What is love?

Chow: What is love?

Old man: I do not know.

Chow: Does it exist in duality?

Old man: You're finally learning something. Yes. Love is a concept, and a concept being a concept requires it to exist in duality. Every form of teaching deals in concepts and thus every form of teaching must be false. Love exist in duality and thus it is unreal.

Chow: What is the mirror reflection of love?

Old man: Hate.

Chow: Love and hate are one?

Old man: Correct.

Chow: What about the love demonstrated by the Gaotama or Jesus?

Old man: That is not love. They are merely doing what they must according to cosmic necessity. There is much difference between a Gaotama and a Boddhidarma to the naked eye but they are both enlightened beings. They were simply doing what they must by not identifying themselves with the false ego. To the eyes of an unenlightened person, Gaotama's actions can be interpreted as "loving" while Boddhidharma's "unloving" but every form of evaluation is false. It is not love that you saw, it is something more. Not something that a word could describe.

Chow: So are you saying that they can't love?

Old man: How could they? In order to love, they must hate as well. Love is dependent upon hate. Just like good and evil - evil is defined by good and vice versa. Love is defined by hate as well, they are essentially one. There are no words to describe what the enlightened beings experience.

Chow: So are you saying all form of loving is wrong?

Old man: As long as you could not detach yourself from the "I", every form of loving or even hating will exist in duality thus making it unreal. I do not use the word "right" or "wrong" because these two are also mirror reflections of each other and thus could not be used to describe anything. The term "real" and "unreal" bears more meaning whereby the former pertains to the ultimate truth and the latter a reality misapprehended. And one's ultimate goal is to be able to acquire wisdom in which will allow one to see things "as they are in reality" instead of looking at mirror reflections, thus reducing one's world to nothing but an illusion.

Chow: So are you saying that I should stop loving?

Old man: How could you? As long you're not enlightened, you are bound to love thus hate, and you are also bound to hate thus love. It is your ego to love and hate. To discipline the ego is to fight a never ending battle. It will be like trying to "unfish" a fish, or to "unbird" a bird. The ego can only be dissolved by realizing its not there. And until you come to that realization, there is nothing you can do to stop loving and/or hating.

Chow: So what should I do?

Old man: Nothing.

Chow: So are you saying that I should love and hate until the end of time?

Old man: By doing nothing you are allowing yourself to be aware. Only in a state of awareness can you learn to observe. And only by being more observant can you see the truth. The more you try to stop yourself from hating, the more you deviate from the truth. No discipline is required here. Just do absolutely nothing and let things be.

Chow: So if I love?

Old man: Then love with every beat of your heart.

Chow: Won't that generate hate?

Old man: Then hate with every beat of your heart as well.

Chow: Won't that make me suffer?

Old man: Its either you look, look at once and become enlightened... or you make friends with misery and let it be your teacher. There is nothing else you can do.