Book Notes — Tuesdays with Morrie

An old man, a young man, and life’s greatest lessons

The most important thing in life is to learn how to give out love, and to let it come in. Let it come in. We think we don’t deserve love, we think if we let it in we’ll become too soft. But a wise man named Levine said it right. He said, ‘Love is the only rational act.

Most of us all walk around as if we’re sleepwalking. We really don’t experience the world fully, because we’re half-asleep, doing things we automatically think we have to do. We are too involved in materialistic things, and they don’t satisfy us. The loving relationships we have, the universe around us, we take these things for granted/

The fact is, there is no foundation, no secure ground, upon which people may stand today if it isn’t the family. If you don’t have the support and love and caring and concern that you get from a family, you don’t have much at all. Love is so supremely important.

Without love, we are birds with broken wings 🕊

If you want the experience of having complete responsibility for another human being, and to learn how to love and bond in the deepest way, then you should have children.

Don’t cling to things, because everything is impermanent. But detachment doesn’t mean you don’t let the experience penetrate you. On the contrary, you let it penetrate you fully. That’s how you are able to leave it. Take any emotion-love for a woman, or grief for a loved one. If you hold back on the emotions-if you don’t allow yourself to go all the way through them-you can never get to being detached, you’re too busy being afraid. You’re afraid of the pain, you’re afraid of the grief. You’re afraid of the vulnerability that loving entails

For loneliness: you let go, let the tears flow, feel it completely-but eventually be able to say, “All right, that was my moment with loneliness. I’m not afraid of feeling lonely, but now I’m going to put that loneliness aside and know that there are other emotions in the world

If you’ve found meaning in your life, you don’t want to go back. You want to go forward. You want to see more, do more.

You have to find what’s good and true and beautiful in your life as it is now. Looking back makes you competitive. And, age is not a competitive issue.

“You know what really gives you satisfaction?” What? “Offering others what you have to give.”

The status will get you nowhere. Only an open heart will allow you to float equally between everyone.

Each night, when I go to sleep, I die. And the next morning, when I wake up, I am reborn.

“I believe in being fully present,” Morrie said. “That means you should be with the person you’re with. When I’m talking to you now, Mitch, I try to keep focused only on what is going on between us. I am not thinking about something we said last week. I am not thinking of what’s coming up this Friday. I am not thinking about doing another Koppel show, or about what medications I’m taking”

Few rules about love and marriage: If you don’t respect the other person, you’re gonna have a lot of trouble. If you don’t know how to compromise, you’re gonna have a lot of trouble. If you can’t talk openly about what goes on between you, you’re gonna have a lot of trouble. And if you don’t have a common set of values in life, you’re gonna have a lot of trouble. Your values must be alike

You have to work at creating your own culture.

We need to forgive ourselves for all the things we didn’t do. All the things we should have done. You can’t get stuck on the regrets of what should have happened.

Death ends a life, not a relationship.

In business, people negotiate to win. They negotiate to get what they want. Love is different. Love is when you are as concerned about someone else’s situation as you are about your own.

Originally published at https://www.harshdarji.com on April 5, 2021.