I once read a story about ‘Love and Time’ that stuck with me forever. It was deeply meaningful, almost like a fable. Now, the story was simple and wasn't exactly how I am narrating it. It was about how only the time realizes the value of love. 

The one I am telling you is different, and hopefully, you will find it deeply meaningful. 

So here it goes ...

Once upon a time, on a beautiful island, lived all the emotions. Respect, Joy, Hope, Sadness, Fear, Ager, Hatred and the best of all, the Love.

Obviously there were two groups of friends, positive emotions- Joy, Respect, Hope and negative emotions Fear, Anger and Hatred. 

And then there was Love. Love was friend to them all. It was unconditional, unbound, giving without expecting anything in return. Even the negative emotions enjoyed the soothing calmness of Love.

As the time went by, the nature of Respect to respect itself generated an emotion of Pride. The Pride was dandy, it roamed around with self-confidence. With all the admiration, Pride felt it was the most important emotion on the island. It’s the overpowering nature of self-centered Pride that generated the Ego. 

Ego was introvert, self serving and self-centered. While Pride stayed with the group of positive emotions, Ego on the other hand, grew stronger in the company of negative emotions. 

But you see,  Respect, Pride and Ego were just one emotion. Self Respect in abundance created Pride and in turn pride created Ego. Every time other emotions admired the Respect, it transformed into Pride. 

The nature of Love is unconditional and as it gave more to pride, it’d transform into Ego. Only one of the Respect, Pride and Ego existed at a time. 

On one fateful day, a powerful tsunami approached the island. Fear sensed it from miles away and announce it to everybody. 

It was a worthy situation for the group of negative emotions, Fear, Sadness and Hatred to became very active. They quickly readied the only ship island had and jumped on it. The dire situation turned Joy and Hope into Sadness and Despair. They too, jumped on the ship. 

The Respect on the other hand was not ready to join the others. It took time while Love desperately waited for it.

“We must go now before it’s too late,” Love said.

As Love continued to convince the Respect, all that attention, all those requests transformed Respect into Pride. 

“I think I don’t have to leave the island, I can run to the higher hills and survive the tsunami. I don't need you, just leave me alone.” Pride said.

As the Pride started running towards the hills, Love continued to follow it. 

“Please, come with me, the ship is leaving. You know I will not leave you alone.”

It was just the nature of Pride. Empowered by all the importance from Love, self-centered Pride could not help itself but quickly transform into Ego.

Ego kept on walking ignoring the plea of Love. 

Meanwhile the ship left. 

Ego kept ignoring Love and ran alone towards the higher place. Love followed requesting it to turn back but the Ego ignored it and ran faster.

Finally, the wave of tsunami hit the island. In a moment, it swept away Love with it. 

When Ego realized Love has vanished, it stopped. Having no one left around, Ego ceased to exists and transformed back into the Pride. The helplessness and loneliness turned it back into Respect.

Just when the respect though that it had survived, it realized the truth. The truth that Respect is merely an expression of Love, that it cannot exist without Love. Without Love, there is no Respect.

On that day, both Love and Respect died. 

We are all islands. Our Pride dwells between the blurred boundaries of Ego and Love.