What Is Love

“When you look at love, you're looking into the face of appreciation.”

Throughout the history of mankind, we as a world culture have made love out to be mysterious, complex, difficult, and undefinable. It’s the subject of endless poems and literary works. There is an enormous amount of material available out there about love, a lot of it contradictory.
We’ve been given the impression that to define love is near to impossible. Maybe there’s a fear that if we define it, it would somehow be less powerful...less impactful...less exhilarating. Maybe we like the mystery of it. But is it really that complicated? Perhaps the complications surrounding love come from all “stuff” we add on to this powerful emotion. Lets drop all the baggage surrounding relationships and define what it is we are experiencing in the moment of love.

Basic Components of Love

What do you feel when you love someone? If distilled down to it’s core components, what would those be? Yes, love is an emotion, a feeling, a wanting, and a “being”. We know it feels good, but what specific feelings, wantings, and beings are present when we feel love? Here are the common denominators of love...

Love is Accepting.
Acceptance is labeling someone as "okay" and having no particular desire to change them. Who they are is perfectly fine with you. You pose no condition on whether you will love them or not. This is call unconditional love. When your love IS conditional, the moment they step outside your set of conditions, love wanes. Consequently, love is rarely a constant state but fluctuates based on our degree of acceptance.
Love is Appreciating.
Appreciation is one step beyond acceptance. Its when your focus is on what you like about another. We look at them and feel this sweeping appreciation for who they are, their joy, their insights, their humor, their companionship, etc. When someone says they are "in love" with another, they mean their appreciation is so enormous for this person that it consumes their every thought.
( "Oh man, he/she is so smart, attractive, funny, talented, etc." ..and if they are all these wonderful things AND they like me, I must be pretty darm wonderful too!)
Love is Wanting Another to Feel Good.
We want those we love to be happy, safe, healthy, and fulfilled. We want them to feel good in all ways, physically, mentally and emotionally.

How Do We Express Love?

We don’t always express our love. Love is a feeling and the expression of that feeling is separate. It’s an action. There’s a practical reason we don’t always express our love for another. It’s an issue of TIME. We only have 24 hours in a day (if you make it up that way). If the expression of love was a core ingredient to love, we would have to be stingy with who we loved, because there simply wouldn’t be enough time to demonstrate our love for everyone! If you see the distinction between the feeling and the expression, you can then love endless numbers of people.

Attention

Love expressed is when you give your attention, your time, your focus to someone. Webster defines attention as “the giving of one’s mind to something." There are many ways in which we give our attention to another. We use our five senses. Our ears to listen. Being completely present with the one who is speaking. Our eyes, watching another, undivided attention. Tasting/smelling? (I’ll let you figure that one out). Touching, giving a hug, holding a hand, a caress, or sexual expression. How you express your love depends on the type of relationship.

