Maybe You’ve Never Loved

A daring statement that changed my perception of love

When we feed and support our own happiness, we are nourishing our ability to love― Thích Nhất Hạnh

Once upon a time, there was a girl who was convinced that she knew what love was. She didn’t need it to be explained to her. She felt it — that intense desire, those butterflies in her stomach, the willingness for self-sacrifice, and the forevers that never seemed to last.

She enjoyed reading about love. Everything she read and every movie she watched seemed to validate her experiences. She thought about her family, her lovers, her friends — she loved them. She was sure — love is a feeling, somewhat magical, intense, mysterious, very often painful, and quite complex.

She knew that humans had been trying to define love since the beginning of times, and nobody ever got to a conclusion.

She looked for answers everywhere; philosophy books, poetry, novels, movies, and she was certain that love was what she felt.

The Older Woman

Then one day, an older woman came to her mother’s house. They were having a conversation about these topics. So the girl joined in and shared some of her experiences of love.

“I don’t know if anyone really loves me.” She said with a sad, fearful face like an abandoned puppy on a rainy day.

She told the older woman about her frustrations — how much her mother tried to control her, how much her father had been unfair to her when he left, how heartbroken she was when her boyfriend broke up with her, and how her friends were too selfish to listen to her stories.

The older woman listened patiently and, in the end, said only one sentence:

“Maybe you never loved.” The older woman smiled kindly and left.

It took the girl by surprise. From the other side of the table, her smile seemed so patronizing, sending the girl’s mind on a journey of defensive anger.

“How dare she say something like this? She doesn’t even know me. What does she know about love? Maybe she is the one who’s never loved.”

Little did the girl know that this was going to become one of her last tantrums.

To say that the older woman’s words had planted a seed in the girl’s mind is an understatement. Those words had gone straight into her subconscious like bullets, shattering her fragile ego and clearing the way for a whole new range of questions.

The Search

The girl searched high and low for ways to prove to herself that the woman was wrong.

Books, songs, and movies started to acquire a whole new meaning. Something much deeper than what she was able to see before.

She re-read some of her favorite passages from her favorite authors, and they told a different story. It was as if she had never read them before. As her anger slowly subsided, something extraordinary happened.

‘Maybe she was right! Maybe I never really loved before.’

Suddenly, there was no more space for questioning whether or not she was loved — she was too busy searching for this love inside herself. And from that moment on, the older woman’s bullets turned into a gift.

The Bullets Turned Into Gifts

The girl finally understood that if you’re feeling unloved, look inside, change yourself, and you will see love.

Everyone has the power to turn bullets into gifts.

It was obvious to the older woman that the girl was desperately trying to fill her missing pieces with love and attention from the people she loved. She sensed the girl’s lack of self-love.

The woman could have remained silent. But she didn’t. She offered the girl a gift in the shape of a bold statement and trusted the girl’s potential to explore the meaning of the words on her terms. It was an act of kindness.

The girl jumped to the conclusion that the woman was cold-hearted, a judgment based on how the woman made her feel, belittled, and unloved. By punishing herself with negative thoughts, the girl demonstrated her lack of self-compassion.

When the older woman smiled kindly, the girl took it as an insult. Her words were initially received as an assault until the girl had learned enough about love and to be able to appreciate the gift.

The words on the books that she was reading never changed. What changed was the girl’s perspective. She was no longer trying to reassure her self-harming delusions about love.

She started to use those books to prove to herself that she was capable of love, and in doing so, she learned the real meaning of the word Love.

The love you give, which is infinite, doesn’t cause pain.

Final Thoughts

Anxious and avoidant personalities would be the ones with the most fear, whereas the secure ones have less fear and healthier levels of self-love.

Moving from a fearful attachment style to a secure one is nothing more than expanding your capacity to love.

Learning how to love is an ongoing process. We study and study and die stupid, but it’s never late to start.

I promise. It’s worth it.

Thank you for reading.

If you are interested to know why I left my metropolitan life and moved to a small ski town in the Alps, you can read the following article.