The Prince And The Swallow: A Tale Of Attachment To Couples

With this story of attachment in couples, I want us to reflect on the mechanisms of this phenomenon, how it causes us suffering and how it affects us when we try to control and dominate the other person and use love as an excuse.

So where is the difference between love and attachment in a couple? How can a conditional attachment negatively affect our relationships?

The prince spent his days looking out the window, waiting for something to happen. There was only one servant who had the task of shopping and keeping the castle clean. “What a sad life,” he sighed.

One morning in April , a swallow perched on the windowsill. “Oh!” he exclaimed, “what a small and fragile creature.” The swallow sang a short song for him. He was left amazed: her song seemed to be the most beautiful in the world and her plumes the most original. What a unique creature!

From then on, the prince waited impatiently for her return. The day came and the swallow sang another song. He felt very lucky. “I wonder if she’s freezing?”, He asked himself just before she flew away again.

The third time the bird returned, the prince worried that she might be hungry. For the next few days he devoted himself to building a small house for the swallow. He sent his servant to buy wood and nails, as well as to hunt for insects. Finally, after several unsuccessful attempts, he demanded that the servant build the little house. “Sabla bird,” muttered the servant.

Inside the small house he placed insects and water, as well as some silk cloth as a bed. When he saw how she came to sit on the windowsill , he took the little house there and enjoyed watching while the bird drank the water and used the food he had prepared for her. “Do you like these insects, my sweet swallow?” He asked. “I caught them for you,” he added. With a short drill, the swallow seemed to nod before flying away again.

Then he became worried. What if she never comes back? What if she finds a better place to seek refuge? Maybe other princes would build better houses or hunt for insects themselves. He could not allow it. There was no other swallow like this in the whole world.

The prince spent two days without sleeping or thinking about anything else, until he finally decided to use his free time to make a door with a padlock for the little house. The swallow returned as always, and when she went in to eat the food, the prince closed the door. “I love you,” he said, “you will never lack food or water, and you will never be cold.”

A little confused , the swallow first agreed to it because of the convenience. She enjoyed the warmth of his home and having access to food without having to fly around the plantations in search of it.

The prince placed the cage on his bedside table and caressed her head every morning. “You are my cool, sing me a song, a beautiful one,” he used to say. “This life is not so bad,” thought the swallow. And she sang. But over time, her singing became weaker and weaker, until she finally fell silent.

“Do you not sing anymore,” the prince asked in surprise. “You made me happy when you sang.”

“My song was inspired by the flow of the river, the sound of the wind in the trees, the reflection of the moon in the rocks of the mountain. I gladly gave it to you, but in this cage I now have nothing to sing about. ”

” I did it because I loved you, ” said the prince. “It is dangerous for you to fly around alone. What if you had an accident? What if you could not find food? What if a hunter shoots you? ”

“A hunter? What is a hunter? ”She asked.

“I will take care of and protect you, you are safe from all dangers here.”

One day, however, the prince woke up with a jerk. He went to pet the bird and found that she was dead. Full of anger , he sought out his servant and fired him, as no doubt one of the insects he had caught had killed her. The fact that he had found “the culprit” did not comfort the prince, and he felt even more alone and helpless than before the swallow even appeared. But suddenly another swallow sat down near the window and began to sing: the most beautiful song he has ever heard…

This story tells how holding on to couples works, and shows how our fears and anxieties are often imposed on other people’s rights and desires. It teaches us the following: by trying to change people, we often push them away from what gives meaning to their lives: their happiness. We do it “for them”, but do not realize that we are actually harming them.

In a situation of loneliness or emptiness, we can accept our own responsibility to get out of the situation ourselves, or we can force our partner to fill this emptiness by establishing a relationship of dependence.

Retention can confuse us by exaggerating the qualities of the one we love and making him or her a unique and irreplaceable being in our eyes, which increases our anxiety by imagining what would happen if we lost the person. To claim that we care about his well-being or just want to protect the person can cause us to deprive the person of his freedom.

This is a story about attachment in couples, but it is also one about love. Love is accepting and respecting what the other person is, keeping his happiness higher than his own needs and – just like the swallow – letting him fly when he needs it, if that is what gives the person happiness. Holding on to couples will always result in unhappiness for both parties.

* Original story by Mar Pastor.