Proposed: Love is just loss that hasn't happened yet.

[shereads]

Discuss.

Alternate topic for the squeamish: "Isn't most so-called 'tap-dancing' just nervous legs?" ~ Jack Handy

 

[carsonshepherd]

Well, you can also look at it as "Everything is fleeting and I will enjoy every moment as much as I can."

 

[rgraham666]

never been in love so I can't say.

 

[brightlyiburn]

I think, when you love, you lose something of yourself, because you give of yourself to others.
But I think if you never love, you lose even more. Love is an experience in life that shouldn't be missed, even if it turns out painful. If you give up, you might miss it when the right person comes along.

 

[sophia jane]

On the flipside, love is just happiness that hasn't happened yet.
Not speaking from experience, though, since I've never been in love either.

 

[rgraham666]

Haven't given up yet. Just not very hopeful of it happening.

 

[sincerely_helene]

Tap dancing. Tee hee.

 

[SeaCat]

Brightly,

Very nicely put, but I would add that when you are in love, yes you do lose a part of yourself, but it is replaced by a part of the one you love.

Yes love can befleeting, or it can last for many long years. It is always worth it.

Cat

Tis better to have loved and lost it, than to have never loved.

 

[cloudy]

Brightly,

Very nicely put, but I would add that when you are in love, yes you do lose a part of yourself, but it is replaced by a part of the one you love.

Yes love can befleeting, or it can last for many long years. It is always worth it.

Cat

Tis better to have loved and lost it, than to have never loved.

Exactly.

How could you actually experience the highs, without also experiencing the lows?

 

[DrFreud]

Since Gibran Khalil Gibran said it better in his discussion of Joy and Sorrow, I'll just quote him:

Your joy is your sorrow unmasked. And the selfsame well from which your laughter rises was oftentimes filled with your tears. And how else can it be? The deeper that sorrow carves into your being, the more joy you can contain. Is not the cup that holds your wine the very cup that was burned in the potter's oven? And is not the lute that soothes your spirit the very wood that was hollowed with knives? When you are joyous, look deep into your heart and you shall find it is only that which has given you sorrow that is giving you joy. When you are sorrowful, look again in your heart, and you shall see that in truth you are weeping for that which has been your delight.

Some of you say, "Joy is greater than sorrow," and others say, "Nay, sorrow is the greater."

But I say unto you, they are inseparable. Together they come, and when one sits alone with you at your board, remember that the other is asleep upon your bed.


I think it very much applies to love and loss.

DrF

 

[moonlight elf]

Exactly.

How could you actually experience the highs, without also experiencing the lows?

Agreed!!! There seems to be a Yin and a Yang in everything, without one the other is incomplete. Together they form a whole, one that is both dark and light. So, love too is a made up of joy and pain, opposites that make up a whole.

 

[minsue]

Life is loss that hasn't happened yet.

Love makes it bearable.

 

[CharleyH]

Discuss.

Alternate topic for the squeamish: "Isn't most so-called 'tap-dancing' just nervous legs?" ~ Jack Handy

ROFL, Depends, does the cock twitch, too?

 

[shereads]

I'm not really talking about romantic love, which comes with sex, which makes it worth it.

I'm at an age where I've lost one parent and the other is increasingly frail; those losses are hard but universal. But I've seen a friend lose a child to suicide and after more than a year I'm still haunted by the brutality of that grief. It consumed light and oxygen; a black hole from which no optimism was allowed to escape. I used to believe - still want to believe - that it isn't possible to love too much. Now I'm less sure. I find myself keeping a distance from friends and family, as if it might be better to lose them slowly, on my terms.

Maybe tap-dancing is a better topic, after all.

 

[brightlyiburn]

I'm not really talking about romantic love, which comes with sex, which makes it worth it.

I'm at an age where I've lost one parent and the other is increasingly frail; those losses are hard but universal. But I've seen a friend lose a child to suicide and after more than a year I'm still haunted by the brutality of that grief. It consumed light and oxygen; a black hole from which no optimism was allowed to escape. I used to believe - still want to believe - that it isn't possible to love too much. Now I'm less sure. I find myself keeping a distance from friends and family, as if it might be better to lose them slowly, on my terms.

Maybe tap-dancing is a better topic, after all.

Ah, I see now.
I know how you feel. My father commited suicide when I was nine. Since then, I've lost quite a few relatives, and I've known people who have died of overdoses or killed themselves. Young people. It does make it hard to get close.
I read a book last year called "Shizuku's Daughter". The girl in the story lost her mother to suicide, because her father had been having an affair. She stopped getting close to people, to family and friends. By the end of the book, though, she'd realized that she would miss out on so many joys if she tried to avoid all the pains. I found it incredibly inspiring. Maybe you should read it, too. It can help to read stories about someone who can relate.

 

[DrFreud]

I'm not really talking about romantic love, which comes with sex, which makes it worth it.

I'm at an age where I've lost one parent and the other is increasingly frail; those losses are hard but universal. But I've seen a friend lose a child to suicide and after more than a year I'm still haunted by the brutality of that grief. It consumed light and oxygen; a black hole from which no optimism was allowed to escape. I used to believe - still want to believe - that it isn't possible to love too much. Now I'm less sure. I find myself keeping a distance from friends and family, as if it might be better to lose them slowly, on my terms.

Maybe tap-dancing is a better topic, after all.

"And what is fear of need but need itself?
Is not dread of thirst when your well is full, thirst that is unquenchable?"

DrF

 

[mismused]

Love is a mystery that is as yet unexplained. It may also be a cosmic directive to merge with others.

Loss is a human perspective.

 

[CWatson]

> Proposed: Love is just loss that hasn't happened yet.

True. But loss is just the potential for new loves that haven't happened yet either.

