they do not know how to heal themselves. Love is freedom and wisdom. It leads people to the best path in life, because it sees the truth.

A friend of mine said that the highest love is the mental love and not the astral love. Astral love is based purely on emotions and it leads the person to the comfortable path. Mental love is not attached to anyone and it leads the person to the best path in life to become the greatest version of himself. Love should teach you how to become a better person.

Now, if you are having trouble loving yourself, know your weaknesses and strengths. Through this, you will know what makes you feel weak, or sad, or jealous. True love is born from understanding, but most importantly, love must follow the universal laws, and the golden rule, which is, do no harm.

There are meditations that could help you cultivate virtues, love, understanding etc but I think I have to make another book about that. Message me if you are interested. I will make a book about different kinds of meditations, if you are only interested.