Love - A Second Hand Emotion?

What's love got to do, got to do with it

What's love but a second hand emotion

What's love got to do, got to do with it

Who needs a heart when a heart can be broken

What's love got to do, got to do with it

What's love but a sweet old fashioned notion

What's love got to do, got to do with it

Who needs a heart when a heart can be broken

-- Graham Lyle, Terry Britten, "What's Love Got To Do With It?" (1984)

As we move forward through God’s greater scheme, we can forget to love. Maybe "forget" isn't quite right; we tend to take love for granted. We think we love, we say we love, we even go through the motions of making love, but we forget to love, how to love, or to acknowledge love. Many of us forget what it is to truly love. We find ourselves like a paper boat on a lonely sea, constantly trying to stay afloat until we are rescued. For those of us who live our lives alone, perhaps especially for those, we must remember to love as if we were surrounded by others. Life is all about our ability to love, even in the face of those incapable of understanding why. Love isn’t so much about who you're with as it is about who makes you smile when you think of them. Love is, at the same time, selfish and selfless. It accomplishes much while accomplishing nothing. Even in its pain of loss we masochistically relish the warmth and expectation of its return. Love is certainly the cruel mistress of life. For each of us love is something different and, yet, at its root, the same.

Love can be a lifelong relationship with a soulmate, a good friend, whether you're together or apart. There is the love of a spouse, a child, a parent or guardian, and self. There is, also, the unrequited love of someone who, for all your efforts, either does not acknowledge you exist or wants a relationship less than what you would like. This doesn't necessarily mean the love isn't there, it simply means the love is different. It could be that it was love lost, and found; two lives that took different paths and intersected again, years later. It can be love felt and never declared, and it can be that moment before you board a jet for home, feeling the eyes of someone who cares boring through the back of your head and silently pleading for you not to leave; that split second you have when you want to run back into someone's arms, but board the jet, anyway, because it seems the best thing to do at the time. "We'll always have Paris."

Everyone has their own idea of love. We learn love from our parents, from our friends, from media, and mostly from life. Life teaches us the joys and pain of loving others. We learn through trial and error, but mostly through error, what love we are looking for. There is nothing like pain to define what is truly important, and there is nothing like loss to teach the value of something taken for granted.

I asked friends and readers to send me their thoughts on love. These are a few of what they sent:

Love is not only about saying you love, but actually living the act of love. Smile at people you meet showing the love inside of you. Let it radiate through your actions and deeds. God loves all and we can show his love by loving all mankind.  -- JS

The only thing I know, true love is being able to lay your own life down for someone else. To me that's love, and it was shown by Jesus.  -- NW

I believe love is not an emotion but our acts of love. It is a conscious decision every day.  -- CS

I agree with CS, it's a conscious decision because other emotions can overwhelm feelings of love, and focusing on hurt, anger, disillusionment, etc., will kill love if you let it. Except for love for children. That seems to be the most unconditional love we can experience. It's easy to walk away from romantic love unless you always remember the reason you fell in love in the first place , and constantly nurture and grow with each other. It's every day, doing little things with occasional grand gestures.  -- DF

I'm of a different opinion than CS. In my opinion, an act is cleaning the house, mowing the lawn, etc. I can't feel any of those things. Although, I feel dread when I think about those things. We actually feel love. I, personally, don't make a conscious decision to love someone. That may be a character flaw, because I find it easy to love others, only to be disappointed later. When we love a pure, genuine love, we believe that the other party (spouse, friend, etc.) FEELS the same. When we learn they don't, through words, behavior, or what have you, it hurts. We feel it! Perhaps love is the best teacher we know. She teaches us how to let our guards down, that it's okay to be vulnerable, and how to pull up our bootstraps and toughen up when things don't go our way, as a result of doing so... and, by all means, let's do it all over again! She teaches us life's greatest gain, and life's greatest loss... life's greatest pain, and life's purest contentment.  -- LBB

Wow! That's great! So true! I think almost all of us get caught up in the day to day life and not only forget how to love but forget what it is. People take it for granted most definitely. Love is something everyone needs and deserves no matter what. The less you deserve love the more you need it. Right?  -- AHM

