Admiration
The recognition of something genuinely worth honouring in another.
Classical Definition
Respect and warm approval for someone or something of quality.
The Spiritual Perspective
Admiration often carries a subtle separation inside it. You are above me. You possess something I lack. I want to become what I see in you. There is genuine beauty in this — but underneath it runs a quiet comparison, a distance between the one who admires and the one being admired. What arrives from a deeper place is usually quieter than this, and less hierarchical. Not admiration — but recognition. Not looking up at someone, but seeing yourself in them.
How It Unfolds
Something genuinely worth honouring appears — a quality, a way of being, a presence that seems rare.
The mind registers it, and immediately does what the mind does: it compares. Without noticing it is doing so, the mind places the other person on one side of a scale and you on the other. The comparison is almost instantaneous — and almost invisible. They have this. I do not.
From that comparison, a distance forms — and with it, the ego's familiar structure: above and below. You are here, looking up. They are there, elevated. The person you are seeing gradually becomes less like a person and more like an image — a symbol of something exceptional, something you perhaps secretly want for yourself.
The body reflects this: a slight pulling forward, an opening in the chest, a brightening of attention. The energy moves toward them and upward — reverence mixed, often, with a quiet ache.
That ache is the clue. It is the feeling of something desired at a distance. What began as a genuine recognition — something real was seen in the other person — has been placed outside you, as something they have and you do not.
What began as seeing has become longing.
From Mind to Heart
You meet your favorite actress after an event. You see her walking toward you and immediately feel the excitement move through your body. "I can't tell you how much I love your work," you say smiling. The whole interaction feels slightly unreal the entire time.
You meet your favorite actress after an event. You see her walking toward you. You smile at her. She sees your eyes and smiles back. You feel grateful and a joyful sense of aliveness.
Same Wavelength
What the Traditions Say
Krishnamurti spoke often about image-making — the mind's tendency to construct images of people (teacher, genius, ideal, threat) and then relate to the image rather than the living person. Admiration is one of these images. It elevates someone into what they represent rather than who they are. Real relationship, he said, requires the images to dissolve — that two people meet directly, without the interference of idealization or comparison. Presence does not turn people into symbols. It allows them to remain alive.
Notice whether what you call admiration carries a subtle distance — an upward movement, a comparison, a quiet sense that the other person possesses something you do not. This is the mind at work: turning a living person into an image of what is possible, and relating to the image rather than the person.
The shift is not to admire less. It is to notice when the distance dissolves — when what you see in the other reminds you of something already possible within yourself. At that point, admiration becomes something quieter. Not elevation. Not comparison. Recognition. Gratitude.
The mind admires from a distance. Presence meets directly.