We Can't Buy Love.

It's not something I am going through breakup or anything related, it's just I felt like writing, while I was looking towards the sky.

You talk about love?

Then write a breakup letter to someone who has loved you most, like really deeply, write it on a sheet of 24-karat gold or even on a diamond, or any valuable things you can look for. But when they read it, they might still feel as though their whole world is collapsing, like they don't exist anymore, now that person is in a state where it's just their emotions and feelings of something immense. Although we already know Gold has immense value. But what can gold possibly compensate for when the thing being lost is love? Can it really be a substitute for getting the same reciprocation when it comes to love ?

Imagine being the person receiving that letter.

You gave someone your affection, your trust, your time, your vulnerability, your space, your emotions, You built your hopes around them. Probably you imagined a future with them, how are you going to share the same home together, go on tour, maybe museum, art gallery, Library, reading book together? It's not like they were objectively the most valuable person in the world, they were just the ordinary person you loved, it's your perception that made them a great person, a great mind and great heart.

And then they hand you a sheet of pure gold and say:

“I don't love you.”

What are you supposed to do with the gold?

You can sell it. You can become richer. You can make your life more comfortable. You might even appreciate the gesture someday, Isn't it invaluable at least from a materialistic perspective? Maybe you could buy something you always dreamt of ?

But none of that answers what you were actually losing, no right ?

I don't think you were asking, “How much am I worth? ” your question was just that “Do you love me?”, if the answer is no, no amount of money can turn that no into a yes, I said no amount.

Perhaps that's what makes love so strange, and mystical, despite knowing the practical benefits of it's substitute we don't and we can't choose something else in exchange, despite being aware that it would lead to a better future ? Apparently? Something can have enormous objective value and still be incapable of comforting us when it has nothing to do with what we actually desire.It cannot compensate for the particular thing that was lost, and that's love, that's a human connection. maybe that is why heartbreak can feel so disproportionate from the outside. Someone else might look at you and think, “You still have everything. You're young. You'll find someone else. Nothing material has been taken from you, you will be okay soon in the future, everything is going to be fine”, everyone knows that it will be fine, you will be fine, time heals right ?

But the person grieving isn't necessarily mourning a material loss, that's what makes love beyond the material possession, something which exists within ourselves but can't be replaced, touched or treated as objects.They're mourning a particular person, to a particular bond, and a future that existed in their imagination. perhaps that's why even the most precious gold can feel almost meaningless in the hands of someone who would have traded all of it just to hear:

“I love you too.”

Which that person never heard back.

“We know our fellowman, and yet we do not know him, because we are not a thing, and our fellowman is not a thing.”

— Erich Fromm, The Art of Loving