LOVE, especially during this Covid-19
Gimme a break. A break from politics. A break from the sports world. And this is no less an eye-opener even for me. Accidentally, I stumbled across this very recent movie preview screaming on us ‘GIVE ALL THE LOVE ALL YOU CAN GIVE’. Although the movie revolves around a quadriplegic, I did draw a parallelism with the covid-19 global pandemic we’re stuck with, for more than six months now. If this is our rude awakening, so be it as long as we ‘GIVE ALL THE LOVE ALL YOU CAN GIVE'.
Like a sword of Damocles hanging over us [and until when, only God knows], I thought this ‘GIVE ALL THE LOVE ALL YOU CAN GIVE’ message resonates across us especially during this pandemic. With unexpected fatalities littered across the world, how many spine-tingling stories have we heard or read with regard fatalities of of this brutal covid-19 virus. Sordid stories wherein the dying loved one was by himself/herself with no family members at the bedside the days and weeks before the last breath just went kaput.
Taking a leaf from the multifarious messages of Pope Francis during this global pandemic, the very crux of his messages kept harping on the need for us to DO IT ALL, GIVE IT ALL, POUR IT ALL, SHOW IT ALL to our loved ones. The long and short of it is this: why love our loved ones if your outpouring of your love is less than 100% ? What justifies you to love less and keep that remaining reservoir of love in the dustbins of the unknown ?
The revered Saint Mother Theresa was quote “It’s not about how much you do, but how much love you put into what you do that counts”. Does this quote hit our nerves ? Absolutely because it strikes the very chords of the typical selfish human that is us. What Mother Theresa presses here is that in our manifestation of our love to our loved ones, it has to be genuine enough where sincerity is beyond doubt.
Whereas this quote should make us feel guilty: ‘When you give and don’t expect anything back, that’s LOVE. But if you give and expect a return, it’s an investment’. But interjecting an ‘investment’ mindset in our relationship with our loved ones is the worst insult we can ever spew out.
Theodore Dreiser, the great American novelist, was quoted as follows: ‘Love is the only thing you can really give in all this world. When you give love, you give everything. Anything less than that taints and blemishes your intentions. But does our loved ones deserve that, really?
