Image of love

This is also imaginary (yes, I know, as my teacher says: Anything can happen in your imagination and sometimes... we need a reality check. So I am aware of that, working on it...).

"What is your intention for the practice period?" he asked the group.

She heard her answer inside her head but struggled to speak it out, to share.
She squirmed, started to speak, twice.

"Love," she finally blurted.

"Could you say that again?" he asked.

She dropped her shoulders in defeat.

"You're so mean...." she said playfully. "You're going to make me say it again!"

"No," he answered plainly. "I actually couldn't hear what you said."

"Oh," she said, and looked down.


"Love," she repeated, and hung her head in shame.


"Why do you say it like that?" he asked. "What's wrong with love?"


"You're not supposed to have it," she explained, looking to him to refute her.
"It leaves you," she looked down.
"It's frivolous," she explained.

"Ah," he said. "Anything else?" he asked.

"That's all," she said in sadness, seeing that this was her image of love.

"Well then," he said. "There's your practice intention."
And then he paused.
"Love?" he asked. "Or to love?"

"To love," she replied, immediately frightened by what she had just uttered, the public vow of it, the certainty of support to do it, the inevitability of her approaching it: choosing to love.