Love as Liberation, Not Limitation

For Mirabai, love to Krishna expanded her being—it made her more alive, more expressive, more herself. Yet her marriage was presented as limitation, a boundary on her spiritual becoming. This distinction separates healthy from unhealthy attachment: Does this relationship enlarge your life or shrink it? Does it make you more yourself or less? Does it call forth your gifts or suppress them? Does it honor your growth or demand stagnation? Anxious attachment often manifests as love that feels like drowning—the relationship becomes your entire world, and you lose yourself in the effort to maintain connection. Avoidant attachment manifests as love that feels like entrapment—you distance yourself to preserve autonomy. Secure attachment, in Mirabai's model, is love that liberates: it expands your capacity, deepens your understanding, makes you more alive, and supports your becoming. When evaluating a potential partner or examining an existing relationship, ask honestly: Am I more fully myself in this connection, or am I contracting? The answer reveals whether your attachment is serving your wholeness or your fragmentation.