“True love is like ghosts, which everyone talks about and few have seen.” —Francois de La Rochefoucauld
We go around looking for true love, hoping and wishing to find that ONE person who will make our imperfect life perfect. We fool ourselves into thinking that true love can only come from outside of us but rarely from within ourselves.
True love can only be found by love. It goes where love is. And the more love you hold in your heart and the more love you have for yourself, the more love you will be able to attract upon yourself.
Love cannot and will not go to those who have an empty heart. True love comes from within. It starts with you. It comes to you abundantly when there is an abundance of it in your heart. It flows through you and it ends with you.
“Seek not outside yourself, for all your pain comes simply from a futile search for what you want, insisting where it must be found.” — A Course in Miracles
This being said, here are 6 things you should know about true love:
1. Self-love is the best way to attract true love.
Love yourself with all your heart, for who you are and for who you are not. Be good to yourself and the whole world will be good to you also. If you don’t have love for yourself, you can’t expect to get it from someone else. And even if you get it, it will only be for a little while. It won’t last too long. It doesn’t work that way. Love comes in abundance to those who have it in abundance in their hearts.
“Find the love you seek, by first finding the love within yourself. Learn to rest in that place within you that is your true home.” —Sri Sri Ravi Shankar
2. True love is not about finding your completeness in another.
You are already whole and complete and the more you learn to love and accept yourself the more you will know this to be true. You really don’t need another person to complete you, you only need someone with whom you can share your completeness. True love is not about finding your completeness in another person but rather about sharing your completeness with them fully in order to grow and expand more and more each day.
3. The love of your life is YOU.
Why look outside yourself for something that is already within you? True love starts with you. The love of your life is nobody else but you. Within you lies all the love that you need and desire. In you, not outside of you. The love you will receive from outside of yourself will be nothing but a projection of the love that is present within you.
“Life is just a mirror, and what you see out there, you must first see inside of you.” —Wally Amos
4. True love doesn’t need to be fought over.
You often hear people say, “If you really love somebody, you have to fight for that person.” I really don’t think so. If you need to “fight” for someone’s love it means it ain’t worth having. It ain’t the real thing. It ain’t love. “To fight” and “to love” are two opposite things and you can only have one without the other. You can’t have them both.
“Love is patient, love is kind. It does not envy, it does not boast, it is not proud. It does not dishonor others, it is not self-seeking, it is not easily angered, it keeps no record of wrongs. Love does not delight in evil but rejoices with the truth. It always protects, always trusts, always hopes, always perseveres.” —1 Corinthians 13:4-7
5. True love is effortless.
True love feels easy. It flows and everything comes naturally. Where there is true love, there is no need for control, no need for fixing the other person, no need for criticism, judgment, jealousy, blame or any other toxic behaviors. Love is love and that’s all there is to it.
“True love does not come by finding the perfect person, but by learning to see an imperfect person perfectly.” —Jason Jordan
6. True love is free from bondage.
Love needs to do what love knows best, to love and be loved. Love imposes no demands. Love has no interest in holding on to something or someone. Where there is love there is no clinging and no bondage, and where there is bondage there is no love. These two cannot coexist.
“If our love is only a will to possess, it is not love.” —Thích Nhất Hạnh
By Luminita D. Saviuc for ThoughtCatalog