A friend has asked me to write a post on love (assuming he meant "romantic" love), which in my view is similar to trying to dance a painting. However, I will try, but let me post a disclaimer right up front: "Love is a mystery to me, a never ending maze, an enigma, but also the code of life". Erich Fromm writes in "The Art of Loving": "Love for life, far from being an abstraction, is the most concrete nucleus in any kind of love. Anyone who believes he loves a person, but does not love life also, may desire, want, cling to a person - but he does not love him."
I decided to ask friends to share with me what love is to them.
"What about her do you love?" I asked my friend. "Her illuminating joy and beautiful intelligence," he answered.
Another described it: "Love is total acceptance of another without any expectations from them."
A friend of my son answered: "I am not sure, I don't think I have ever felt that my love has been fully reciprocated."
I read somewhere that "falling in love is the temporary collapse of a person's ego-barriers".
Is seeking love, the seeking to transcend ones ego and connect with another human being?
What happens when we "fall in love", and why is it termed "falling"?
"I couldn't help it, I just fell in love." Does it happen to us, like an accident? We "tripped" into love?
In collective societies, an individuals identity is tied to his/her social group, in individualistic societies the individuals identity is paramount. Arranged marriage's versus the individuals personal choice. Love growing from and out of, or because of intense feelings of having fallen in love..........
Growing into love, or falling in love? Or both?
"I do love him/her, but not madly, passionately, rather sincerely, and dearly." "Man, I love her so much I can't eat, I can't sleep, all I do is think of her."
The more research I did, the more the subject of "need" appeared. Pop music for instance, is saturated with the lyrics: "I love you, I want you, I need you." What part does "need" play in loving? A "need" may be defined as something necessary for organisms to live a healthy life. We need oxygen, water and food, we need safety, stability, we need to belong and to be loved, we need respect, dignity and a sense of achievement, and we need to fulfill our potential and to be the "best" we can be.
Is "needing" someone perhaps more about the self, and "loving" about the "other"?
How do we ascertain whether what we feel is love or attachment based on needs?
A few suggestions to help identify feelings based on needs: Am I expecting my beloved to be flawless/perfect?
Do I love him/her because he/she "ticks all the right boxes"? Do my feelings of love fluctuate between exhilaration and despair?
When I am not with him/her do I feel anxious, jealous, fearful? Is my love dependent on how much my beloved fulfills my desires? Do I love him/her for who he/she is or my idea of him/her? Do I seek constant confirmation from my beloved?
Many of us may see the problem of love as primarily being a problem of being loved rather than our own capacity for loving; loving is easy/simple, finding the right one.....that is hard.
To increase our "lovability" perhaps we try to acquire "assets" to make ourselves more "lovable".
If I have more money, a better physique, the "right" clothes, speak eloquently, know the "right" people, et cetera, I will become more "attractive", more of an asset; more lovable.
Do we fall in love when we feel we have found the best person available to us considering our own "exchange" value? (What assets do I offer?)
Perhaps at this point you are thinking; "Come on now, it's all very simple, your heart tells you when you love someone. You either feel you love him/her or you don't." Thing is, we often use the word "love" to describe an array of strong emotions/feelings, often we just use "love" as an umbrella term. Do we really love our car, the movie we just viewed, the new i-thingy, pizza, the sports team, etc. etc.? If we do love those things, how is that love different from the love we feel for our partner?
Do perhaps some of us consider "falling in love" as a cure for feeling separate, for loneliness, and alienation (an aspect of the human condition)? After all, the initial rush, sense of excitement, euphoria, and increased feeling of well-being that often accompany "falling in love" is amazing! The transformation of a stranger into becoming the "beloved", from being separate to being part of a union; an exclusive "us"; is so powerful and emotionally charged that writers, poets, painters, sculptors, musicians, and the rest of us may find ourselves "wax lyrical".....
Of course the flip side is that if we can "fall" in love, perhaps we can also "fall" out of love?
Some suggest that we can only sustain such a blissful state for six to thirty months and what we are really seeking is a "self sustaining" love, not romance. The passion of romance is often directed at our own notions, projections, fantasies, and expectations, and not so much about our love for another person, but rather that of ourselves. (If you love me so much, perhaps I am lovable after all, you make me feel..., when I am with you I feel....) Having said this I will add; I believe that love (of any kind) awakens the ego to the existence of something outside of itself.
It seems to me that we love someone when we care more about the other as he/she is, rather than who we think they should become, when we reveal ourselves honestly and vulnerably just as we offer the same for the other. We love someone when we act with patience, resilience, compassion, forgiveness, attention and with a whole hearted commitment to their well being.
Perhaps we "fall" in love but we choose to stay with love.
“For the first time in my life I saw the truth as it is set into song by so many poets, proclaimed as the final wisdom by so many thinkers. The truth - that Love is the ultimate and highest goal to which man can aspire. Then I grasped the meaning of the greatest secret that human poetry and human thought and belief have to impart: The salvation of man is through love and in love.” (Viktor Frankl)
"Love is like a friendship caught on fire. In the beginning a flame, very pretty, often hot and fierce, still only flickering. As love grows older, our hearts mature and our love become as coals, deep-burning and unquenchable."
(Bruce Lee)
"I have found the paradox, that if you love until it hurts, there can be no more hurt, only more love."
(Mother Teresa)
No comments:
Post a Comment