Valentine’s Day – Distinctive to Cupid’s Love?

With the new year merriments receding by the month-end, the upsurge of celebratory spirit resurrects with the valentine vibes around the corner. A consistent presence of ever-evolving traditions all over the world through centuries to commemorate and celebrate love on 14th February, otherwise known as Valentine’s Day, the day is conjured up with a mixed bag of emotions from being most loved to becoming most hated. With varied origin stories proposed over time and an invariably uniform interpretation of its representation, is the essence of the celebration more distinctive to cupid’s love or does it have a broader prospect?

Surrounded with the mysteries of its historical significance and cascading through various versions that of being celebrated as the feast day of St. Valentine, or commemorating the anniversary of Valentine’s death, or the European belief of the day marking the ‘beginning of birds’ mating season’; the day has one element that has been consistent and one that has a definite association with love and affection.  In modern times, valentine’s day is recognized as a day to celebrate love, and exchange gifts, flowers, and chocolates with loved ones.

‘Valentine’s day and its symbolism depicted with the Roman God of love and his bow and arrow’, does this contribute to the general assumption that the day is dedicated to romantic couples having been given the privilege to celebrate love freely in the public domain? Regardless of what the original intent of the day was, valentine’s day today has transcended from the sober and sacrificial love and become more of a holiday spirit around romantic love. A day when social media is flooded with love quotes, there are grand gestures of love, exchange of flamboyant gifts, fancy dinners, comparing of celebrations with others, love matching expeditions, and mustering of courage to propose love through cards, candies, and chocolates. The innocence of the day fading over time and being replaced by commercialization and generating mass profits for capitalist industries.

Bombarded with the images of ‘happy couples’ flaunting at supermarkets, magazine covers, media, and everywhere, reminding the mainstream masses to feel even more alone and wonder whether they are supposed to be in a relationship! Isn’t the celebration meant to allow people to focus on family, friends, loved ones, and caring for themselves as much as the hullabaloo about cupid’s love? Beyond the materialistic portrayal, we need to develop our perception towards cherishing the worth in every bond that we share as human beings and finding our own way and comfort in celebrating it.

Love is an ethereal experience that includes understanding, care, support, gratitude, and much more than just romance. And that insinuates in a sense of self-love as much as it is imbibed in loving and caring for others. Whether you are married, in a relationship, seeking out love, or you are single; whether you believe in celebrating love on this day or choose to be a non-participant of the vibe prevalent all over, just make this day filled with joy and fun as much as you would on any other day. Acknowledge a selfless, generous, and unconditional feeling that surpasses the measurement of love through materialistic scales. Show love to your loved ones whether they are parents, siblings, partners, children, or anyone you care about.

Love is all around and deriving happiness from this divine feeling is not restrictive to our relationship status. ‘Lack of a significant other does not indicate lack of love in one’s life’. While enjoying the moments of romantic relationships is important, identifying, acknowledging, and celebrating the emotion of this pious feeling everywhere is equally momentous. While there is no need for validating one’s bond with another through commercial means of forceful celebration on a particular day, rejoicing the joy of love on a specific day may be significant in taking some time off from the usual and reflecting upon how much we care about someone, be it, anyone.

Despite the anticipation of the day being symbolized with passion and enthusiasm by some people, or regarded as the dreaded irritation from another lot, the day continues to carry the charm around it and a medium to express love, care, affection, and positivity amongst people across the globe. Let’s rejoice in the spirit and celebrate the joy of extending warmth, love, affection, kindness, and care with near and dear ones, family, friends, pets, and the sentiment that we share as human beings with our kinds and every other species that we share space with on this beautiful planet.

About the columnist-

An HR-turned-Author, Jyoti Jha is an MBA by qualification and has been associated with corporates like Infosys and Whirlpool in the past. After almost a decade of globe-trotting, she pursued her compelling passion of expressing through words and embarked upon the journey of exploring the field of literature.

An esteemed winner of ‘The Times of India Write India Season 3’, she has authored the books, ‘The Realms of Human Emotions’, ‘Around The World Through My Lens’, and ‘Aanandi’. A Literary Critic, Columnist, and a Lyricist, she has been proud panelist and Guest Speaker in Talk Shows at prestigious institutions like IIM Lucknow, IIT Delhi, IIT Jammu, and Christ College. Having been interviewed and featured at one of the Top Literary Journals of the country, Jyoti has been an honorable Jury Member at the Literary Club, IIT BHU for Storytelling. She has been an esteemed guest speaker at a unique Talk Show ‘The Lit Talks’ on a reputable OTT Platform. Her debut Hindi novel ‘Aanandi’ has been featured at the Pune International Literary Festival (PILF) 2021.