Defining Love

[~Dream~]

i agree with that ....but i tend to be very guarded who I let in my inner circle of friends....


....see yank it was tough but i didnt mention any sport what so ever

ahem!! ya STILL said the WORD "SPORT "..and that Counts!! LOL

being guarded is a good thing ,just dont put up impenetrable walls..

 

[DLL]

Originally posted by ~Dream~
ahem!! ya STILL said the WORD "SPORT "..and that Counts!! LOL

being guarded is a good thing ,just dont put up impenetrable walls..

 

[~Dream~]

hey what can I say i was a cheerleader in college...and whos side are you are anyway

lol@ yay rah!! LMAO * watches you shake your POM-POMS!!

I'm on the WINNING side of course....( whatever side THAT is)

 

[DLL]

Originally posted by ~Dream~
lol@ yay rah!! LMAO * watches you shake your POM-POMS!!

I'm on the WINNING side of course....( whatever side THAT is)

 

[midwestyankee]

i agree with that ....but i tend to be very guarded who I let in my inner circle of friends....


....see yank it was tough but i didnt mention any sport what so ever

You can't fool me. I know they play a mean game of "Inner Circle" on the east coast.

 

[Ammo44]

You can't fool me. I know they play a mean game of "Inner Circle" on the east coast.

Mean is such a harsh word........

 

[midwestyankee]

Mean is such a harsh word........

Not in this context. Here it means skillful.

 

[Peteslaw2]

 

[DLL]

Re: DLL

Originally posted by Peteslaw2
DLL, I came by to lend a hand to you darlin', but it looks like you are taking care of yourself just fine. Love ya.

 

[Peteslaw2]

Re: Re: DLL

I will always take a hand of a friend
because that same friend holds my heart

You are so sweet. See you tomorrow. Plane lands at 11:30. Meet you out front.

 

[DLL]

Re: Re: Re: DLL

Originally posted by Peteslaw2
You are so sweet. See you tomorrow. Plane lands at 11:30. Meet you out front.

 

[Peteslaw2]

Re: Re: Re: Re: DLL

thats just like you right to the point...wear that tie I love so much okay???
oh and I got you a navy lacrosse shirt....

I'll put on the shirt. Just don't call me for high sticking.

 

[DLL]

Re: Re: Re: Re: Re: DLL

Originally posted by Peteslaw2
I'll put on the shirt. Just don't call me for high sticking.

 

[midwestyankee]

Love is as love does.

I can say that I love my new car and may wash and wax it weekly until it shines like a mirror. I can say I love my dog and treat her well. I can say I love golf. Yet would anyone confuse any of those statements with what we might call genuine love? I doubt it. Yet the emotions of "loving" one's new car or dog or sport are every bit as real as the emotions we feel when we first fall in love. Still, they are only emotions.

Would anyone call it a loving relationship if there was no commitment in the relationship? I doubt it. So how do we know that commitment exists in a relationship? We know when people act on their commitment when they attend to and care for their beloved despite preferring to be elsewhere or wanting to be doing something else. This is not emotion. This is action.

Emotions fade because they are ephemeral, temporary things. We have little control over our emotions. Thus we have little control over falling in love. But we have total control over the decision to love. When we feel the emotions associated with love, we have a choice. Do we act on them or not? Sometimes we act with discipline and choose not to act on our feelings. Sometimes we go ahead. How do we make the choice? Why do we make the choice? I think we make the choice to love or not love because on some deep level we know the difference between the emotion and the action.

We say we love our children, and certainly we do. But do we ever fall in love with our children? No. Why not? Because falling in love is not love. Falling in love is a biological event necessary to ensure that people mate. It is a matter of sexual attraction, pure and simple. Yet we love our children their whole lives. How do we do this? Through attention and caring - all action suffused with emotion.

Falling in love evokes strong emotions and powerful feelings. It enables us to collapse our ego boundaries to allow another much closer to ourselves than anyone else. It enables us to feel that the universe is spinning around our center. But it goes away. It is temporary. Genuine love is not temporary.

Genuine love is in the attention, care, and discipline we bring to a relationship. Of course, there will be stong emotions assocated with these actions from time to time. But the emotions are not the actions. These are not selfless acts merely motivated by strong emotion. These are the outward form of the mysterious force of love.

The entirety of love is a mystery. How it happens, when it appears, the company in which it manifests itself are all impossible to divine. Yet we know this force exists and we depend on it for our lives. We can love another person without the strong emotions of falling in love. We can achieve similar strong emotions through sexual ecstasy - we might even cry out "I love you" to a partner we hardly know, simply from the collapse of ego boundaries that occurs at climax. Yet this is not love and none of us would argue that. The genuine love that propagates human spiritual growth is not the temporary emotion of lust or ecstasy. Indeed, it is far greater than that.

Can we define love? Ultimately I think we can't. What I do think is possible is to clarify our understanding of it so that when it enters our lives we see it for what it is, we give it the time and attention it requires, and we grow with our patners in the process.

Oh, and it also makes the flowers we pass along the way smell ever so much more beautiful.

This got lost in a hailstorm of irrelevancies so I thought I would bring it back to the fore in hope of prompting some more discussion.

 

[Cathleen]

You certainly said a lot in that post Yank. I agree love is action. I had never really thought about it in the way which you described and I've spent a few days thinking about it.

I am wondering is part of people's difficulty with being in love and love stem from a lack of willingness to delay gratitication. Being in love is different, and yes the world seems to revolve around us, our life. But loving someone takes time, takes a willingness on each person's part to let go of themselves, their wants and give over to the other person. But that takes so much time - could we wait? Sure. Do we wait? Not always.

