Purified Love

In the plane, heading to Hong Kong. Thought of parting soon with the children, who are continuing on to their final destination back home, while Prad and I are staying over in Hong Kong for a few days. With the sweetness of motherly love, comes the worries and the 'what ifs'. Daughter is talking about driving to friend's New Year's Eve party up in the hills. Fearful mind immediately brings up catastrophic image of drunk driver hitting her car in the middle of the night. Wise mind intervenes:

Although we think of affection as something positive, it has attachment in it . . . That attachment creates hate, not towards the people we are attached to, but towards the idea that they might be lost. There is fear and we can only fear what we hate. Therefore the purity of love is lost. The attachment makes it impure and thus less satisfying. No total fulfillment can be found. This is what happens within the family. That is why there is always unsatisfactoriness in that kind of love. (from Being Nobody, Going Nowhere, by Ayya Khema)

Sitting in 17D. Thoughts, all gone. Only heart, filled with love. And steady noise from the airplane. Transient moment, soon met with fear, again . . .