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"The Buddhist psychiatrist and author Mark Epstein once asked the late Thai master Ajahn Chah about attachment. Ajahn picked up the drinking glass next to him and explained how he found it useful to view the glass as already broken. He realised that sooner or later the glass would be gone. Because he realised the futility of attachment to this object he could truly give his attention to it without any suffering, without any fear of losing it souring the experience.

"I find many explanations of non-attachment to be reductionist and intellectualizations of something that is very deep. This woman's husband asked a vital question, and to answer it with things like not getting attached to a 'glass' trivializes what he was asking. He was talking about human beings and our relationships to them. People are with us for a very short time, so it is extremely important to love and cherish them while they are here, mourn when they leave us (even Thich Nhat Hanh cried when one of his brother monks died!) and remember them fondly.

"Attachment as Buddhists mean it isn't love, it is more akin to suffocating jealousy. Love is not about attachment. It is about trust and devotion.

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