What's LOVE got to do with it?

It’s Valentines Day

Some see this as a cheap commercial gimmick, designed to commercialise the raw emotion that is love.

Others see it as an excuse to shop in shops they would never visit, for presents they would not normally buy and openly express their emotions to pay homage to their ‘love’.

Around the world, flowers will be bought, chocolates given and cards exchanged. Cash registers will ring with the sound of dollars and businesses will sell “Love”.

Like it or hate it - it is a date that inspires positive emotions and expressions of sentiments often not spoken. It’s about red hearts and bleeding hearts.

St Valentine let’s not forget was a martyr - as legend has it, to love.

Love……often an overused word - bandied about freely and with abandon. Too freely for my mind....

I am glad Facebook and other social media selected ‘like’ as their positive affirmation. “Love" would have been just too passionate - too personal.

Recently Mitsubishi had an entire ad campaign around the song with lyrics “I don’t care, I love it”!

Even the software companies got on board with a big campaign of “Love your work”.

And I still often sign off my phone calls with “Love your work”.

But what is love ?

and can you love more than 1 thing in your life?

  I love my family

  I love my dog

  I love my work.

  I love LOTS of things and lots of people - some obvious and some private and deeply personal that I just won't share.

I love - freely and passionately - I wear my heart on my sleeve - that's what love is - free willing pure emotion.

My relationship with my work is often like a relationship - at times I am giddy with love, all silly and happy and giggly like a school girl, other times I am in awe, proud of its achievements and keen to spend quality time with it.

Other times I feel the sting of our first fight - the way we don’t talk anymore and just co exist until one of us breaks the silence and we start over.

Sometimes I have to treat my work like a first date, a new meeting, where I have to step back and act like I have never heard the same story before. Smile and be supportive to it’s demands even when the times are really tough and I really don't feel the love.

Confucious says “ Choose a job you love and you will never have to work a day in your life “

Unfortunately most of us have to kiss a few frogs before we find that magical prince - we all start out in jobs and careers that perhaps we thought would be our passion - until we finally find our niche.

Can you love your work and also have room for the other 'loves' of your life ?

I firmly believe that you can - if you set boundaries, clearly communicate the limits and devote the time to your passions and loves - they can all have a space in your life. It's ensuring that you dedicate the time to your 'loves' that counts. It's making sure you follow your passions and don't make them 'work'.

Moreover what I have realised that what I like about love is the surprise

The mystery - the not knowing - will I make it - can I do it ? Then the elation when I achieve that goal.

I guess I am lucky that I stumbled into doing something I love.

It’s like the secret Valentine - it’s the mystery of being thought of, the wondering of who it is and why they picked you. It’s about feeling the love. Raw and real.

So on a day when there is all this outpouring of emotion about in the world - all the flowers being sent and secret valentines cards…….

• do you love what you do ?

I do.