Your loved ones are with you at every step of your life

Friendly relations with our family and friends have the potential to make our lives beautiful. The choice is yours: whether you want others to reciprocate the love and happiness that you show towards them or instead you want the hatred you display for them to come back at you.

Whichever manner you opt to behave with towards society at large, your first priority has to be family. Being responsive to the needs of your loved ones — your spouse and children— spending quality time with them, can bring you satisfaction.

Sure, you can also derive happiness through your interactions with friends and colleagues. But there can be no greater satisfaction than spending moments of togetherness and love with members of your family.

Nobody can take the place of family. In the event that your family life is disturbed, nothing else can restore your peace of mind. The relationships that you form at work can be transient and ephemeral, but ultimately you come back to your family since they are always there for you.

For many of us, our strength emerges from the emotional support that our loved ones provide us. In moments of distress, the support that we get from our loved ones can bring us back from the brink. In an emotionally bleak scenario, even if the world is against us, our families provide us the strength.

Outside our immediate family, the next best thing is to seek the blessings of the elderly. The amount of goodwill we generate by helping others can bring grace into our own lives. By nature, human beings like to act in a reciprocal manner. What we give to others comes back to us. If we want to command the love and respect of people, then we have to make ourselves worthy of love and respect. (Inner Voice comprises contributions from our readers The views expressed are personal)