One Good Thing

What is love? Baby, don’t hurt me. [#3]

[This is a guest post from Heidielka]

As of January 5 this year, I’ve officially been single for 10 years. I’m pretty sure there are nuns out there who’ve had more action than me. So I’m not sure why Amber thought of me when planning her guest-posters for V-Day week. That said, I was incredibly flattered, and will try my best to provide you with something worthy of this fabulous blog. [From Amber ← you are too kind]

When I asked Amber what she wanted me to write about, she simply told me to talk about what I believe love is all about. So that’s exactly what I’m going to do.

Here’s what I believe:

LOVE IS A VERB

John Mayer is right. Real love isn’t an object, tangible or otherwise, or a simple description of what you’re feeling — it’s an active representation of your relationship with another person. Loving someone means holding them when they cry, or driving the three-hour round trip in one day just to spend a few moments with them. Real love is doing things they love but you hate occasionally, and sitting with them all night when they’re sick. Love is about defending someone even if it embarrasses you in front of your mates. It’s all in the doing. Because uttering the L-word means nothing if your actions prove hurtful.

IT’S WORTH THE WAIT

Yep, 10 years single. It’s Depressing, pathetic, a little tragic, and a lot embarrassing to admit. But, you know what? Every time I see a friend being belittled by a boyfriend, or feeling bad because they know this guy isn’t going to be a forever fella, and they have to let him down somehow, I feel OK about it.

Don’t get me wrong, I’d love to have someone to snuggle with this winter, and Christmas would have been less painful had I not had to answer for the hundredth time, ‘Yep, still single.’ But, until I meet someone I can honestly say I connect with, why bother wasting my time or his? Unless he sparks some kind of interest, what’s the point in getting his hopes up — and vice versa?

I don’t believe that you know immediately if someone is The One. However, if after a day, a week, or a month, you can’t see anything happening, why force it? Why play games with people you see no future with? Good love, love that actually makes you feel good, is worth the wait—even if it’s 10 years between hits.

LOVE WITH YOUR WHOLE HEART

This is where I get all Disney on you.

It may seem obvious, but when you love with everything you have, that love becomes all you need. Trying to love because it’s the right thing to do, or because you feel obliged to, just becomes complicated and messy. Loving, but with conditions, is just playing games. And loving without trusting, as hard as it may be when you’ve been hurt, is unfair — how can someone love you if you won’t let them in?

So when you love, even after being hurt, love with everything: heart and soul. Give it your all. And, if you find you just can’t muster the energy, or strength, or courage to love completely, then let the other person go, so you can both find that all-consuming love. Everyone deserves to have that at least once in their life and, if they’re lucky, more.

FOREVER MEANS… WELL, FOREVER

OK, this might me a bit old-fashioned of me, but I don’t believe in divorce. I know circumstances change, people grow apart, feelings get hurt — I get all that. What I don’t get is how, at one time, you can feel so strongly for someone that you are happy to commit to eternity, and then later on you can decide that you are so strongly averse to that person that you need to sever the tie completely.

I’m not suggesting that this thinking is for everyone, and I’m certainly not suggesting staying with someone abusive or dangerous. I’m also not saying that there is only one love out there for each person (in fact, I believe wholeheartedly that we all have the potential to love completely many times over). But, for me, when I finally find someone I am happy to commit to for better or worse, that’s exactly what it will be. For better or worse, til death drags us to our graves. No second thoughts, no backing out, and certainly no pre-nup. That’s for the tacky and the untrusting.

LOVE IS MAGIC

It really is. How else can you describe something that makes you feel weak at the knees and ready to run a marathon at the same time? Why else do otherwise sensible, intelligent people turn into mindless idiots in the name of Love? It’s magic — a special kind of magic that can raise us to giddy heights, or send us crashing to unbearable lows.

Love can make grown men cry, the dying fight to live, and the hardest heart soften. Love can appear seemingly from nowhere, when two friends suddenly realise they feel so much more for each other. And Love is the one thing in life we all yearn and strive for, especially once we’ve had it and felt it slip away. Love is bliss. It’s our own special fairytale moment in this crazy, stressful, chaotic world.

So there you have it: Heidielka on Love.

My final words on the matter I leave to the ever-wise Dr Seuss:

How goes your search for mutual weirdness?

Tagged with: love, valentine's

Categorised as: wisdom+philosophy