Love

Well, in order to love someone you need to learn how to love yourself first. You are correct in your way of thinking mango_mochi, at least to me, they shouldn´t be upset at all, they just don´t know what love really is. I was thinking if it was worth reading this long post but turns out it really was worth it, you´re pretty wise. Something that makes you feel expressed can never be a wrong thing as long as you don´t disrespect others. ;)

I'd say that I've been in love once. A smart, intelligent girl who had a firm grasp on her future. Kind of a goof and nerdy just like me, but an amazing person nonetheless. For reasons unknown to me even now, I don't know why things didn't work out. It affected me greatly and for quite some time I thought I would never find someone that produced such strong feelings in me. I'd be lying if I said I didn't feel that way to some small degree. Still, I do what I can to do better in my own life and hope that I find that someone that's willing to put the time and effort to be with me and there for me. For me, love is when you see someone for all that they are and vise versa. You then do what you can to help them grow as a person.

Love is such a delicate thing and a strong feeling. It’s something that I can’t understand fully yet and distinguish between other forms of love but I know at some extent. I agree with Mango – love (mostly in romantic sense) is not a word to throw away so simply, I think people mix it with a word “like” or find the person nice to talk to; if a person confesses after little talk, it must be simple like but if the person honestly thinks the person is the right person for them, take the time and figure out if you truly feel that way. Confession is a good thing to do if you want to let them know how you feel and also how they feel about you. Yet again, here comes what Ringo talked about - it’s a hard thing to do if feelings are genuine, both parties should respect each other’s feelings and none of them should force other to love them back nor hate the other because they don’t share their feelings, if that happens then it’s not love after all. I also want to point out the will to help the person you love. I understand what you mean here but I need to tell this: if you want to help someone it DOES NOT mean you love them. Examples can be drug addicts, alcoholics and other people with serious problems. Don’t get into relationship with them purely because you want to help them, just help them without going into romantic relationship. Doesn’t matter how strongly you love them, don’t ruin your life, that’s not what real romantic love has to do, BOTH parties should develop and improve of it, like Ringo said. Yet again, I’m not an expert in this kind of thing, I’m just saying what at least a healthy relationship should be; trust, support, likeness and accepting their flaws are basically the main ground in my opinion. It all also depends on people, how they view relationship and love in general. I like this thread and I read everyone’s comments here, it’s nice to see different views on the topic.

Love is, dealing with my fiancee's family and not losing my shit. I just keep telling myself... I love country folk....I love country folk....I-aw screw it...XD

Heh. I know all about crazy in-laws... My ex's dad was a state trooper, but her mother had remarried to a disgusting horse rancher with a horrible rascist streak that she had been cheating on her dad with. (-_- ) If nothing else, I'm glad I'll never have to be in the presence of that asshole ever again...

As a note, I haven't read through everyone's posts yet. Every person has their own personal definition of love and needs to discover it for themselves. Discovering it for yourself will give more meaning than trying to follow the footsteps of others. If I were to tell you what love meant to me, it won't be the answer for anyone else. I have said "I love you" to 3 people in my life. One of them was my Mom, another was in my first relationship to a girl that I was with some years ago, and the third can be a secret for now. In my first relationship it started with me wanting to help her out of a bad situation. She stayed with me and some roommates for a while. We spent some time together and started relying on me. Before I knew it she fell for me. I was reluctant at first, but she wasn't going anywhere and I eventually caved in. It turned into a physical relationship a little too quickly, and that kind of skewed how I saw love and relationships for a while. Looking back on it, that was probably the part that made things turn out poorly. I think that relationships need to start with a strong foundation. To do that, learn about each other. Their personalities, strengths, weaknesses, preferences; If you learn everything you can about them and still want to be with them, you could be off to a good start. My first relationship didn't have much of that. We started by sharing our lives: playing games, going places, watching things while cuddled on the couch. We did what we could to learn about each other, but she had a lot of secrets and a hard past that she didn't want to share, and I wasn't very good at talking about myself. We knew each other "in the now" and liked each other for it. It was easy for her to start using the word "love" because she had experience on me. I think I followed her lead eventually and started using it as well. I don't think it was love looking back. My primary thoughts were: "I want to help her", or "She needs me". That's not the right way to look at a relationship After seeing how the word "Love" was misused in my first relationship, I feel like I give more weight to it. It means a lot to me and I wouldn't use it with just anybody. To me, "Love" is to be able to accept someone in their entirety. It's to have an unprecedented desire to see them, hear from them, or spend time with them. It's to want to share your life with another, even if it means running into challenges. It's to do the same things that you have always been doing, but find more meaning in them because of the person you are doing them with. It's to have someone that you can share new experiences with and try new things. Love is to care for someone, possibly even more than you care for yourself. But most importantly, love is a two way street. It's to have all of those feelings returned to you by another person.

I think love for me is acceptance. I like to learn everything about the person I'm with. Why? Because I want to fully know them. Understand them. Accept them for them. Even if there are things about them that I really don't like, I wouldn't care because I accepted all of them. So if I'm able to fully accept someone after getting to know them for months, I think that might be love for me. But I wouldn't know unless it happened. I barely feel love anyway.