The power of love

Our Kintsugi founder on the power of love, the importance of embracing it fully and the healing potential within it

There are only four questions of value in life, wrote Lord Byron: What is sacred? Of what is the spirit made? What is worth living for? And what is worth dying for? The answer to each is the same: only Love.

Love is a powerful force. Historical and spiritual teachings have long extolled its power to heal, comfort and transform. From Christianity to Buddhism and Hinduism, many faiths and cultures have emphasised the importance of cultivating love within ourselves and in our relationships with others.

Love has the power to bridge divisions between people. In an increasingly divided world, love can help us create healthy connections and build understanding. Recently, we’ve seen movements of peace and unity grow out of acts of love and compassion, such as the muslim men embracing love movements, which seeks to promote harmony between people of different backgrounds.

Love has the potential to bring out the best in us. In challenging times, it can act as a source of strength and help us to stay hopeful. We see this in the Black Lives Matter protests: despite the hardships and injustice faced by so many, the protests have been powered by a message of love, leading to many positive changes.

Love can even foster physical, psychological and emotional healing. Many studies have shown that being surrounded and supported by loved ones can help us cope with physical and mental health issues. In addition, expressions of love – hugs, words of affirmation, and gestures of kindness – can have an immediate calming effect on our bodies and minds.

The Sufi poet Rumi is one of the most beloved voices in Islamic literature, and he was known for his works emphasising the power of love. In his poetry, Rumi urges us to open up and embrace love, reminding us that we can only find divine truth when we accept love into our hearts.

Rumi described love as a burning flame, capable of consuming all obstacles in its path; this speaks to the immense power of love to help us overcome our fears and reach greater heights. Through his work, Rumi showed us how to find joy and liberation in love.

Finally, love can help us access spiritual fulfilment. As we open ourselves up to love, we can find ourselves tapping into divine energies and grace. We find peace, joy and liberation on a spiritual level, allowing us to live more conscious, purposeful lives.

However busy our lives get, we must always remember that love is the highest form of energy. It vibrates at such a high frequency that it can have a powerful and positive effect on our lives. When we open ourselves up to love, we tap into its healing power, which helps us to be more focused, energised and motivated. By embracing love, we can discover the true power of its healing potential and lead happier and more fulfilling lives.

WHAT IS LOVE?

From family ties and friendship to passion and philanthropy, Annabel Harrison explores ancient variations of the word ‘love’

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Love’ is a weighty word, with huge emotional, physical and psychological breadth. As lexicographer Susie Dent points out, we don’t have a truly apt synonym for it, but the ancient Greeks had several, and understood love in a nuanced way.

In his work Symposium, Greek philosopher Plato used the image of a ladder to describe various stages of love: starting with physical attraction and moving up to the highest form – which was, for him, spiritual and intellectual.

The Greek word for romantic or sexual love, eros, came from the name of the mischievous and unpredictable son of Aphrodite, goddess of love, beauty and desire. It was seen as a powerful force that could drive people to both great and terrible actions, and lives on in words we use today such as ‘erotic’ and ‘erogenous’. And it enticed millions to cinemas for compelling, often heart-rending depictions, such as The Notebook and Titanic.

Eros, says classical historian and author Mary Beard, was considered ‘the most dangerous and intense form of love, often involving a sense of madness or obsession’. In contrast, ‘Philia was valued as a cornerstone of Greek society, a deep friendship between individuals based on shared values and experiences.’ This affectionate, virtuous form –developed by philosopher and polymath Aristotle in his work on ethics – was considered by Plato to be even greater than eros; hence the concept of platonic love that endures today. Tolkien brought to life one of literature’s best known examples of this form in The Lord of the Rings: Frodo and Sam are bonded by mutual admiration, respect and a shared sense of loyalty.

The same text by Aristotle identifies philautia: a positive interpretation of self-love. Today, self-love is a somewhat loaded phrase: seen on the one hand as an appreciation of one’s worth, and denoting proper regard for, and attention to, one’s own happiness or wellbeing; but seen on the other as an inflated love of, or pride in, oneself.

But to the ancient Greeks, philautia was a necessary component of a virtuous life and essential for a wellrounded person, providing balance between vanity and self-deprecation. They did agree that philautia is a double-edged sword: too much could be harmful, characterised by vanity and embodied by the myth of the beautiful and self-obsessed Narcissus, from whom we get the word ‘narcissist’.

Agape was a more spiritual type of love, Beard explains, ‘characterised by selflessness and a devotion to a higher cause.’ In ancient Greece, it was associated with the divine and seen as the highest form of love. The teachings of Siddhartha Gautama –The Buddha, who is said to have died before Plato was born – also emphasised the importance of compassion and selfless love, which have the power to transform individuals and societies. Mother Teresa is an example of agape in action, as is Malala Yousafzai, who advocates for education and the rights of women and girls, despite the danger she faces for doing so. We can practice agape through selfless acts of kindness, such as volunteering, donating to charity, or being there for someone in need.

That ‘someone’ might be a family member or close friend. The Greeks defined this love as storge, although the word does not appear often in literature. A source of comfort and security, storge is nurturing and unconditional; a love that is innate and unbreakable, like the bond between a parent and child. It is an essential part of strong, healthy families and communities, as illustrated by six series of the TV hit This Is Us. That followed multiple generations of a family, illustrating the enduring, instinctive and complex bonds that connect parents, children, siblings and relatives.

We remain as captivated by the power of love as the ancient Greeks were. Our cultural landscape reflects that, just as theirs did. ‘All You Need Is Love’ sang The Beatles: five simple syllables echoed ever since by millions all over the world.