Thomas Merton Quotes

If I love you, what business is it of yours?

If I find the person that I love, it is because I love them, not because I will be dependent on them.

Yes, love is free; it can dwell in no other atmosphere.

Part of love is letting a person be who they want to be.

Don't walk in front of me, I may not follow. Don't walk behind me, I may not lead. There is only one happiness in life, to love and be loved.

There are different definitions of love, and one of the most wonderful definitions of love is to allow somebody to be.

But let there be spaces in your togetherness and let the winds of the heavens dance between you. Love one another but make not a bond of love: let it rather be a moving sea between the shores of your souls.

No one worth possessing can be quite possessed.

I have rules for a lot of areas of my life. Love is not going to be one of them.

I like my life alone. I mean, I love being with friends, and I love kissing and loving someone to pieces. But it's hard to find someone who doesn't ultimately start judging you and your choices.

Love is so much better when you're not married.

Free love? As if love is anything but free!

There are no rules when it comes to love.

Never say never, I find I get claustrophobic in a relationship.

Love is generally confused with dependence; but in point of fact, you can love only in proportion to your capacity for independence.

You've never been in love," she said. "You don't understand." "If being in love means giving up your freedom, not to mention your opportunities," Caitlin said, "Then I haven't missed anything.

It is not the nature of love to force a relationship, but it is the nature of love to open the way.

One of the most important of life´s lessons is to learn independance, to understand freedom. This means independence from attachments, from results, from opinions, and from expectations. Breaking attachments leads to freedom, but breaking attachments does not mean abandoning a loving and meaningful relationship, a relationship that nourrishes your soul. It means ending dependency on any person or thing. Love is never a dependency.

Love is the child of freedom, never that of domination.

No human being, even the most passionately loved and passionately loving, is ever in our possession.

Love is the revelation of the other person's freedom.

If you love someone, set them free.

I love being lost! I don't need to control anything. Even with romantic partnerships, I don't need to control anyone. I think I have some very meaningful relationships with people, we all do. At the same time, I recognize that everyone is following their own heart; there's been people who have left my life and I don't have a problem with that.

Love, and love as deeply as possible. And if love itself becomes the marriage, that is another thing, altogether different. If love itself becomes such an intimacy that it is unbreakable, that is another thing, that is not a legal sanction. Legal sanctions are needed only because you are afraid. You know that your love is not enough; you need the legal support for it. You know perfectly well that you can escape or the woman can escape, hence you need the policeman to keep you together. But this is ugly, to need a policeman to keep you together. That's what marriage is!

There are no rules that can bind you when you find your other half.