What is love?

What is love? There are tomes, poems, article and blogs written on it, but nothing can quite capture the experience of love in words.  Rumi is right when he said it is a bitter-sweet passionate experience we need to embrace and give into, rather than analyze...but, alas, I am a thinkaholic, and couldn't help analyze it.

I think love is part passion, part reason, and part trust. There are certain things about love and it's reasons we can know and there are certain things about love that are beyond the grasp of reason. In the heat of passion we cannot be rational, and even after that we might not entirely know why we love someone. But, once we "simmer down" and reflect, we can truly ask ourselves if the object of our love personifies the values and virtues we seek in a lover. I am not denying that there is an ineffable element in love, we call "chemistry" or " attraction" which we should not dismiss, but a true and meaningful relationship can't be built on that alone.

 Love is a more enriching experience the moment you realize it is also part trust and part hope in the face of ambiguity and uncertainty. At some point you have to trust and hope everything will be okay and "You" will be okay regardless of what happens. Absolute clarity that your lover will love you faithfully and indefinitely, or that you will not be hurt, is impossible. You have to be willing to be vulnerable and be willing to give into love, for loves sake. In his song, 'And so it goes', Billy Joel elegantly describes this moment; "In every heart there is a room, a sanctuary safe and strong, to heal the wounds from lovers past...I'll share this room with you and you can have this heart to break". Only when you submit yourself to love and accept not just the good, but the possibility of pain or suffering, can you embrace and fully enjoy love. Even the worst of heartbreaks teaches you a valuable lesson in life and love, if you are willing to embrace the experience, than try to run away from it. So, I hope we can find the courage to fall in love and let not fear or the pursuit of an elusive clarity hold us back.