True love is when someone becomes more important to you than yourself. It is eternal. Love does not rise, it only falls, and that’s likely why we have the English expression “falling in love”, which is so significant. There cannot be any exchange in true love. It isn’t about loving somebody in exchange for something in return, or for a mutually beneficial scheme. With true love, you are ready to lose something of yourself for the sake of love. Unfortunately, love in general, is understood as just a transaction.

Normally, we enter into a relationship under the so-called framework of our comfort and profitability, and to confirm this, we say ‘I love you’. There are emotional, financial, psychological, physical or social needs. And this so-called love has become a sort of mantra. Of course, there would be some experience of love in a relationship, but that would be with certain limitations and is bound to fall apart, since these are relationships of convenience, expectations and conditions. The moment you have conditional love, it doesn’t amount to true love. Love cannot be between two human beings only. One cannot say ‘I have to fall in love’. It happens and when it does, it comes from within. If you can look at everything lovingly, the whole world becomes beautiful in your experience. You realise love is not something that you do, love is the way you are.

The ancient Greeks called love the madness of deities. Modern psychologists define it as a strong desire for an emotional union with another person. But what, actually, is love? It means so many different things to different people. Songwriters have described it as “whenever you’re near, I hear a symphony.” English playwright William Shakespeare said: “Love is blind and lovers cannot see.” Greek Philosopher Aristotle said: “Love is composed of a single soul inhabiting two bodies.” True love doesn’t have a happy ending, because true love never ends.

- The reader is chartered accountant, based in Dubai.