A Meditation on Love

I wrote this out on paper just because I wanted to feel a pen beneath my fingers gliding through the words, but I knew that I’d eventually post it here.

The human condition is one huge, fascinating paradox to me, and I find the knowledge that no one will ever completely understand it to be far more humorous than vexing. One attribute of humanity that I think puzzles all of us is the most cliché and controversial of human devices: our capacity for love. Love itself is the cause of such an enormous uproar in human cultures globally. I speak from experience as I write that even those souls which are fortunate enough to taste love first-hand and fully embrace it do not ever entirely comprehend it. So, here and now, I present a few of my notions and contemplations on the concept of love. It’s one of those things that can only very poorly be put into words, but I shall do as best I can.

The word itself is so overused, not to mention misunderstood. Love is not an emotion or even the sense of completion that a loved one may bring to one’s life, but is rather the choice to put another person before oneself day by day. This is where the thin, tragically blurred line between loving someone and being in love with someone is drawn; when one loves someone they are absolutely beautiful, but when one is in love with someone they are absolute beauty. To be in love is not to make the object of one’s affections the core of one’s world, but is to relate one’s world to one’s significant other. Love is not an unstoppable force which binds people together without fail, but is the daily choice people must make to avoid failing one another.

Love is the most fervent madness the human soul may know, but is in the same instant the most resolute form of order on the planet. Love feels understated even when expressed through the sacrifice of human life, and yet can be fully conveyed through the simplest actions and gestures. Love is a feature of all intelligent species, yet is only worshipped and romanticized by ours. It is a razor-sharp blade, the tip of which we spend so much of our lives longing to balance upon. Don’t take me for a cynic; I have been cut many times and bleed copiously in the name of that blade, but I still believe in its virtue, and I still believe that it is one of the greatest treasures of life that one can possess. The trick of the balancing act is to cherish every second at the top knowing that sooner or later you will be at the bottom. All marriages end in death or divorce; love is only as lasting as we are, and is often only as lasting as our wills for it are, no matter how intense its presence may be in our lives. Love can be a sword or a shield, and is sometimes both at once. It may be a gift or a curse, or may phase from one into the other. Love is forever coveted, even when it has already been achieved. It’s the most intravenous high to be had, and, when abused or lost, can cause withdrawals or injury; it’s the hardest drug on earth.

Some believe love is only a chemical creation, a result of just the right combination of sympathy and sexual interest, a psychological anomaly in response to the mingling of personalities and random stigma. Others believe love is predestined, some component of destiny or product of fate, a force of nature that acts upon whichever souls it chooses to, a wayward agent of the powers that be. I believe that love is all of those things, both random and set, and that it’s so much more, and less, all at once.

Love is patient, kind, and understanding. If God is love and all things are possible through God, all things must be possible in love. Love is an incomprehensively big thing that’s all about the little things.

Love’s about pulling a blanket over them when they fall asleep on the couch during a movie. Love is about smiling past the faults and pet peeves at the tiny pieces of perfection behind their eyes, even if you’re the only one that sees them. Love is about finding pleasure in watching them sleep or being brought to tears by their smile. Love is about letting them cry on your shoulder and being brave enough to cry on theirs. Love is compromise, communication, passion, hope, determination, and all the little spaces in between. Love is the answer to its own question, a mystery and yet a fact of life. Love is both a factor and a product of hope in many ways.

In the end, love is valued for the same reason our loved ones are; brilliance despite imperfection. To many love is a dream or a fantasy, but to others it is a very real source of pride and strength. To me, it is all those things. Power rests with those willing to risk everything to seize it, and love is the prize so often eludes the powerful. It takes serious strength to love with all one’s being, but strength and obstinacy should not be confused. The love should be wielded like a fine weapon; carefully and with great responsibility and skill.

“Greatness lies not in being strong, but in the right use of strength.” -Henry Ward Beecher.