Two Clever People Can’t Fall in Love—True Love Needs One Fool

Love, the word we toss around so casually, is perhaps the most misunderstood experience in human existence. We say we fall in love, we say we rise in love—but the truth is, love is not something you do. It’s something that happens to you when the walls of ego fall, when logic surrenders, and when the clever mind becomes utterly useless. Love is not a conclusion reached by analysis. It is a madness, a divine numbness that takes over the soul—and only fools, the sacred idiots of this world, are capable of enduring its fire. Clever people calculate, compare, and protect. Fools surrender, dissolve, and burn.

In the realm of love, cleverness is a curse. It sees boundaries, checks for returns, examines the worthiness of the other, and tries to predict outcomes. But love does not work with boundaries; it is the explosion of boundaries. It does not operate on exchanges or validations—it simply exists, inexplicably, like a silent storm. To love is to be stripped bare, vulnerable before the divine or the beloved. And that’s why the fool is the only one qualified to love. He has no pride to lose, no plan to guard, no ego to preserve. The fool jumps. The clever waits.


In today’s world, love is increasingly becoming a carefully curated emotion. Dating apps, compatibility algorithms, personality quizzes—all geared toward clever love. We try to find a partner who ticks all the right boxes, aligns with our ambitions, supports our lifestyle, and looks good in pictures. But love that requires a checklist is not love—it is comfort dressed in affection.

True love, the kind saints spoke of and poets wept over, doesn’t make sense. It often arrives at the wrong time, for the wrong person, in the most inconvenient circumstances. And yet, it feels like destiny, like something pre-written in the folds of the universe. This is because love is not a transaction; it is a recognition. Not of the body, not of the mind, but of the soul.

Even the Bhagavad Gita, that ultimate scripture of clarity and wisdom, begins not with instruction but with confusion. Arjuna’s breakdown on the battlefield is not a moment of weakness—it is the moment love enters. His attachments, his grief, his fear—all born of deep love—lead him to question the very foundation of his clever dharma. And it is in this sacred disillusionment that Krishna plants the seed of transcendental wisdom.


There is a sacred madness in love that the rational mind can never comprehend. It is the madness that made Radha forget herself in Krishna, that made Mirabai walk away from royal palaces and wear the dust of Vrindavan like jewelry. It is this madness that Kabir called the “pagalpan” (insanity) of the soul yearning for the Beloved. And madness it is—for only the mad can hear the music of love in a world that sings only the songs of ambition, lust, and pride.

Radha never questioned Krishna. She never demanded promises or explanations. She was not clever. She was mad. She did not ask why, she only asked where—"Where is He? Where is my soul’s other half?" Her love was not based on security or reciprocation. It was pure devotion—bhakti—not bound by form or function. The clever ask for love with guarantees; the mad surrender without conditions.

Mirabai sang to her beloved Krishna not to gain wisdom or salvation but because she was love. Her verses were not crafted poems—they were spontaneous eruptions of her soul in divine intoxication. When the world called her mad, she smiled. Because she knew that in this world, those who truly love are always called fools. And rightly so.

Love, when it is pure, is not a virtue but a vulnerability. It makes you weak to the world and strong to the soul. It isolates you from reason but unites you with the divine. That is why Krishna did not ask Arjuna to become clever—He asked him to surrender. And surrender, real surrender, can only happen in foolish love.

The mind is sharp—it calculates risk, reward, and return. It separates the self from the other and draws fences around the heart. The mind is afraid to dissolve, afraid to lose, afraid to become one with something it cannot control. It is a good servant but a terrible lover.

Love requires the exact opposite. It requires you to become nothing. To lose yourself so completely that the boundary between you and them vanishes. It is not logic but the language of silence. The clever cannot handle this silence—they seek meaning, clarity, patterns. The fool simply listens. He dances in the absurdity, finds joy in the irrational, and allows the heart to guide what the mind fears.

That is why in every tradition, the fool is the mystic, the lover, the saint. He walks barefoot on the path of thorns, smiling. He speaks to the sky and sings to the stars. People call him mad, but the heavens call him home.

