The Everyday Human

May: On Love

May 10

Today's reflection was inspired by a quote from Shakespeare's Hamlet.

Hamlet writes to Ophelia, declaring an unshakable love, and then his actions betray both those words and her. Did he mean the words he wrote—if only for a time? Was the love true, then, even if it didn’t last? That’s the harder question. But don’t be afraid to ask it. A love untested might be no love at all. 

Now, that said, listen to these words: Do not compare your love to others. You cannot measure your heart against someone else’s failure. You may doubt the stars, the sun and even truth itself. But if you hold the love in your heart as sacred and steady, if you feel it in your soul and know it to be real—what reason would you ever have to doubt it?

• Reflection title: To Doubt or Not To Doubt
• Creative inspiration: William Shakespeare, Hamlet
• Reflection Question: Do I measure my heart by someone else’s story? Do I let doubt take root where certainty once grew? Do I know the love I carry to be real? 

May: On Love

May 9

Today's reflection was inspired by a quote from Oscar Wilde's play An Ideal Husband.

It’s so important to love yourself. 

As the cliche goes, you can’t love someone else before you love yourself—and it’s true. It starts with the society within you—your soul. And it’s a lifelong romance . . . the most complex and fragile relationship you might ever have. It’s something, if nurtured, that deepens over time, just like any relationship—romantic or not—and each stage brings a new level of understanding and affection. It’s so important. I don’t think I can say it enough. 

If you take one single thing from this book (or podcast), take this: care for yourself, take care of yourself, love yourself. 

It all starts there. 

• Reflection title: Take Yourself Out on a Date, Seriously
• Creative inspiration: Oscar Wilde, An Ideal Husband
• Reflection Question: Do I give myself the same care, respect, and attention that I reserve for others? Where could I strengthen my relationship with myself? And where am I taking myself out on a date—seriously—and when?

May: On Love

May 8

Today's reflection was inspired by a quote from Carl Sagan's novel Contact.

Love—is it a mystical force of the cosmos? 

I deny that it is and claim rather that it is a deeply human one grounded in action and presence and in choice. One that transmutes our insignificance in the expanse into greatness. It is the only answer to the question and it is the only thing that can anchor us in the endless vastness of the stars and human consciousness. 

Some may say love is a construct. Maybe that’s true. Maybe it’s not. But if it is, it is our most honest invention, and our greatest gift back to the universe.

• Reflection title: Our Most Honest Invention
• Creative inspiration: Carl Sagan, Contact
• Reflection Question: Have I been listening? Do I understand yet what the universe (indifferent or not) is teaching me about love?

May: On Love

May 7

Today's reflection was inspired by a quote from the 1998 masterpiece of a video game Xenogears.

We can imagine that God had a choice when creating humans: create us perfectly, or make us flawed. And God chose, very obviously, to make us flawed. If we were perfect, then we would not help each other—perhaps even, we would not love each other. 

Would we even have a need for something like love?

And so in order to fly, and as we are imperfect, and as we each have only one wing, we are dependent on one another.

There’s a somber beauty in this idea. Who we are with others lies at the core of our being—the essence of what it means to be human. To exist in isolation, well that would make us something else entirely.

• Reflection title: The Two Great Angels
• Creative inspiration: Xenogears
• Reflection Question: Who do I rely on to fly? And who relies on me?

May: On Love

May 6

Today's reflection was inspired by a quote from the book The Book Thief by Markus Zusak. 

The fact that someone loves you so much that your mere presence is all they need to feel whole, protected, and loved in return is a remarkable and beautiful thing. 

It’s not always possible, of course. Other obligations call, you need your own time to be yourself, but know that when they need it most . . . that’s when it matters most. 

Those are the moments of fragility that you will be the glue holding it all together. Might that be a bit of pressure? Sure. But that comes with the territory of love. Stay now, while you can. Because one day, your time will be up, and you’ll no longer be able to.

• Reflection title: Stay
• Creative inspiration: Markus Zusak, The Book Thief
• Reflection Question: Who do I need to stay for? And who do I need to stay for me?

May: On Love

May 5

Today's reflection was inspired by the poem "Music, When Soft Voices Die (To–)" by Percy Bysshe Shelley.

