1. What if you’re never really in love with anyone?

“You’re never in love with anyone. You’re only in love with your prejudiced and hopeful idea of that person. [...] Isn’t that how you fall out of love? Your idea changes, doesn’t it?”
- Anthony De Mello

Started reading this book my dad passed to me recently (even though I’m supposed to be jampacked busy with other things right now)  This Jesuit priest actually just turned my “people are concepts that are a part of you” idea and turned it into something entirely negative.

2. Here’s a nice valentine’s day experiment: pose the question – “Would you want me to love you at the cost of my happiness?”

This de Mello guy goes on:

“Wouldn’t that be wonderful? She would love me at the cost of her happiness and I would love her at the cost of my happiness, and so you’ve got two unhappy people, but long live love.”

And this is a priest writing about spirituality. Hardly the feel-good message of a mega-church that tries to pander to its customer to increase its market share of Sunday church-goers.

3. Given how I foresee being busy to the point that I’m almost living two (or rather 2.5) lives, I was toying with the idea of the future of relationships for working professionals:

That we have two independent individuals who are busy as a dog, seeing each other only once in a long while. This may actually be a good thing for two reasons. First, it maintains the much needed autonomy that a busy working individual has – given the little time that he or she has. Second, and counter-intuitively, lesser quantity may mean greater quality. From a practical viewpoint, think of it as being Efficient.

Interesting, I wonder how this experiment will turn out. Sounds like not a bad idea — it probably caters to the needs of a few.

In practice, it’s probably going to be quite hard to find someone equally busy and non-needy.