What is love? It is one of the most difficult questions for the mankind. Centuries have passed by, relationships have bloomed and so has love. But no one can give the proper definition of love. To some Love is friendship set on fire for others Maybe love is like luck. You have to go all the way to find it. No matter how you define it or feel it, love is the eternal truth in the history of mankind. Love is patient, love is kind. It has no envy, nor it boasts itself and it is never proud. It rejoices over the evil and is the truth seeker. Love protects; preserves and hopes for the positive aspect of life. Always stand steadfast in love, not fall into it. It is like the dream of your matter of affection coming true.   Love can occur between two or more individuals. It bonds them and connects them in a unified link of trust, intimacy and interdependence. It enhances the relationship and comforts the soul. Love should be experienced and not just felt. The depth of love can not be measured. Look at the relationship between a mother and a child. The mother loves the child unconditionally and it can not be measured at all.   A different dimension can be attained between any relationships with the magic of love. Love can be created. You just need to focus on the goodness of the other person. If this can be done easily, then you can also love easily. And remember we all have some positive aspect in us, no matter how bad our deeds maybe. And as God said �Love all�  Depending on context, love can be of different varieties. Romantic love is a deep, intense and unending. It shared on a very intimate and interpersonal and sexual relationship.  The term Platonic love, familial love and religious love are also matter of great affection. It is more of desire, preference and feelings. The meaning of love will change with each different relationship and depends more on its concept of depth, versatility, and complexity. But at times the very existence of love is questioned. Some say it is false and meaningless. It says that it never exist, because there has been many instances of hatred and brutality in relationships. The history of our world has witnessed many such events. There has been hatred between brothers, parents and children, sibling rivalry and spouses have failed each other. Friends have betrayed each other; the son has killed his parents for the throne, the count is endless. Even the modern generation is also facing with such dilemmas everyday. But �love� is not responsible for that. It is us, the people, who have forgotten the meaning of love and have undertaken such gruesome apathy. In the past the study of philosophy and religion has done many speculations on the phenomenon of love. But love has always ruled, in music, poetry, paintings, sculptor and literature. Psychology has also done lot of dissection to the essence of love, just like what biology, anthropology and neuroscience has also done to it.  Psychology portrays love as a cognitive phenomenon with a social cause. It is said to have three components in the book of psychology: Intimacy, Commitment, and Passion. Also, in an ancient proverb love is defined as a high form of tolerance. And this view has been accepted and advocated by both philosophers and scholars.   Love also includes compatibility. But it is more of journey to the unknown when the concept of compatibility comes into picture. Maybe the person whom we see in front of us, may be least compatible than the person who is miles away. We might talk to each other and portray that we love each other, but practically we do not end up into any relationship. Also in compatibility, the key is to think about the long term successful relationship, not a short journey. We need to understand each other and must always remember that no body is perfect.  Be together, share your joy and sorrow, understand each other, provide space to each other, but always be there for each others need. And surely love will blossom to strengthen your relationship with your matter of affection.

Love all, trust a few, do wrong to none.
William Shakespeare

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Are You in Love with an illusion?
Take the Love Quiz Illusion!

Our Old School Test:
1) My relationship or relationship to be is different from everyone else's and I will never have the problems other people do because our love is so strong.

a) True
b) False

2) Love alone will overcome all obstacles.
a) True
b) False

3) Arguing is a bad sign in a relationship.
a) True
b) False

4) The romance that my partner and I have will always stay just as passionate and romantic as it was in the beginning and our life will be like one long wonderful date.
a) True
b) False

5) It is important to go all out on your wedding ceremony and receptions, because it is your once in a lifetime special day and proves how much you love each other.
a) True
b) False

6) If a relationship is truly meant to be, then there should never be any conflicts or misunderstandings because you will know each other so well.
a) True
b) False

7) When it comes to true love, it means that you and your partner only have eyes for each other and will never admire other people's good looks or check them out.
a) True
b) False

8) If my partner is financially supporting me, then the least I can do is to tolerate his/her rude comments to me- they are simple releasing stress and I should not be so sensitive.
a) True
b) False

9) Sex will always be wonderful and if my partner starts losing interest or wants changes, then he/she is no longer attracted to me.
a) True
b) False

10) Money will never come between us or cause any stress in our relationship because we love each other. As long as we have our love, the problem will work itself out.
a) True
b) False

11) Flirting with other people is a bad sign for a relationship and is a way of mentally cheating.
a) True
b) False

12) If my partner does not feel like talking about a certain problem, I should just leave him/her alone; I will only create a bigger problem by trying to talk it out together.
a) True
b) False

13) Having doubts about your relationship is a sign that things will not work out and that you
should move on- no true loving relationship should have doubts.
a) True
b) False

14) A relationship is about understanding, respect and accepting differences.
a) True
b) False
15) If a relationship has reached it's anniversary of being long term, then it is not really necessary to keep going out on dates together- we have passed that stage.
a) True
b) False

16) Communication is about making your partner agree with you.
a) True
b) False

17) Physical appearance is important to a certain extent, but if I let myself go a little after marriage or being in a long-term relationship, my partner should not lose his/her attraction to me, because our love would have reached a deeper level by then. If they lose some attraction to me because of my weight, then they do not really love me.
a) True
b) False

18) If my partner continues to spend as much time with of his/her friends like before we got together and does not quit seeing so much of them, then the relationship is not as loving as it seemed to be.
a) True
b) False
19) When my partner walks away from an argument we are having, it means that he/she has had enough of me and does not truly care to solve our relationship conflicts.
a) True
b) False

20) If one or both of us gets even just the temptation to cheat, then the relationship is doomed and over.
a) True
b) False