LOVE: What life is all about

Am citit cartea aceasta acum o sută de mii de ani, dar n-am apucat să-i fac o recenziuță și pe blog, însă iacătă-mă. Mi-a plăcut mult și nu mi-a plăcut un pic, o să vedeți mai jos de ce:) Am citit-o în engleză*

Titlu: Love – What life is all about
Autor: Leo Buscaglia, autor american, de origini italiene

Despre ce e vorba: Trebuie să știți că această carte nu este o carte de acțiune, nu e un roman de dragoste. Este teoria dragostei, dacă vreți să-i spunem așa, explicată pe exemple și noțiuni semi-abstracte. Leo Buscaglia a fost profesor în California, și a dezvoltat el însuși un curs despre dragoste. Cartea de față este o însumare a crezurilor și experimentelor sale.

Opinie personală: Nu știu de ce m-am gândit, când am cumpărat cartea, că o să citesc despre iubirea de cupluri și oai, ”un curs despre dragoste”, asta trebuie să fie interesant. :)) A fost interesant, însă nu cum mă așteptam, chiar mai bine, pentru că vorbește despre mult mai mult decât atât.

Mi-a plăcut să descopăr lucruri pe care poate le intuiam sau erau undeva în capul meu, dar nu știam cum să le exprim – poate. Ziceam mai sus că e și o parte mai puțin drăguță – am avut deseori impresia, citind capitolele, că se repetă unele lucruri doar ca să se adune numărul de pagini … și nu îmi place asta. Dar am încercat să trec peste acest aspect și să-mi scot ideile principale. Le aveți mai jos, așa câte puțin, și chiar vă provoc să le citiți. O să vă provoace mintea un pic, la rândul lor 🙂

Și într-adevăr, life is all about love și, aș adăuga, the lack of it. Mai ales the lack of it. 😉

Citate:

”I have a very strong feeling that the opposite of love is not hate – it’s apathy. It’s not giving a damn. If somebody hates me, they must „feel” something about me or they couldn’t possibly hate. Therefore, there’s some way in which I can get to them. If you don’t like the scene you’re in, if you’re unhappy, if you’re lonely, if you don’t feel that things are happening, change your scene. Paint a new backdrop. Surround yourself with new actors. Write a new play. And if it’s not a good play, get the hell off the stage and write another one. There are millions of plays – as many as there are people.”

„I don’t know how many of you have ever seen the play Our Town but one of its most poginant scenes is when little Emily dies, and she goes into the graveyard, and the gods tell her that she can come back to life for one day. She chooses to go back and relive her twelfth birthday. She comes down the stairs in her birthday dress (…). And Mama is so busy making a cake for her that she doesn’t look up to see her. Papa comes in, and he is so busy with his books and his papers and making his money, that he walks right by, doesn’t even see her.(…) She says ‘Please, somebody, look at me.’ (…) But nobody does, and she turns to the gods, if you remember, and her line is something like ‘Take me away. I forgot how difficult it was to be a human being. Nobody looks at anybody anymore.'”

„It would be a miracle if we could let people know what was right rather than always pointing out what is wrong.”

„Then ask yourself and yourself alone one question. It is this: Does this path have a heart? All paths are the same. They lead nowhere. They are paths going through the brush or into the brush or under the brush. Does this path have a heart is the only question. If it does, then the path is good. If it doesn’t, it is of no use. If your path is love, the goal is unimportant, the process will have heart.”

„You can only be ‘real’ on your path. The hardest thing in the world is to be something you’re not. By straying from yourself you must get closer and closer to what you are. (…) Find „you”, who you are, be as you are. (…) You won’t be playing games anymore. Clear them all away and say „Here’s me. Take me for what I am with all my frailties, all my stupidity, and so on. And if you can’t, leave me be.”

„Most of us continue to behave though love is not learned but lies dormant in each human being and simply awaits some mystical age of awareness to emerge in full bloom. Many wait for this age forever.”

„Love is now! It is only in the „now” that love is reality. Love has meaning only as it is experienced in the now. If one is looking at a flower, he is one with the flower; if one is reading, he is totally absorbed; (…) Love can only be given, expressed freely. It can’t be captured or held, for it’s neither there to tie nor to hold. It’s in everyone and everything in varying degrees and awaits actualization. It’s not apart from the self. Love and the self are one.”

„In fact, man may be the only living creature with sufficient will and intelligence to choose happiness. How sad that he so often chooses despair. An optimist is seen as a fool. A lover is seen as a helpless romantic. Man gets the feeling that if he’s joyful, he is certain to be punished for it tomorrow.”

„We tend to suspect man of evil more readily than of good. The evil about him makes the news media, the good seldom does. Considering the world’s population, there are relatively few murders, robberies, rapes or major crimes. But when a crime does occur, we are certain to hear it. Not simply because it’s news, but rather because it sells newspapers. But, in reality, the greater number of men are like ourselves. They do not voluntarily hurt another human being. They can usually be trusted, are concerned and are friendly. (…) To discern only the evil in the world and live willingly in its shadow, is to set up another obstacle to love.”

„To be open to love, to trust and believe in love, to be hopeful in love and live in love, you need the greatest strength. This condition is so seldom experienced in real life that people don’t know how to cope with it, even when they discover it. They crucify a Jesus, shoot a Gandhi, behead a Thomas More and poison a Socrates. Society has little place for honesty, tenderness, goodness or concern. These get in the ”way of the world”. (..) It’s as if they cannot handle perfection, as if it causes them to reflect upon themselves, to move them to change, the thought of which is perhaps too uncomfortable and painful.”