Love has inspired books, songs, works or art, great achievements and
even the course of history. It is the bond that holds humankind together.
There are many definitions of love, yet each one is inadequate. Love
can be found in the dictionary somewhere between ‘like’ and ‘lust.’ And
maybe that’s where it belongs!

To understand what love is, we have to understand what love is not.
Love is not hate, violence, ambition or competition. It is not infatuation.
Infatuation focuses only on external traits and is merely a form of
conquest, which fills a personal need that is invariably followed by
disappointment.

For example, a woman marries a man because he is handsome, then
says that all he thinks about is his looks. She marries him because he is
intelligent, then feels stupid and accuses him of knowing it all. She
marries him because he is steady and sensible, then finds him boring
and dull. She marries him for his money, then is unhappy because all
he thinks about is business. She marries him because his is sexy, then
objects when he is sexually attractive to other women. And on and on it
goes! These examples are not love, merely infatuation. The same
examples can be used for a man as well.

Love in not sex. You can have sex without love, and love without sex.
But when sex and love are combined, the result is a beautiful, spiritual
experience, one unequalled by any other.
What, then, is love? Love is the attracting, uniting, harmonizing Force of
the Universe.

Love is the desire to support a person in being all that they can be. It’s
helping the other person to grow emotionally, mentally, and spiritually.
Most of all, love is allowing another person the complete freedom to be
himself or herself and accepting that person without trying to change
them.

The problem with many relationships is that love is one-sided. In order
for a relationship to be balanced, you must give, but also expect to
receive. Your needs must be met as well as those of your partner. The
compulsion to keep giving without expecting a return, or keep receiving
without expecting to give, does not support true love.

To love means to love. Period! It doesn’t imply conditions such as “I will
love you if…” “I will love you as long as…” or “I will love you when…”
Love that implies conditions is nothing more than emotional blackmail.
A child’s ability to love is usually set by the time he or she is
approximately two years old. This is why it is important to build the
child’s self-esteem during this period. The child must learn that he or
she is accepted for who they are and that love (or withholding love) is
not based on his or her actions.

Often, young girls do not learn that they can be loved for who they are.
They feel they need a man to make them feel loved and valuable. They
will often marry the first man that comes along who tells them what they
want to hear – that they are loved. Sensing her inferiority, the man will
often play on her feeling of inadequacy and try to dominate her. Since
she really does not love herself, she will obsessively seek the approval
and the love she didn’t get as a child. The odds are that she will end up
either in the divorce court or with a husband who is an alcoholic,
mentally, physically or emotionally abusive, or perhaps something
worse. If self-confidence, self-acceptance and the acceptance of others
had been cultivated early in life, this could have been avoided.
It is important in a relationship to preserve love. In order to do this, it is
necessary to realize that you are not a couple or twosome or anything
else. Despite the abundance of poetic imagery, it is literally impossible
to merge two human beings as one. You are simply separate individuals
who have found a great deal to share together. You came into the world
alone, and you will leave this world alone.

It is sheer folly to promise to love another person forever. While it is
beautiful to hear someone declare that they will love us forever – it is an
empty promise. Think about it for a moment. You cannot count on your
lover loving you forever, no matter what he or she says, for love is a
moment-by-moment experience. Yesterday’s love has been spent,
tomorrow’s love is not here yet, and today’s love must be earned.
The fact is that love will only continue as long as each person fulfills a
need and contributes to the relationship. And love must continue if a
relationship is to be held together. A legal contract won’t do it!
In order or preserve love, one partner must not attempt to change the
other. This happens much too often and is a major contributing factor to
break-up and divorce.

Love, romance and excitement are all possible when you permit your
partner to express his or her own individuality. When a relationship is
not stifled by unreasonable demands and expectations, it will grow
closer. The more independent you feel, the more you will value your
partner. True love depends on true freedom. Only those who are free
can afford to love without reservation.

Time spent together should be devoted to motives of love and sharing
those things you both enjoy. This will eliminate boredom and keep the
relationship alive. Vital, in this regard, is the development of a romantic
personality. Without romance, a person’s life lacks magnetism, so it is
important for you to cultivate it. A romantic personality will increase your
magnetism and enable you to attract the people, events and
circumstances you desire. We all need romance in our lives and are
grateful to those who stimulate and encourage it.

Everyone wants to be loved. Every stranger you meet is crying out
inside, “Please love me.” Sometimes this is difficult to justify in the light
of our actions; sometimes the individuals themselves don’t recognize
this as the inner hunger they feel.

Most people believe that they are not loved enough. This is because
they cannot recapture the love they once knew as children. And so, they
go through life trying to regain this perfect emotion by searching outside
of themselves.

Look at your life. You go to the grocery store for food, to classes for
education, to the doctor to get well, to a contractor to build your house,
to the hair stylist to have your hair done, to the department store for your
clothes. And so it is with love. You go to others for love. Like a carrot
dangled before a horse, there is love, just out of reach.

What is Love? If you are In love what is it that you are in love with… Her? or the Idea of her? Her goodness or your perception of her Goodness? Do you love her for her and all her beauty or do you love her for what she does for you?

To Know Love you must become it. LOVE IS NOT AN EMOTION but a way of being. It expresses itself in your devotion to the truth. Your smile to a stranger in the streets. Your willingness to be polite instead of rude. Your ability to be kind for the pure enjoyment of being kind.