| My 17-year-old self: | Falling in love is a wondrous adventure & path to discovery. |
| My 70-year-old self: | There's no need to fall in love to discover anything. In fact, love is a form of blindness preventing clear sight. If you really want to discover something, be a neutral observer – Emotion reduces our capacity to discriminate. |
| My 17-year-old self speaking: | Each chance for love should be accepted since people become richer though love. |
| My 70-year-old self responding: | Most people conflate "love" with "passion." Moreover, romantic relations involve a lot of time, energy, and responsibility. Since your resources are limited, it's wiser to complete the relations you already have rather than invite any new dramas. |
| The voice of my 17-year-old self: | When you love others, you show them who you really are. |
| The voice of my 70-year-old self: | Frankly speaking, people do not want to see who you are – They're merely interested in what you can do for them. Often the best way to help others is to be invisible: Get out of the way to allow others to learn their core lessons. |
| My 17-year-old self chattering: | Physical intimacy is a blissful, tender expression of love. |
| My 70-year-old self retorting: | Love and sex have a tenuous connection. It's possible to experience deep love without sex. It is also to possible experience physical intimacy without any love. A more important question is energy focus: Is it better to hanker after sensual longings or to cultivate contentment? |
| An echo of my teen age self: | There is a perfect "soulmate" waiting for you. |
| An echo of a much older self: | No humans are perfect. Through hard work over time, your partner can become "perfect enough" for you. In fact, accepting imperfections is a valuable life lesson. |
| my adolescent self: | Spontaneity is a virtue. Desire should be neither invited nor spurned, but accepted as a natural process whenever it arises. |
| An ancient semblance of a self: | Restraint is a virtue. Most desires are never satisfied, merely temporarily sated. Attending to old desires is not only exhausting, but boring as well. If you can't learn anything new from old patterns, why continue them? Do people grow by clinging to the past, or by exploring new fields? |
| Cindy: | No doubt as we age, our perspectives on love change. |
| Don: | What is I notice is that multiple perspectives coexist in myself. The voices of different selves often differ, and seldom there is a single clear message. I can hear a cacophony of messages vibrating throughout my skull. |
| Bai-Luo: | Soon enough, the skull you currently occupy will become empty space. Perhaps then there will be silence. |