The Four Elements of Love

Buddha taught that to experience true love, you have the qualities of:
• Loving-kindness,
• compassion,
• joy, and
• inclusiveness (equanimity).

Applied on a daily basis, these principles cause romance to blossom.

LOVING-KINDNESS -First, let’s deal with what true love is and isn’t:
If you’re making the other person cry every other day, that isn’t love at all.
This is because true love should generate joy- not pain. And that starts with making serious efforts to understand how to meet your significant other’s needs…whether or not it’s easy.

COMPASSION
Secondly, compassion is an important element of love and he emphasizes that in order for love to grow, one must practice compassion, which in turn, will also grow.
One compassionate word, action, or thought can reduce another person’s suffering and bring them joy.

JOY
Thirdly, true love has the ability to make someone suffer less. There is an art to suffering and once you grasp it, you’ll suffer less and less. Being in the moment is truly joyous!
Better still, if you help your partner suffer less, then that’s half the battle won.

EQUANIMITY
The fourth element of true love is upeksha, which means equanimity, nonattachment, nondiscrimination, even- mindedness, or letting go. Upa means “over,” and iksha means “to look.” You climb the mountain to be able to look over the whole situation, not bound by one side or the other.
If your love has attachment, discrimination, prejudice, or clinging, it’s not true love.
As long as we see ourselves as the one who loves and the other as the one who is loved, as long as we value ourselves more than others or see ourselves as different from others, we do not have true equanimity.
We have to put ourselves “into the other person’s skin” and become one with him if we want to understand and truly love him. When that happens, there is no “self’ and no “other.”
Simple yet so practical, isn’t it?

#getting married; #Wedding; #Celebrant in St Marys; #Nepean Celebrant; #Wedding; #Naming Ceremony; #Celebrant; #Wedding Celebrant;  #Celebrant St Clair; #Civil Celebrant; #Funeral Celebrant; #Family Celebrant