Love Is.

In the world today i find myself sometimes questioning the strength of the line between love and hate. I won't go political and comment on wars or anything like that, but i hardly need to living in the world i do today. Everywhere i look people - just regular everyday people - are doing all possible to shred and destroy those that they apparently 'love'. I know where the only example of perfect love can be found, and within Him my heart will be found forever, but recent events have sparked an interest in what love actually is, because i know i dont understand it.

You receive a phone call at midnight one night to find your best friend has passed away. It would hurt like crazy, you would die a little inside forever, your world would fall apart and you feel like you'd never be okay, all because you love them right? But what does that phrase, "I love you" actually mean to you? Would you be destroyed because they were gone? Or would you be destroyed because you miss them?

I would find myself torn because while I would give anything to trade places with them, is it because I think the world would be a better place with them or is it that I believe I can't live without her? One reason is borne of love, the other of hate . . . can the reasons co-exist or is the paradox too great? Does the evidence of the two being present within the reasoning behind such a statement act as proof of love and hate? Or would my desire to not exist without my best friend be what is really driving me and therefore proving me to be acting out of selfishness, which is, broken down, a hate of where I'm at.

Lets take it all back a few steps though, back to what physiology told me love was. Scientifically, love is felt when a particular pattern of neurons fire in a particular order when certain chemicals are released simultaneously into the brain. But, setting that aside, lets say love is a particularly strong emotion, the strongest along with hate in fact. But how can emotions be truth? They can be altered, controlled, consciously changed. Truth, by definition, is unwavering, unmoving, unchanging. Truth must withstand the test of time and circumstance; otherwise it is little more than a fad. Keeping in mind perception of truth is a completely different matter as well as what is truth and what we believe to be truth are two totally different things, let's look at yet another example.

My hair is black. Plain and simple, it is a very, very dark black. Truth, yes? Not entirely. My hair is actually a very light brown / ash blonde. No amount of dying, covering or weather-ware can change the fact that, when traced all the way back to its roots, its origins, where it comes from, is that brown / ash blonde colour. So, if love is an emotion, that means we can choose to love. That makes it wavering. That makes it changeable. BUT was the love always there to begin with? Do we just choose whether or not we acknowledge its presence? Can I then draw that by hating I am proving the possibility of love? And then, am I therefore acknowledging the existence of love?

Kurt Tucholsky, a 19th century German essayist and poet once said, "those who hate most fervently must have once loved deeply: those who want to deny the world must have once embraced what they now set on fire." This is a long shot, but bear with me. If we have it within us to hate ourselves so much that we can intentionally sabotage all we aim for, that we can slash our own skin, that we can starve our bodies, that we can chase away those we love so we really are alone, but most of all that we can deprive ourselves of the one key that can actually set us free from the above torments, does this mean something far greater than the surface observation that we, as human beings, are all mentally unstable? Probably. But, does that then mean that by having the ability to withhold such freedoms, we also have the power to embrace them? Is it in fact not a choice to create such a freedom, but to accept the freedom that is there, unwavering, unchanging, unmoving, which, broken down, can be translated to truth?

Taking all this into account as well as the famous 'God is love' verse (1 John 4:8), does that then mean the opposite of faith is not in fact heresy, but indifference? Does the fact someone would care that they can't 'find' God mean that they acknowledge His existence? That He is here, amongst this mess, this tangle, this over-thought, over-reasoned, misunderstood, confusing existences we find ourselves lost in?

The best piece of writing I have ever produced is this:

"There she sits . . .

Some say she cared too little, some say she cared too much; but in her mind at least they said she cared. Some say she was their hero, some say she was their villain; but in her mind at least she was something to them. Some say she was too loud, some say she was too quiet; but in her mind at least she was heard. Some say she was too open-hearted, some say
her heart was too closed off; but in her mind at least they knew she had a heart. Some say she knew where she was going, some say she had lost her way; but in her mind at least they know she was going somewhere . . .

There she sits . . .

Knowing where she's going, but so completely lost. Running on a schedule in a land that time has all but forgotten. So much on her heart to share, but absolutely no one to share it with. A heart with such determination, and yet short the drive required to tap into it. A thousand brilliant words to say, but mute to her own power. Having lost some treasures, but rendered oblivious to all she has gained. A life full of obvious hope, and yet blind to all before and behind her. A mind overflowing with knowledge, but having no idea how to utilize or control it . . .

There she sits . . .

Well within reach, but no one can touch her. In a crowd, but on her own. Breathing in and out, but holding her breath for the next wave. Open, but fenced off. Desperate for a hug, but so cold and prickly. Boldly facing the storm set before her, but so frightened she cries alone . . .

There she sits . . .

In a complete state of confusion and despair but clinging desperately to the one notion she knows has never forsaken her . . . has never lead her astray . . . has never shown her contempt . . . has never abandoned her . . .

There she sits . . .

Loving her friends, loving her enemies, loving her family, loving her strengths, loving her weaknesses, loving her insight, loving her confusion, but then she realizes that these all encompass one single thing, the thing that sometimes she wishes she could run from, one thing she could abandon . . . loving her God and loving her life . . .

There she sits . . .

On her own, but someone whispers something into her heart . . . something she will never forget, something she will never understand, something she will hold in her heart, something she will shout to the world, something so soft, something so strong, something ageless, something perfect . . .

There she stands . . .

In truth, in light, arms out strelies, eyes open to truth, tired of the possible, longing for the impossible . . .

There she stands . . .

There she realizes . . .

There she knows . . .

There she proclaims . . .



L  O  V  E     N  E  V  E  R     F A I L S"

I wrote it after I first read 1 Corinthians 13. Verses 1- 3, i feel speak vividly why so many people feel unfulfilled in life. If we are not living for something greater than ourselves, then what are we living for? If the meaning of my life isn't something beyond our own existences, then life carries no meaning.

But love. Love love love. Verses 4-13 speak of something so powerful that it is insurmountable. Something so long-lasting that it is ageless. Something so complex that it surpasses all knowledge and understanding.

If love never fails, then love conquers all.

If love conquers all, therein lies my answer.

Mother Theresa put it beautifully in my favourite quote of all time. "I have found the paradox, that if you love until it hurts, there can be no more hurt, just love." This may be a selfish interpretation of the quote, but try and see past that. I have loved until it hurt. I have loved and lost, I have loved and been betrayed, I have been denied love, I have been forced to love, I have been yanked back from love. So do I just keep loving, though I do not understand completely why, in the hope that I really will greet the day where there is no more hurt, just love?

Because to me, that means that though hate and hurt exist, though there will always be new reasons to mourn, to cry, though there will always be a battle or a storm of some sort on the front, it means that while indifference could completely counteract this, I would miss out on what in fact is the meaning of life – to love. Love may not be able to reverse hate and hurt, but it can heal it, and it can offer protection from the next onslaught, and strength for the next battle. It isn't something we create or that we bring into our lives. Love is something that has always been there and always will be, we just choose whether we embrace it or not.

So my revised definition of love? It's so simple and yet so complex.

Love is.

Two words, but I believe they explain it all.