Category: Let's talk
What is love? Is it a complicated melody, or an extremely difficult recipe to get right the first time around? Love is made up of only four little words, but it is suppose to convey an infinite list of feelings, emotions, and physical actions. Love encompasses the spiritual, mental, and emotional. Is it any wonder that those who lack the mental capacity to tie one’s shoe know love? What of the person who does not believe in the spiritual side of the soul and of life itself. The irrational emotions of adolescence are expected not to know true love, but it is a given that these beings with all their raging hormones still love fathers, mothers, brothers, and sisters. I ask how.
Back to falling in love. As if falling in love is like falling into some void, some higher plane of existence in which all the problems one possibly has will magically be corrected.
“If the world had a little more love in it, then the world would be a better place.”
But would it? Would the world not fall into this void also? Love is a journey that can be taken with four-thought, and a clear and purposeful mind. Sure, falling in love lends itself to the romantic. To feel like one is being swept away by the raging currents of another’s heart, mind and soul, is the very essence of romance; a sort of baptismal washing by the love from another through words and acts. Why must love, or the concept of love and how it is reached be so traditional? Why must love be defined by the traditions of our four fathers? Why do we use love as a catch all, a bowl for our significant others to choose its meaning. Like children who approach the door to receive their Halloween delights. Why is it that the phrase “I care about you” means less than I love you? What about the phrase “you are the most beautiful person to me,” or even “you touch my heart, like our interlaced fingers?” Does not the word love, convey these words and acts? Let us humans use our higher thinking brains, to express ourselves. Love is anything but a neat little package, four little words, or a corrective device for problems. Let us leave the illusion of love behind and go in pursuit of a more realistic modern version of what love really is. Seek love not in its four letter derivative but in all its majestic glory. Let us feel and say all the things the four letter word is meant to pass along from one to another. Let us mean what we say, so that there is no confusion, or misinterpretation between man and woman, woman and woman, and man and man. Seek, and ye shall find.
Author:
Nem
Before I say anything about the actual topic, let me first say that I am a prominent member of the Cynical Bitches Society.
That said, I'm not one for romance and faerie tale happily ever afters, even if such things existed. I like my fair share of cheesy romance novels and chick flicks, but it's only sweet and awww-worthy when it's not happening to me. People tend to want to focus on the romantic aspect of love and forget the realistic, and while there's nothing really wrong with romance in moderation, there should be a balance. Just because your heart doesn't flutter and your pulse doesn't quicken every single time you see or speak to your significant other doesn't mean your love has lessened, and just because you or they may want to spend time with other friends, or even alone once in a while, doesn't mean you don't still enjoy one another's company just as much as you used to. Tradition and conventionalism (is that even a word?) are fine as a base, a place to begin building, but a base serves little purpose if nothing is built on it.
As for the word itself, 'love' is a very broad term. I've always thought it kind of silly that what we say to our relatives to convey affection is the same thing we say to our significant others, and our friends, if you're the type who does that. In some cases, it's even what we say when we only mean to convey a sense of admiration or amusement. I'm the perfect example of that last. I constantly say 'I love you' to someone when they've said something that amuses me, and while I think my meaning is perfectly clear, you can really never tell how someone else will perceive something you think is obviously meant to be seen a certain way. My sister and I had a similar conversation once, and she said that people say 'I love you' instead of 'I care about you' or, in her words, 'I like you', simply because it sounds better than any of the alternatives. In short, I agree that there are much more accurate expressions of affection than just the word 'love' on its own, and they should be used.
What is love? The question of the ages, or at least one of them. We as people are always trying to define the things we don't understand, to simplify and attach our own ideas to them so they won't be so overwhelming. This kind of goes back to love being a very broad term, one that is, in my humble opinion, much overused when other, more accurate terms would also apply. There was a point to this particular bit of rambling, but its taken me ages to just write this much and I've lost it, so perhaps I'll return to make it later. Lol, cheers for causing me to put forth more effort than I ever have before on one board topic.
There are so many varying facits of love. Perhaps this is a fault of language. For example the Greek word agape, pronounced Uh-gah-pey expresses unconditional love for all mankind, very different from romantic love or familial love. I would expound on the differences between the three types of love denoted by the three different Greek derived words, but I need to do some research first, for the exact spellings of the other two and for deffinitions of all three for personal clarification before I share here. I am a true and hopeless romantic, so I believe very much in the importance and power of love, the romantic kind and the other two as well.
first I just want to say, wow! that was so deeply thought out Nem. Isn't love what a person chooses to make it though? I mean, isn't it different to different people. Love is a battle field anyway.
Oh, those four letters. I thought you were going to talk about something more viceral.
Very good Nim.
Bob