(Okay, this is one of my favourite movies, right. So I thought, why not treat TVSA bloggers to this beautifully written piece by Blaque? And of course I hope he doesn’t mind. NOTE: I found this totally and absolutely interesting. As much as to some, copying it might seem unethical, my small head told me that I am not taking any copyright infringement risk. Enjoy ...)
True Meaning Of Love
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I just watched one of my favourite love movies of all time on etv. I have seen IF Only, starring Jennifer Love Hewitt, many times before and everytime I see it it takes me to another world. A world where love transcends all that we know it to be. The movies plays on cliches of what we expect love to be. We expect it to be selfless, happy, magical and all that society has indoctrinated us to think it should entail. The truth is; love is complex and yes LOVE can hurt.
I can't claim to know more about love than any other person. However I know that what I know as love is my truth, my reality and certainly my experience. We all see and experience love differently. I am not referring to the biblical and societal notion of love. You know; “Love thy neighbour” and “Do good unto others as you would expect them to do unto you”. I am talking about the kind of love that other people in your life may not understand. I'm talking about that feeling you have for the someone that everybody tells you is not good for you but you are willing to look beyond what the world sees in him her and love him/her for the person he IS, the person he WAS and the person he WILL be.
Some call it unconditional love. I beg to differ. The kind of love I yearn for is the kind that is there on condition that the object of my affection does not pretend to be anything but themselves. I want to love you in your best and worst form. I want to love you when you don't expect me to love you. That to me is what LOVE is. There is no script on how to love and quiet frankly I think there shouldn't be. Why should I love you the way others expect me to? Why should one feel obliged to express his or her love in the way that society deem acceptable? Love should not be about the oohs and the aahs from spectators.
I have known love, well atleast I thought I did. However, as my history will bear witness to that, I confused lust, neediness, insecurity, vanity and conformity as love.
Lust – You meet someone and from the moment you see them you want to be with them. If you lucky you will end up with that person. The sex would be amazing but often meaningless. Sadly when that wears off and you have to be with that person without the attraction you realise they are not what you want.
Neediness – You don't want to be alone. The idea of having a boyfriend or girlfriend becomes more paramount that the actual affection you may have for that person. Love stops being a feeling but rather a necessity.
Insecurity - “You complete me” as if you would not exist without that person. You do not trust yourself enough to know that you do not have to settle for less than what you worth just for the sake of being in a relationship.
Vanity – You believe yourself to be a “catch” so why shouldn't you be in love. You are gorgeous, rich or whatever frivolous societal tags you may have so why not have love attached to that as well?
Conformity – Everybody around you has a boyfriend or girlfriend and you think you should as well. You are of a certain age and your family expects you to have someone. You do not wanna show up in a club by yourself or have your facebook relationship be SINGLE forever.
Realistically love alone can not sustain a relationship, I know that. Though love ought to be about the heart than the possessions, it helps to have someone in your life who can enhance your life rather than diminish it in any capacity. If you are accustomed to a certain way of living then you would want to find love in someone of the same socio-economic status or higher. It makes things easy. The flip side to that is that such has a tendency of becoming a relationship of convenience than actually love.
Think about it; People tend to get into relationships because they are horny, lonely or materialistic. That is the fact of life. Now this begs the question; Can you still love that person if his penis got cut off or her v-jay jay gets sewn up? Can you still love that person if he/she lost his/her financial status? The common and acceptable answer to these question will be YES but the truth is that most of will not do it. For some of us we just don't know what we would do.
I guess we can just safely say we are all clueless when it comes to matters of love. BUT I know this; I know what love means to me. I know that I love my boo. My loving him is not about me expecting the feeling to be mutual or for him to say it back to me when I say I love you. I have learned that not all of us know how to love. If we have expectations on what the other person should do or say to show us that they love us we will never get to see the real love they have for us because we will be caught up in trying to see the signs we expecting from them.
As controversial as this may sound; I don't care if my love for my lover is not reciprocated because it's not about him. I love him because I see qualities in him that I admire. I love him because I feel safe around him. I love him because I do not have to pretend around him. I love him because I am happy when he's around. I love him because he always does this little gestures for me that he thinks I do not notice but does them anyway. I love him because even when I am mad at him I can not resist the urge to smile when he says something snooty. It's all about me and what I get from him. With that I know that my love for him is genuine and do not expect him to have the same sentiments. He has his reasons why he loves me, if he does but that his issues. Now, this is what I mean when I say love can be selfish and why not?
Stop beating yourself up if you do not have someone who'll say they love you everyday because too often the people who love you the most would not tell you. The mere utterance of the words is an impositions for some people as it makes them feel vulnerable so why foist your need for validation on your lover. Understand that we all love differently. Stop reading this silly books and watch this movies and think you know what love should be. Rather read the books and watch the movies then look into your own life to find the answers. Let them be a portal to your journey to discover what love means to you not the gospel of love. Remember to be able to find what love means to you, you have to get rid of everything you think you know about love first. That way you can experience LOVE without an preconceived notions of what it is or should be.
Nonetheless
IF ONLY is a beautiful movie that will leave you appreciative of your boyfriend or girlfriend for the little things they do, things that make you all fuzzy inside :)
Love you Boo!!
Have An Awesome Weekend Everybody
http://blaqueskorner.blogspot.com/2010/09/true-meaning-of-love.html