In the eyes of the world, the fool is poor—he has no status, no gain, no success. But in the eyes of God, he is the richest soul. Because he alone has tasted love. Not the temporary thrill of romance, but the eternal sweetness of merging. The clever count moments; the fool loses time. The clever stay safe; the fool dies every day—and in that death, finds immortality.


In Chapter 18 of the Bhagavad Gita, Krishna delivers one of the most explosive declarations of love and liberation:

"Sarva-dharman parityajya mam ekam sharanam vraja,
Aham tvam sarva-papebhyo mokshayishyami ma shuchah."
(BG 18.66)

“Abandon all varieties of duties and just surrender unto Me. I shall deliver you from all sinful reactions. Do not fear.”

This is not a call for duty. It is a call for love—pure, naked, terrifying love. Krishna is not asking for cleverness or strategy. He is asking for surrender. He is inviting Arjuna to become the fool—abandoning all pride, all knowledge, all righteousness—and to fall into the arms of the Divine.

What Krishna is really saying is: “Stop trying to fix everything. Stop trying to be wise. Just love Me. Without reason, without demand.”

This is the ultimate spiritual truth: Bhakti—devotion—is not for the clever. It is for the broken, the desperate, the “idiots” who are ready to lose everything in the name of the Beloved. Arjuna, the great warrior, becomes a true seeker only when he breaks down. And that breakdown is love.

In Chapter 9, Krishna gives us another glimpse:

"Ananyashchintayanto mam ye janah paryupasate,
Tesham nityabhiyuktanam yogakshemam vahamyaham."
(BG 9.22)

“To those who are constantly devoted to Me and who worship Me with love, I carry what they lack and preserve what they have.”

This is the divine promise. Not to the wise. Not to the clever. But to the idiot who loves with all his being. The one who sees Krishna in dust and dew, in joy and pain, in life and death.


Real love is not emotion. It is not excitement, not pleasure, not pain. It is a kind of holy numbness—a sacred blankness that silences all thoughts and expectations. You don’t feel high. You don’t feel low. You feel... nothing. And in that nothingness, everything is contained.

The world tells you that love must thrill you, must make your heart race, must fill your days with ecstasy. But that is romance, not love. Romance is fleeting. Love is stillness. It is the vast, empty ocean under the waves. It is the silence behind all sound. It is the space where even thoughts feel shy to enter.

This is why only fools can dwell in love. Clever people panic when words fail, when there’s no label, no clarity, no direction. But fools? Fools smile. They don’t need answers, because they are not asking questions. They are not dissecting the experience; they are drowning in it.

The great Sufi saint Rumi once said, “Love is the bridge between you and everything.” But that bridge is not made of logic. It is built by surrender. And once you cross it, the mind shuts off. You don’t care what tomorrow brings. You don’t care how the world sees you. You are numb to all that doesn’t matter—and that numbness is the greatest bliss.

In love, identity melts. You are no longer your name, your role, your ambition. You become... a prayer. A tear. A silence. You become the song that has no singer. The flame that has no source. You become love—not the lover, not the beloved—just love itself.

In every age, the lovers of God have been called mad. They defied society, rejected norms, danced in the streets, and cried in solitude. Why? Because they were not interested in being clever—they were interested in dissolving. Saints like Chaitanya Mahaprabhu, Tukaram, Rabia, Andal—they were laughed at, beaten, exiled. But they smiled. Because they knew what the world never understood: that to truly love, one must be willing to become a fool.

The fool is not someone who lacks intelligence. The fool is someone who has transcended it. He knows that love is not an equation to be solved but a fire to be entered. And he walks into that fire, willingly, joyfully.

In the eyes of the world, this is stupidity. But in the eyes of the divine, it is grace.

If you look closely, even Krishna—God Himself—is a fool in love. He breaks rules for Radha, steals butter for Yashoda, dances for the Gopis. He is not the detached ascetic. He is the ultimate lover. He chooses leela (divine play) over logic, mischief over morality, dance over duty.

So if you ever feel too much, love too deeply, cry without reason, and long for something you cannot name—do not shame yourself. You are not weak. You are not broken. You are blessed.

Because you have touched the madness that only the soul understands.

Because you have become a fool.

And only fools fall in love.