Being able to love is an ability. But no one ever tells using that allowing ourselves to be loved is also an ability. Love is not a given. It can be lost. It can be forgotten. But, if we’re lucky, we might, in some magical moment, recover love.
Author Chou Mu-Tzu describes many life paths in this book. Some twist and turn. Some are so faint they can scarcely be seen. Some unfold in ways that defy logic. But, just as all rivers return to the sea, all of these paths can be traced back to our need for intimacy, and our willingness to assume the burdens of intimacy.
Whether we speak of intimacy or love, both imply a kind of fatalism. Both have their source in our family of origin. With a kind of genetic logic, we replicate this inheritance, shaping it to the words that are fashionable at the time. Perhaps we call it an avoidant attachment style. Perhaps we use one of the countless phrases coined by gurus and spiritual teachers, calling it “the power of attraction,” or “the cosmic ordering service”, packaging it with a confectionary sweetness. In the end, however, it all comes back to the same thing: you weren’t loved well in childhood, and, as a result, you don’t know what real intimacy is.
Because this pierces the core of the inner emptiness and deficiency we hold so close, we struggle even more to draw close to one another, to depend on each other, hoping to receive a tiny piece of the life’s warmth.