Loving in Silence: The Unspoken Boundaries of the Heart

I choose to love you in silence… For in silence, I find no rejection,
I choose to love you in loneliness… For in loneliness, no one owns you
but me,
I choose to adore you from a distance… For distance will shield me from pain,
I choose to kiss you in the wind… For the wind is gentler than my lips,
I choose to hold you in my dreams… For in my dreams, you have no end.
– Rumi

There’s something incredibly profound about loving someone in silence. As Rumi once wrote, “I choose to love you in silence… For in silence, I find no rejection.” These words resonate deeply because, in many ways, silence becomes a shield, protecting the heart from the possibility of rejection or pain. It allows us to hold onto the beauty of love without the vulnerability that comes with laying everything bare. It’s a quiet form of self-preservation.

We often find ourselves in situations where the love we feel is too strong, too consuming, and to express fully. Maybe the fear of rejection looms too large, or perhaps the reality of the situation makes it clear that love, when spoken, would only complicate things. In these moments, silence feels safe. The love exists, pure and untouched, within the boundaries of our hearts, where no one can question it or take it away.

Loving someone from a distance, as Rumi suggests, protects us from pain. When you adore someone from afar, it creates a space between the ideal and the reality—allowing the love to remain untainted by life’s messiness. Distance becomes a form of emotional safety net. “For distance will shield me from pain,” Rumi writes, and isn’t that the truth for so many of us who’ve chosen to guard our hearts in this way?

There’s also a certain vulnerability to being too close. When you kiss someone in reality, when you touch them, your emotions become exposed. You risk disappointment or heartache. But when you “kiss in the wind,” as Rumi beautifully puts it, you can preserve the gentleness of that moment without risking the fragile nature of human connection. The wind carries your love but never brings it too close to breaking.

In many ways, loving someone in your dreams feels safest of all. In our dreams, love has no boundaries, no limits. We can hold onto the ones we love forever, free from the constraints of time, distance, or rejection. “For in my dreams, you have no end,” Rumi whispers. It’s a reminder that love can exist in the realm of imagination, where it never fades, never fails, and never disappoints.

But what does this say about the way we love? Are we protecting ourselves from the inevitable hurt of a true, vulnerable connection? Or are we cheating ourselves out of the full experience of love by keeping it locked away in silence, distance, and dreams?

There’s no clear answer. Some of us find solace in the quiet love that stays hidden, while others are compelled to shout it out to the world, regardless of the consequences. Maybe it’s a balance of both—loving deeply but understanding when to hold back when to cherish love in its quietest forms. It’s a delicate dance between protecting our hearts and allowing ourselves to feel the weight and joy of real, tangible love.

At the end of the day, love, whether in silence or speech, is still love. And that, in itself, is a beautiful thing.