The universe is made of paired dualities. Everything has its opposite. And only by experiencing the opposites do we learn to recognize one from the other. If there were no sun, how would we know the difference between night and day? How could we differentiate bad writing from good if we didn't know what set them apart? We need the contrasts, suck though they might.

--Then again, I'm slowly (and with great alarm) discovering a certain amount of optimism within myself, so, really, you should treat everything I say as coming from someone who's drunk. Though at least I'm not cewrehgsn uno[ my tutpmning too much. I;vau esennf oseme pretrety messty dtpmnign whinmle peinpe were dreunklr.

~CWatson
(not creaunk! not!)

 

[Boota]

This is along the lines of having been better to have loved and lost, but it deals more specificaly with death than with a romantic break.

There gets to be a point in grief where you lose the feeling of bemoaning what you lost and end up being happy that you got to know that person. I had to think about that once. Would I have been happier if I hadn't known that person and never had to experience the loss from their death? The answer was a quick "No". No matter how traumatically it ended, knowing that person was worth every bit of the pain of loss.

 

[English Lady]

Since Gibran Khalil Gibran said it better in his discussion of Joy and Sorrow, I'll just quote him:

Your joy is your sorrow unmasked. And the selfsame well from which your laughter rises was oftentimes filled with your tears. And how else can it be? The deeper that sorrow carves into your being, the more joy you can contain. Is not the cup that holds your wine the very cup that was burned in the potter's oven? And is not the lute that soothes your spirit the very wood that was hollowed with knives? When you are joyous, look deep into your heart and you shall find it is only that which has given you sorrow that is giving you joy. When you are sorrowful, look again in your heart, and you shall see that in truth you are weeping for that which has been your delight.

Some of you say, "Joy is greater than sorrow," and others say, "Nay, sorrow is the greater."

But I say unto you, they are inseparable. Together they come, and when one sits alone with you at your board, remember that the other is asleep upon your bed.


I think it very much applies to love and loss.

DrF

Yup...I think that says it nicely too.

 

[Lucifer_Carroll]

This is along the lines of having been better to have loved and lost, but it deals more specificaly with death than with a romantic break.

There gets to be a point in grief where you lose the feeling of bemoaning what you lost and end up being happy that you got to know that person. I had to think about that once. Would I have been happier if I hadn't known that person and never had to experience the loss from their death? The answer was a quick "No". No matter how traumatically it ended, knowing that person was worth every bit of the pain of loss.

What he said.

What I gained from him in life and death and how much he affected me and my life will always be greater than the pain I felt and feel after his passing. Without him, I would have been a different person, a far worse person.

I think it works like that for all great losses. How much it hurts is directly related to how much they were a part of your life and how much they affected you. Thus, when it hurts so much you almost wish you never met them, you already know that you couldn't have not met them without being someone else.

Just my two cents.

 

[shereads]

This is along the lines of having been better to have loved and lost, but it deals more specificaly with death than with a romantic break.

There gets to be a point in grief where you lose the feeling of bemoaning what you lost and end up being happy that you got to know that person. I had to think about that once. Would I have been happier if I hadn't known that person and never had to experience the loss from their death? The answer was a quick "No". No matter how traumatically it ended, knowing that person was worth every bit of the pain of loss.

I believed that too, until this.

She wasn't the first suicide I've known, but she was the first whose death was entirely unexpected by everyone who knew her. She was described as happy, right up to a few hours before her death. The realization that someone can be that deep in despair and hide it so effectively has me wondering whether we can trust what we believe about anyone. For that reason alone, I'm not sure I would rather not have known her. She brought light and joy into the world, then left us wondering how much of it was a facade.

 

[Lucifer_Carroll]

I believed that too, until this.

She wasn't the first suicide I've known, but she was the first whose death was entirely unexpected by everyone who knew her. She was described as happy, right up to a few hours before her death. The realization that someone can be that deep in despair and hide it so effectively has me wondering whether we can trust what we believe about anyone. For that reason alone, I'm not sure I would rather not have known her. She brought light and joy into the world, then left us wondering how much of it was a facade.

"Only the good die young.
All the evil seem to live forever.
Only the good die young"

 

[cantdog]

An acquaintance's daughter ran away and left no word, didn't get in touch.

Eventually, discussing it, we all came to the idea that it didn't make sense. That girl just would not have acted that way.

We kicked the police, eventually, after months of effort, into a semblance of investigation. She had, as it turned out, been murdered. Not a good outcome, but sometimes when things are too fucked up to be believed, you really oughtn't to believe them.

There are plenty of things we probably didn't know about the girl. Things she'd pulled the wool over our eyes about. I hope so, for her sake. A person needs to find some privacy for some things. It's not always a benign thing. Far too many of my daughter's classmates are junkies now, and they all hid it at first.

The question of how much you can ever know about someone else is not answerable except to say, "Well, you'll never know it all."

But living tentatively to avoid loss can't satisfy in the long run. There are times when you're going to do it anyhow, but when you can, open back up and love.

All yinning and yanging to one side.

 

[gauchecritic]

violent emotion

not the kind of emotion that will lead you to violence but an emotion so powerful and from whatever cause that, however briefly, will consume your entire being. Both loving and losing will immerse you in that fire.

It's those feelings, those 'rages' that let you know you're alive, it's the faint taste of that promise in our everyday that keeps us yearning for that rage and drives ordinary people to extraordinary feats of both mind and body. Knowing you are capable of that passion leads you to seek it or yearn for it every time you open your eyes to a new day. Love will kindle it, loss will fuel it and all and every one of our days are spent striving to attain it.

It's a good thing, it's daily within your reach and almost always without your grasp but still it's there to be had unless you turn your back and even then...