Love Makes the Ride Worthwhile

"Love, like truth and beauty, is concrete. Love is not fundamentally a sweet feeling; not, at heart, a matter of sentiment, attachment, or being 'drawn toward.' Love is active, effective, a matter of making reciprocal and mutually beneficial relation[s]...loving involves struggle, resistance, risk...most compelling relationships demand hard work, patience, and a willingness to endure...loving involves commitment...love is a choice."
Carter Heyward

The quote above had me thinking today... what constitutes "real" or "mature" love? I am a student in the game of love and I enjoy listening to others' experiences of love ... hearing the "how we met" stories, seeing people celebrate milestones within their relationships, witnessing love in action ... these give insight into love ... and they spread love around.

"Love at first sight is easy to understand; it's when two people have been looking at each other for a lifetime that it becomes a miracle."
Amy Bloom

Growing up I thought love was that warm fuzzy feeling inside ... those nervous, energizing, sensational butterflies fluttering inside me when my eyes met his. I often thought there was some physical "feeling" that accompanied love, but I have come to understand these feelings and sensations as romantic love. It is a natural part of the journey to love. It usually happens at the beginning of a relationship for me. It is where I only see the good in my significant other ... any red flag I don't let linger in my mind for long ... I romanticize them. It is a time in the beginning of the relationship where little effort needs to be given, where the excitement is constant and the highs are intense and wonderful. It is exhilarating! But, somewhere along this journey to love there needs to be something more substantial ...

In real love you want the other person's good. In romantic love you want the other person."
Margaret Anderson

"Love is more than just a feeling: it's a process requiring continual attention. Loving well takes laughter, loyalty, and wanting more to be able to say, "I understand" than to hear, 'You're right.'"
Molleen Matsumura

"Love is like a campfire: It may be sparked quickly, and at first the kindling throws out a lot of heat, but it burns out quickly. For long lasting, steady warmth (with delightful bursts of intense heat from time to time), you must carefully tend the fire."
Molleen Matsumura

As the journey to love unfolds I think the qualities of predictability, stability, and friendship enter into the picture. I don't mean these things in a boring way ... predictability means that you can guess to a certain degree how someone will act, react, and respond - stability means the other person is steady, available, dependable and their character is constant, they are who they say they are and they demonstrate that - friendship is where the needs of each other are being met without trampling on the other's needs (mutual reciprocation) and both enjoy each other's company.

"The bottom line is that (a) people are never perfect, but love can be, (b) [love] is the one and only way that the mediocre and vile can be transformed...[w]e waste time looking for the perfect lover, instead of creating the perfect love."
Tom Robbins

I think as the three qualities mentioned above are demonstrated and encouraged trust begins to develop, which is essential to any kind of relationship. Now both parties can be open and honest with each other ... now the things within our souls come out ... our deepest fears, our longings, what we learned from our pasts endeavours, our hopes, our dreams, our goals, our weaknesses ... anything that touches us deep inside that we don't share with many people because of the fear of being laughed at or not appreciated or understood. I think a majority of people long to be with someone they can share their deepest thoughts with ... it is my heart's desire to be with someone who knows me, all of me, and loves me anyways ... the good, the bad and the ugly.

"Love makes your soul crawl out from its hiding place."
Zora Neale Hurston

The risk involved is huge. Sharing ourselves with the other person can be hard, yet so freeing. Sharing the person I see in the mirror each morning ... letting someone else see me the way I see me ... the good, the bad, and the ugly and being vulnerable ... that is something we tend to fear as humans because we can be hurt, rejected or embarrassed ... and most of us know what that feels like to some degree for one reason or another ... and if we open ourselves up, let someone into our thoughts, dreams, and hopes ... and it does not work out ... it hurts. We can get scars and some, because of their scars, build walls and defenses. But to love and give of ourselves the defenses need to be removed ... the walls need to come down. The reward outweighs the risk ... every time.

"Your task is not to seek for love, but merely to seek and find all the barriers within yourself that you have built against it."
Rumi

"The important thing is this: To be able at any moment to sacrifice what we are for what we could become."
Charles DuBois

Someone whom I talked a lot with once said to me that when we are in a relationship there are two of us, we don't have to try to figure it out ourselves because there is someone else there to help us, and together we can figure it out. I think that aptly applies here. I don't expect my significant other to have all the answers or to have everything figured out and I know I don't have all the answers or much figured out ... rather I would much prefer someone who is open, honest, and who reveals themselves to me .... who is willing to learn and grow with me. It is not so much about where someone has been, but it is about what direction they are now facing.

"If you were all alone in the universe with no one to talk to, no one with which to share the beauty of the stars, to laugh with, to touch, what would be your purpose in life? It is other life, it is love, which gives your life meaning."
Mitsugi Saotome

I think love involves wanting to be a better person; wanting the other person's happiness more than your own. I think it is about commitment, honesty, truth, having fun, laughing, being goofy, integrity, forgiveness, sharing, being open and being compassionate ... love is a choice. It is not always easy, it is not always alluring ... but it is necessary and beautiful and wonderful and ...

"If you have love in your life it can make up for a great many things you lack. If you don't have it, no matter what else there is, it's not enough."
Ann Landers

I was at a local park last summer reading a book on a blanket under the trees on a beautiful, sunny summer afternoon when an elderly couple caught my attention as they were coming up from the beach. I watched them as they crossed the parking lot and it was clear the woman had difficulties walking. The man was holding her hand and arm helping her along the way. He was paying close attention to her as they made their way across. When they got to their car he opened the door for her, helped her sit down, knelt down, took off her sandals and then delicately brushed the sand off her feet with his hands, put her sandals back on, and gently placed her legs in the car, closed the door, and then proceeded to his side of the car. That is love ... I welled with tears immediately. As a bystander I saw and felt the love between them. That was love personified.

"Earth's the right place for love. I don't know where it's likely to go better."
Robert Frost

Hugs and Love,
Liz

:)