Certainly some attachments are healthy—
our attachments to family and friends,
to community and customs and charity—
those are appropriate attachments, right?
Let’s consider that question from a different angle.
Replace the word “attachments” with “clinging.”
That small change exposes the flaw in “healthy” attachments.
“Certainly some clinging is healthy, right?”
Nope. Be it possessions or people or pride,
clinging is not healthy.
Every attachment is a tether that restricts our freedom,
a governor that constricts our ability to love.
We can’t live right now if we’re fastened to the future,
and we can’t love fully when we’re confined by attachment.
We’ve been told, by pop music and poetry,
that to need someone is to love them.
But that was a lie.
That’s not love—it’s clinging.
We experience the full spectrum of love only when we let go.
Let go of the attachment, not the person.
Without the clinging, all that remains is love.
