The Way of Love
True Love is so quiet, we hardly hear her.
On the matter of trying to understand what love truly is I think my biggest take away is this. The popular view of love is opposite to the one that leads to happier people and healthier relationships. So, how can the two views be so antithetical?
It is because each side believes love originates from a different place.
The Pop Love view comes from mankind, out of our emotional centers. It involves a yearning for connection based on different human appetites and drives. Because these drives exist it is easy to accept the emotional attractions that come from them as a legitimate form of love. After all, they feel real. However, other than the fact this feel-good love really feels good, there are some serious problems when it is accepted as truth worth building life upon.
Pop Love isn’t always patient and kind. It doesn’t always have the other’s best interest at heart. And sometimes, it isn’t real at all, only a trick to manipulate someone through emotional cues and triggers. Furthermore, this emotional stimulation has an addictive element that helps sell products and services, along with the even darker side of coercing people (especially vulnerable children) into a phony digital and potentially dangerous pseudo-reality.
The opposite perspective, so opposed by the pop side that it is branded by so many secular social influencers as racist, sexist and the rest, is that God created Love. Because the idea of God enters the discussion, there comes with it the expected visceral reaction. After all, the idea of a power higher than we are is the greatest brake on self control — something that strongly opposes our natural impulses.
On the other hand . . .
If you have been burned by the casual anything-goes side and are seeking to recover your own mental and emotional health as well as improve and strengthen relationships with others, so they can become healthy and lasting, this less popular road is the one to consider taking. Try asking the God you don’t know and don’t believe for help and see what happens next.
And don’t be surprised if the answers sneak up on you quietly. That seems to be true love’s nature.
