Love is a Rose

       Linda Ronstadt made that song famous back in the seventies:
 "Love is a rose, but you better not pick it. It only grows when it's on the vine. A hand full of thorns and you know you've missed it. You lose your love when you say the word MINE."
       I would hear her sing and to me it meant that you can't own another's love and force them to be the kind of person you want them to be. A handful of thorns - a lot of pain and sorrow happens when you try to make someone into who you want.
      When you declare something as mine is impossible and in fact when you attempt to claim ownership of love is when you actually lose what you were enjoying. I could have been a little more laconic and said -  Love can only be enjoyed in the moment. Now that gets right to the heart of the matter, but makes up a poor song. In fact, just like the Rose you really can't own anything. Some Buddhist's in their attempt to find the path to enlightenment is by renouncing all of their worldly goods and become beggars. This is a typical sight in India, where you will see some of the old ones live on the street and beg for food. The Buddha teaches non-attachment. Now I do not profess to be a scholar of Buddhism, but I can't help but think that maybe the followers have gone too far on this, just like so many other religions and beliefs. Let's substitute the "World for Love." ... you lose your world when you say the word MINE. Maybe the Buddha meant that since you can only live in this one moment and this moment only, then you can't own anything. How can you? Every moment is changing. The moment you are living in right now, is gone and by the time you read these words you are living in another moment and another and then another. You can only enjoy your time here, and since time is continuously in motion you can't own anything you declared in the past to be of the same value in the present. If you own something in the present then you must own it in the future, but you can't own anything in the future because it hasn't arrived. Once you try to take ownership then your moment (the only thing you can really have) is spent trying to protect what you have declared as MINE. Then you spend your moment worrying about owning your thing in the unknown and uncontrollable future. This where stress, worry and negative feelings are born. Out of the desire to own. Now I can't imagine those homeless elders in India being very happy sleeping on the streets and begging for food, which is just as bad as owning because they are NOT owning. It's just the opposite side of the coin. Owning and NOT owning is not where the problem arises when it comes to joy and happiness. It is in the enjoying of each moment the things around you. You can enjoy driving that new car you just purchased from the dealership, but the moment you start owning it is when you worry about getting into a car crash or losing you job and the bank takes it away from you, or it breaks down and it costs you even more money to fix then you expected. Let's say you buy the car and don't own it, because you say to yourself, I can't really own anything except my happiness and joy. If I wreck my car, then it happens, but I am not going to let the fear of an impending unknown ruin my time enjoying driving my new car today. Sure I could lose my job and if I do and I can't make the payments then I'll give the car back to the bank so the bank can give it to someone else. At least I enjoyed it for a few moments in my life and maybe when I get back on my feet again, I'll get another one.
      Enjoy the car and let the future take care of itself. I will end with this extra verse to Love is a Rose (disclaimer - I write books, not songs) so here goes:
 "Love, friendship, home, kids, health, money, clothes, and food is a Rose and you better not horde them you can only enjoy them a moment in time. They all disappear when you try to hold on to them, you lose them all when you say the word MINE."

Nameste'

Barry Brown, Author and National Speaker
"A Journey to Balance - Making Sense of It All."