Because if you only love those who love you, what kind of love is that, and what would that make you as a person?
Handling diverse students challenged my capacity to extend love and empathy to everyone. As a newbie teacher, I resorted to "loving" and "having favouritism" to my students who were brilliant (top of the class brilliant) and participative in class and those who seem to be interested in my subject. I used to treat the "rest of the class who seem to not care and never bother to participate" a bit colder and with less empathy, thinking that they do not deserve my energy because they were also not giving me or my subject any attention, so basically I am just returning them the favour.
It was so foolish to ever think that way: that we only choose to love certain people because it's easy to do so and hate the "difficult people" because, well, they seem to not care at all whether we love them or not so why bother.
Isn't the premise of love supposed to be selfless and with no bounds? How come we have boxed "love" into "selfish and selective"? Is this the future generation that's going to take care of this nurturing Earth? Will we be hypocrites? Will love only be experienced in poems, songs, novels, books, movies and rarely in real life when it's supposed to actually be genuinely experienced?
We have been reduced by consumerism that we are on auto-pilot "by use basis". When something is useful, we buy them, that's how we purchase, right? It's as if we have "subconsciously" adapted this in the way we interact with people, too. When people seem "good", or at least we think so, and they are useful to us, we tend to "love" them. These good people deserve love, after all. But when people seem difficult, annoying and out-of-control, and we "think" we do not need them, we immediately turn on the auto-pilot of non-love towards these considered "difficult people" and quickly dismiss them. What's the use of loving these difficult ones when we can not get anything out of them in return?
But just in case you forget, at times, most often than not, we ourselves are "difficult people", too. We are. We rarely see it of course because of our "confirmation bias" tendencies. This is why we need love because love transforms us and makes us become a magnet of love, too, and then we can soften, and little by little, with consistent sunshine and rain, we can grow into full selves capable of authentic, unfiltered love.
Once upon a time, all of us, have been actual products of love as we have been conceived and born because of such powerful force. What kind of generation will we be when we reduce this powerful force into something as"cheap" as on a utility basis? You and I, we, need to examine ourselves and ask difficult questions, or else our generation will perish without honour.
Have we been loving to all kinds of people, especially the "difficult people" who seem to be unable to love us back, no matter how hard it may be?
Have we opened our hearts to people and fostered acceptance, love, empathy and kindness, regardless of whether we think they deserve it or not?
It is easier said than done-- we have read and heard this a gazillion times already. Yes, it is difficult to rewire our hearts and minds, especially when we are so used to the "auto-pilot setup". But it doesn't mean that it's impossible. We have to keep trying.
We always say we want a better future and bright hope for our generation but we have to do more than FB-ing, IG-ing and Tweeting. We have to "do". You do not need an audience to do good, by the way. Forget what social media has told you about "photo or it did not happen ideology" because the unpublished acts of love and kindness will never ever go to waste, even when we think no one has seen we are "doing good things".
We have to try.
We have to try to love difficult people no matter how hard it is and how "very far from our routine" it may be. Rise up to the challenge and love people--without conditions and prejudices.
We have to try to understand all the people around us because we know that all of us just really want to be understood. We have to try to accept and embrace all kinds of people from all walks of life.
We have to try to be the "bigger person" whenever circumstances or conflicts arise, and still love them anyway because we know how it is like to be unloved and we do not want others to experience it.
We have to try to be better-loving humans, because look at the animals around us, they seem to be better than us when it comes to loving and trusting others. Humans, please, we do not need a Math formula to love people, so it does not have to be complicated.
I know we are so much more than "just a generation who do not try to love difficult people". We can go beyond that and prove to the Milky Way Galaxy that "hey this is how people on Earth love each other: giving, nurturing, accepting, healing, comforting, this tender love is empathetic and kind". Let all other galaxies be jealous of how we do it, humans of the Earth.
To you who's reading this, I want to encourage you by saying: I love you, the way I know how to love. And you are loved, truly, you are, you are born on Earth (it could've been Mars but nah) because of love and Someone loves you so much so that you are here, and your heart is beating--you are alive. You are alive because love keeps you alive, let that be made clear.
You are loved and I hope that you can extend this amazing ball of abundant love to everyone--difficult people or otherwise. The challenge is to rise up and love, accept and understand difficult people in our lives. May the love force be with you. 💕
‘Til the next post, hivers! Remember that you are loved beyond borders and beyond time & space. Okay? Okay. 💛❤️
Ciao for now! 🤗🥰
This original article is written by Jong, the blogger behind writetowander.com. All photos are hers, photographs she took from one crazily beautiful sunset moment somewhere on this beautiful planet.
Hive-llo, everyone! Welcome to Jong's little buzz-y corner in Hive. Jong believes that every person she meets can teach her a thing or two (or three, or more) about life. She shares her love for life here-- the captivating beauty of life! To be more specific, but not necessarily in this order, she's interested in: wisdom, love, poetry, single life, books, travel, health&fitness, fashion, gratitude, unspoken hurts, heartbreaks and healing. Lastly, she loves Jesus.
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