LOVE AND THE EXPRESSION THEREOF
Harder than it sounds.
So. Love. It's hard to define. It's a feeling you have. You don't really
know when you have this feeling. You may only have something like this
feeling, because there are an almost infinite amount of varying degrees of
this feeling, running the gamut from childish "puppy" love to pure physical
attraction (lust) to feelings of deep emotional attraction ("true" love).
You can also find yourself experiencing any degree or combination of these
feelings, which is why it's so damned hard to define. For the purposes of
this short essay, I'll use "love" to denote feelings more towards the
deep-emotional-bonds end of the scale and "lust" for feelings more toward
the purely-physical end.
Now. Using love and lust as our two arbitrary definitions, we can begin
adding information. Almost everyone feels lust, and generally it's easily
distinguishable from love. For example, Keira Knightley is smokin' hot, but
I certainly wouldn't seriously say that I love her. However, people can
confuse the two fairly easily. This rarely ends well. Just to confuse things
even more, lust is inspired not just by physical attractiveness, but by
power, money, or whatever else the luster considers attractive.
Love is, once again, harder to define. Physical attractiveness is pretty
much universal; thus, it's fairly easily understood. Love is a much more
complex, more human emotion. So I won't waste time babbling.
Generally, you can determine if you're into the "love" end of the spectrum
when you can separate the terms "like" and "love".
An example:
Person A: "How could you [objectionable action]?"
Person B: "You're blowing it all out of proportion. Besides,
[excuse]."
Person A: "I still love you, I just don't like you right now."
In this case, there's a strong underlying feeling that isn't going to be
shaken by whatever stupid thing the couple's fighting about at the
moment.
People prefer to think of things in neat and orderly terms, which is why
I've used basic terms like "lust", "love", and "like" to describe far more
complex feelings. Unfortunately, people tend to have different ideas about
the exact definitions of the basic terms they use. What results is best
described as two people speaking the same language with different
dictionaries. All of the individual words are understood, but generally not
how the speaker intended them to be understood. Love, like all emotions, has
varying degrees of intesity. The inevitable problem, then, is two people
using the same word to describe totally different feelings.
This type of problem tends to crop up near the ends of relationships. An
example: Two people, Person A and Person B, have been in a long
relationship. Person A's love, in the sense of "wanting a relationship",
begins to wane. However, Person A's love in the sense of "respect" and
"friendship" remain unchanged. Essentially, Person A is thinking "I do not
want to be Person B's significant other any longer." Person B has a
different definition of love, in which the whole kit'n'kaboodle is grouped
together under one word and is inseparable: Love equals relationship +
respect + friendship. As a result, when A tells B "I want to break up with
you, though I still love you", B is understandably confused. This confusion
is compounded because B also thinks that if love exists, it can't simply
wane, fade, or change. Person A thinks (and feels) differently.