If we are willing to learn how to love, take the time as if we were learning to fix a broken appliance, then we can learn to love. I think it matters about what we are really seeking. Many say that want love, long lasting, for better or worse, till death do we part kind of love. But I think many are not willing to put in the necessary time or give up the required selfcenteredness. They want what they want when they want it - rather like a child. And being in the state of "in love" reminds me of a childlike state. I'm not condeming it, just noticing it. Its a wonderful feeling but it is centered on self and ego. Long lasting love does not do that.

There are certainly many how do want this love and do work for it, but as I see so many friends ending marriages or relationships I wonder about the motive going into the attempt. What was the intention? What did they want? When I think of want, I think of me - what do I want. As if I want chicken for dinner, the focus is on me. Love isn't like that. Love is the other person's wants.

I hope I am up to the challenge if it presents itself to me, I at least have more awareness about love since I began thinking more seriously about it through this thread. For that I thank you.

 

[midwestyankee]

Cate, well said.

If we have but one purpose in this life I think it may be to learn how to love. Not just how to be loved or how to accept love, but how to love another well.

To love another well is a life work and a work of art. There is no science, there is no calculus to lead the way. We use our minds to follow our hearts as thoughtfully and as attentively as we can. And we learn as we err and as we succeed.

It is a journey, this state we call love. I, for one, am happy to be travelling.

 

[Ammo44]

Yikes!!! DLL edited posts...........I thought you had a thing for her MWY........bummer........

 

[Cathleen]

Cate, well said.

If we have but one purpose in this life I think it may be to learn how to love. Not just how to be loved or how to accept love, but how to love another well.

To love another well is a life work and a work of art. There is no science, there is no calculus to lead the way. We use our minds to follow our hearts as thoughtfully and as attentively as we can. And we learn as we err and as we succeed.

It is a journey, this state we call love. I, for one, am happy to be travelling.

Yank, I've been thinking about this post for a few days and then when reading I came across a quote by Whilhelm Stekel (J.D. Salinger quoted it in his Catcher in the Rye) . Stekel wrote:

"The mark of the immature man is that he wants to die nobly for a cause, while the mark of the mature man is that he wants to live humbly for one."

This made me think of your statement that you are happy to be travelling the journey of love. I think it is such a humble (and noble) endeavour.

I think love is humbling.

 

[midwestyankee]

Yank, I've been thinking about this post for a few days and then when reading I came across a quote by Whilhelm Stekel (J.D. Salinger quoted it in his Catcher in the Rye) . Stekel wrote:

"The mark of the immature man is that he wants to die nobly for a cause, while the mark of the mature man is that he wants to live humbly for one."

This made me think of your statement that you are happy to be travelling the journey of love. I think it is such a humble (and noble) endeavour.

I think love is humbling.

I know love is humbling.

 

[Cathleen]

I know love is humbling.

Perhaps that is what so many do not realize, that love is humbling. Giving yourself and your wants over to the other person is a akin to climbing Mt. Everest in December ~ maybe the challenge is too great for some. Maybe it is the lack of maturity - that one wants what they want when they want it - that they cannot truly see what love is.

Love truly is about the other person and not what we can get or feel - its about what we can give to them. For thru giving we receive, I know its trite, but its true. Sometimes its the simple words that speak the best.

 

[justthe2ofus43]

This got lost in a hailstorm of irrelevancies so I thought I would bring it back to the fore in hope of prompting some more discussion.

Wow first words to that post
Love is as love does ........so true and yet so sad as well , as you mentioned in your post we love that car or that cat that outfit ,The word love gets spoken or typed to often without meaning ,sometimes even without feeling . Liking something and loving something often seem to get confused .Loving someone to me is a total commitment ,if its a friend they know i always be there for whatever reason and support them in any way i can . To my kids its unconditinal Love i want them to have the best of life and what it has in store for them and will love them no matter what they choose to do with their life ,I give my best shot to understand where they come from when they have a problem and support their dreams in any way i can and am able to .As to my love he has my full commitment which include total honesty ,complete trust ,my full support in anything he chosses to do and every feeling i have bundled up in me because of him .
We always read the paper together in the morning and sometimes laugh when we come to the LOVE IS colum ....I dont think there can ever be a clear definiton for love that would be universal since everyone looks at love a different way and has different Views .Yet there is so many ways to express and view Love that amaze me time and time again .Love is humble being one of them ,giving of yourself to the one you love should never be a hurdle for anyone who loves someone for who they are .I could never love anyone back that would not truly appriciate who i am and what i stand for .I dont want to be loved by anyone for any other reason than just being who i am ,not for what im able to give or provide or even worse for what i look like or do in bed .Thats where many people go wrong or get led in the wrong direction .Sure a nice Body and sometimes the fact they you be provided for without worrys sound good but lets face it it never comes close to what two people can truly share when they love eachother .

 

[midwestyankee]

Justthe2ofus43, love is rather amazing, isn't it?

 

[justthe2ofus43]

oh yes it is and all consuming and and and * Smiles *

 

[midwestyankee]

Perhaps that is what so many do not realize, that love is humbling. Giving yourself and your wants over to the other person is a akin to climbing Mt. Everest in December ~ maybe the challenge is too great for some. Maybe it is the lack of maturity - that one wants what they want when they want it - that they cannot truly see what love is.

Love truly is about the other person and not what we can get or feel - its about what we can give to them. For thru giving we receive, I know its trite, but its true. Sometimes its the simple words that speak the best.

I can think of three simple words which, when said from deep in the heart, live forever.

 

[DLL]

Originally posted by midwestyankee
I can think of three simple words which, when said from deep in the heart, live forever.

are they.... the yankees rule!!!!

sorry MWY couldnt pass it up..but your post is very powerful I agree the 3 strongest words spoken for sure...