When we love with expectation of return then we love in a restricted way.

We live in a way of thinking that contracts our own sense of completeness. It shadows the limitless capacity of love, into the possessive, the needy, the insecure.

It drives us into cycles of clinging and grasping always wanting more, so we can be satiated. 

Yet there is no satiation to grasping it simply produces more grasping. Tangled, confused and lost in the swirl of wanting we unknowingly bring the demise of our own relationships. 

So what can we do instead?

We can bring attention to our grasping, hurt persona. We can hold it in compassionate awareness, by bringing our breath to the hurt. We can be present and open to whatever arises. 

In this way gently invite this part of ourself to limitless love. Love that is neither attached to healing or pain. Love that is without expectation. When we bring this kind of love time and time again. The grasping self settles, releases and expands into infinite love. 

Then we can go and love another in this way.