It can be beautiful to hear a song you only listened to with your mother long after she is gone. It can be painful to smell the perfume or deodorant of your partner after they’ve left to live their life with another. It can be surreal to touch the wooden handle of your grandfather’s hammer and be transported back in time to his woodshop.

And . . . it can be comforting to know that those loved ones you have lost, in whatever way the world has taken them from you, live on in your memories—memories hidden in a chest that only secret keys of the senses can unlock.

• Reflection title: The Key to the Chest
• Creative inspiration: Percy Bysshe Shelley, "Music, When Soft Voices Die (To--)
• Reflection Question: What slumbering love do I hold in my heart? Has anything stirred it awake recently? What do these feelings evoke in me? 

May: On Love

May 4

Today's reflection was inspired by the poem "Hyla Brook" by Robert Frost.

There is a type of love out there. A love that love does not and will not tolerate ideals of perfection or expectations of permanence. No, instead it exists and thrives in the fleeting moments and in our flaws. This love’s roots grow deeper as the bearers age and are wind-stricken and suffer storms and are changed by time in the ways that only time can change us.

This is the love that exists solely for you to love others for who they are—nothing more, nothing less. When the brook is rushing and babbling in spring and the frogs are splashing, and when it is dried and empty in the heat of summer, carpeted with dead leaves. 

Through it all and always.

• Reflection title: For What They Are
• Creative inspiration: Robert Frost, "Hyla Brook"
• Reflection Question: Do I hold ideals of perfection or expectations of permanence for those I love? Or do I love them for who they are?

May: On Love

May 3

Today's reflection was inspired by the poem "Love Walked Alone" by Stephen Crane.

One cannot be stronger than the other. The stronger love grows, the stronger heart’s pain grows right alongside her—waiting, always waiting. The reason is simple as to why it’s so difficult for some to love—it is because the risk for suffering is so great. 

But the ultimate question you must ask yourself is this: is love worth the risk of the heart’s pain that comes with it?

• Reflection title: An Inevitable Companion
• Creative inspiration: Stephen Crane, "Love Walked Alone"
• Reflection Question: I cannot have one without the other—so am I accepting of both love and heart’s pain? Is the risk worth it to me?

May: On Love

May 2

Today's reflection was inspired by a quote from Antoine de Saint-Exupéry's The Little Prince.

There is so much—too much—emphasis on the wrong stuff. On what it means to live a good life. On what it means to be successful. Too many people have suffered from the belief—instilled in them from a young age by parents, peers, television, or now social media—that money and shiny objects and status equal happiness. And there does not seem to be an end in sight, so indeed, it bears repeating.

Start by looking inward and teaching yourself through questioning: What is essential to me? What, at the end of my life, will be my regrets? What essential, immaterial things in my life like love and friendship have become eroded by the quest for the material? And once you have your answers, it will be time to do something about it. Never forget what matters most—the love in the air between partners, between parent and child, between friends, between you and our life-giving planet, the Earth. Never take for granted the time you have, and learn to use it wisely. Work to live, do not live to work. Keep your eyes shut and your heart open, because next thing you know, you’ll look up and it’ll be time to say goodbye to the fox.

• Reflection title: It Bears Repeating
• Creative inspiration: Antoine de Saint-Exupéry, The Little Prince
• Reflection Question: What is essential to me? What, at the end of my life, will be my regrets? What essential immaterial things in my life like love and friendship have become eroded by the quest for the material?

May: On Love

May 1

April, the month On Nature, is over, and May, the month On Love, is upon us.

Today's reflection was inspired by a quote from Paulo Coelho's novel The Alchemist.

Loving someone or something—to truly love them unconditionally and selflessly demands that you change and improve. Always. Your mind, body, and soul. It is to give away parts of yourself to them in the hopes that they may benefit, grow, and thrive. To truly love someone means to offer them your best self. Nothing short of it will do. And so you work toward this goal, all the while knowing it is unreachable—that the best version of yourself is each rung on an endless ladder. And with every step up you take, you are becoming better, you are loving better, and you are making the world around you better.

• Reflection title: The Endless Ladder
• Creative inspiration: Paulo Coelho, The Alchemist
• Reflection Question: How am I working to become better than I am for those that I love?