Love is such a small word, but such a big topic. Love is the one thing that you never reach your max. You just don't stop loving others even when you find your soulmate. There is an infinite amount. You never even know how much love you can feel until you look at your baby for the first time. Just when you thought you couldn't love anybody more than your spouse, those little eyes of your baby look up at you for the first time.  -- ES

Unrequited love, that love which, at times, can go unspoken for seemingly valid reasons, is evidenced in this exchange which my dear friend, Js, permitted me to use as part of this post. It reflects a young love, felt yet unspoken by both parties who lost contact after high school for over forty years:

Js: Love usually hurts a person. The saying goes we always hurt the ones we love and I've been betrayed by it more times than I'd like to admit to; lots of risks to loving... very painful. Sometimes it's not worth it. So far, for me, it's really never been worth it because I've always been the one hurt.

Me: You say that "sometimes its not worth it." What about the times it is? Tell me about when it IS worth it. Tell me why we spend 40 years of our lives thinking of someone we miss... someone we care about.

Js: That's different because it all started when we were young, can't change that, it just is, and that's a good kind of love - one that can't be broken.

Pay attention to the last sentence of this quote, "That's a good kind of love - one that can't be broken." Maybe, at the end of the day, this is all that is important. If you can spend forty years apart and still feel love for another, if you don't require a license to prove it or a ring to seal it, and regardless of a person's sexual orientation, if your love is "one that can't be broken," isn't that more important than anything else which may arise from the relationship?

In my own life I have loved and lost, but the loss did not diminish the love I feel for them.  The love still exists, but on a different level.  I have even found love that still exists for the mother of my children, even after all she has done to me, and the love of a lost friend found again after forty years.  Love is pliable and ever morphing.  Perhaps we need to recognize that, whatever love morphs into, it is still love.  Maybe it isn't the love we want, but it is still love.  Love does not have to be robust, it simply has to be.  Love is, to a great extent, what we make of it, what we want of it, and all of how we accept it for what it is.

Love doesn't make the world go 'round. Love is what makes the ride worthwhile.

-- Franklin P. Jones

What's love got to do with it? What's love got to do with anything? Love can be a second hand emotion. Love can be a third, fourth and fifth hand emotion until you finally get it right. But, love had to start somewhere. I have gambled with loved, and lost, many times and by many definitions. I have learned to regret none of them. They are important to who I was, who I have become, and who I will die being. It is only important that I have loved and am loved. I think it is so very important that we all learn to love, first ourselves and then others. I got this backwards, trying to love others before learning to love myself, and it was harder in the long run to understand life.

Love can be used and abused, beautiful and ugly, soft and hard, defined in many ways, but it will always be love. But you can never truly love another until you learn to love yourself.  Learning to love yourself makes loving others so much more meaningful. Remember, always, regardless of the love you feel, or the love you receive, it is important to always strive to make love "a good kind of love - one that can't be broken."

You can search throughout the entire universe for someone who is more deserving of your love and affection than you are yourself, and that person is not to be found anywhere. You yourself, as much as anybody in the entire universe deserve your love and affection.

-- Buddha

Editor's Note 

(re: disclaimer cum "get out of jail free" card) 

Before you go getting your panties in a bunch, it is essential to understand that this is just an opinion site and, as such, can be subjected to scrutiny by anyone with a differing opinion. It doesn't make either opinion any more right or wrong than the other. An opinion, presented in this context, is a way of inciting others to think and, hopefully, to form opinions of their own, if they haven't already done so. This is also why, occasionally, I will present an "opinion" just to stir an emotional pot. Where it may sound like I agree with the statements made, I'm more interested in getting others to consider another viewpoint. 

It is my fervent hope that we keep open and active minds when reading opinions and then engaging in peaceful, constructive, discussion in an arena of mutual respect concerning the opinions put forth. After over twenty years with military intelligence, I have come to believe engaging each other in this manner and in this arena is the way we will learn tolerance and respect for differing beliefs, cultures, and viewpoints.

We all fall from grace, some more often than others; it is part of being human. God's test for us is what we do afterward, and what we learn from the experience.

Pastor Tony spent 22 years with Air Force Intelligence as a planner, analyst, briefer, and instructor. He is founder of the Congregation for Religious Tolerance and author/editor of the Congregation's official blog site, "The Path," which offers a vehicle for commentary and guidance concerning one's own personal, spiritual, path toward peace and the final destination.