A woman once asked Kali,
"Why don't the people I love
love me back?"

Kali asked her:
"Do you want to know why they don't
love you back or why you keep loving
where you are not met?"

The woman fell silent.
She had loved deeply.
She had stayed.
She had forgiven.
She had understood.

She had given people the kind of love
she herself was starving for.
She loved unconditionally.

Kali asked:
"When they showed you
they could not meet you,
why did you call it a challenge?
When they withdrew,
why did you pursue?
When they gave you crumbs,
why did you pick them up?"

The woman whispered:
"Because I believed
if I love them enough,
they would eventually see my worth."

Kali replied:
"Then you are not loving them.
You were negociating
for the love you wanted.
Love is not a ritual you perform
until someone finally chooses you.

You cannot pour enough of yourself
into another person
to manufacture their capacity to love you back."

The woman bursted in tears:
"Then what should I do
with all this love?"

Kali took her hand in hers and said:
"Imagine you knitted a blanket
for someone you loved.
You chose every thread.
You picked their favourite colour yarn.
You gave it your warmth.

And when you finally gave it to them,
they refused it. What will you do?"

The woman replied,
"I would take it back."

Kali smiled.
"Would you throw it away
because they did not want it?"
The woman shook her head.

"Would you stand outside their door
begging them to take it?"
The woman said, "No."

Kali looked at her:
"Then why do you do this with your love?"

The woman became silent.
Kali smiled, "When someone does not
receive your love,
why do you decide that the love was
worthless or that you were worthless?"

The woman looked at Kali.
"But Maa, I wanted them to love me back."
Kali laughed:
"Why do you make others
the source of something
that was already moving through you?"

The woman had no answer.

Kali said:
"You keep searching for love
in the one you love.
Perhaps you have forgotten
to recognise that you are the source
and yet you seek it outside.

You no longer need
everyone to receive your love.
You no longer need
everyone to return it.
And you certainly don't need
to keep offering it
where it is abused."

The woman became still.
She had spent years asking:
"Why don't they love me back?"

But Kali had placed another question
in front of her.
One she had never dared to ask:
"Why do I abandon myself
when I am not loved?"

Kali does not tell you how to be loveable.
She shows you where you're abandoning
yourself to stay validated in the name of love.

That is where Awakening begins.

@shaktirise