"Love is a many splendored thing,
Love lifts us up where we belong,
All you need is love"
- Ewan McGregor from Moulin Rouge
Ah, this thing called love. Many sappy movies have been made about it. Even more sappy songs have been written about it. Most people would agree that we all need love, and some have even killed themselves for lack of it. Yet how many of us can even begin to comprehend this powerful emotion that causes people to do the strangest and stupidest things? Love is a language spoken by many yet understood by few... (cool eh? I made that quote up my self! :P).
Ok, enough of the corny intro. As the time draws closer for me to go back to Malaysia, I'm forced to deal with an upheaval of emotions due to having to leave behind my first ever sort-of-bf. And as one thought leads to the next, this has made me think a lot more about this thing called love. All sorts of questions come into my mind. If we had agreed on our beliefs, and ended up committing to each other, would it have become a relationship that lasts? If we made such a commitment, would we be able to compromise on our many differences and make it work out? And even more importantly for me, am I actually in love with him in the first place?
That last question is most important to me because after all the time we've spent together, I've thought several times about telling him those three little words, "I love you". And yet I have stopped myself every time, due to my own philosophies on love, which I have dedicated the rest of this blog entry explaining.
Like most other females, I like romance (especially when it happens to me!). I'd like hearing the guy I fancy whisper sweet nothings into my ear. I'd like being able to have someone's hand to hold wherever I go. I'd like having someone to drive me up to the top of some hill at night so we can lie down and look at the stars in each others arm. In such situations, it would be so easy to think you're in love with the object of your affection. In movies, it's quite normal to see lovey dovey couples saying they're in love with each other after a couple of good dates and a real hot kiss.
But although I do like romance, it really irks me how easily the words "I love you" are so frivolously thrown around in Hollywood movies. Case in point, the movie Titanic, which the first 2 hours shows a young couple getting it on after knowing each other for just a day or two. In the end, when the ship sinks (the most fun part of the movie, I reckon) the couple professes their love for each other in the freezing waters before the poor guy freezes to death in the waters. Very romantic? Yes. But a true depiction of what love is about? I don't think so. And this isn't just a Hollywood phenomenon, but happens in real life too. I's just ridiculous to me that anyone could possibly know that they are in love with someone they've just known for such a short time. And of course, I don't believe in the whole 'love-at-first-sight' stuff either. I think anyone who says they're in love without someone they've known for two seconds probably just thinks that person has the hottest bod they've ever laid their eyeballs on, and they just wanna copulate with that person right there and then. That isn't love, but a little thing else called lust. Love at first sight, to me, is impossible because I believe love is something that takes time to develop. And love is something that has to be learned over a long, long, LONG time.
Before you call me a romance killjoy, just think about it. Love is a completely unnatural thing for us human beings. In fact, the most natural thing for us is to be completely selfish, uncaring brats. From the day we are born and for many years after that, all we care about is our own self interest. When we were babies, did we care that it was 2am and our mummy and daddy needed to get some sleep after a hard day's work? NoooOOOooo...if we were hungry or just has a poo, we screamed our heads off, demanding that our needs be met NOW. When we were 6 year olds walking with mummy and daddy in the shopping complex, do we ask them what they want so we can get it for them when we collect enough angpow next Chinese New Year? NoooOOOOoooo...we only see what we want and then constantly cry and scream and wail until we get what we want. When we're young, our natural instinct is to care about ourselves, not others. It's all about me, myself and I. It's only when we grow older when we start to understand the concept of sharing and giving and caring for others. We have to learn to love over time. And love is a difficult thing to learn because it goes against the very nature of who we are. And I don't mean what I'm about say as a general conclusion about everybody, but I believe a lot of people haven't really learned how to love, but still can say they love someone else very easily, when in fact, they really don't. Kids may say they love their parents... perhaps only because the parents cared for them and gave them good things. Once they stop doing that, would a kid still say he/she loves a parents? Probably not. A dog owner might say he/she loves their dog...perhaps only because the dog is super friendly and has a good nature. But if the dog started chewing up the shoes, well, it's not so easy to love after all. A couple might say they love each other...perhaps only because they make each other feel good or all warm and cuddly inside. But after a couple of spats and misunderstandings, 'love' goes out the window and they break up or get divorced (50% of marriages in America end in divorce, so that's no exaggeration). In all those examples, people all say they love someone because they're getting something in return. And once they stop getting it, they stop loving. It's conditional love. And I don't know if anyone would disagree, but to me, that's not real love. Real love is unconditional. And the closest to real love in everyday life that I can think of is a parent's love for their child. But even that, sadly, can be conditional sometimes as some parents have kids just to have someone to care for them in the future... the child can be more of an investment than someone they truly love.
I don't expect the whole world to agree with me, but I also believe that the real love means being able to give sacrificially even if nothing is received in return. Giving things like your time to be with a person, your money to buy things for that person, and most of all, giving your whole self to that person by opening up and trusting that person, even if nothing is received in return. Even the Bible has the same message in John 3:16, when it says "God so loved the world that he gave His only Son...". Love is all about giving. And the more important something is to you, the more it reveals your love for a person if you're willing to give it away for that person. And fully giving your heart and your trust to a person can be one of the most difficult things to do, as it makes you vulnerable to being hurt by the person if they betray you. Of course, the most important thing to anybody would be our lives (coz' nothing else would matter to us if we're dead, right?), and so it makes sense that the ultimate act of love would be to die for someone else, especially if that someone else didn't give a hoot (Might remind you of a certain guy in the Bible...). And so the whole act of giving, again, goes against our human nature to care for ourselves. Which idiot enjoys getting hurt by someone they gave their trust to? I certainly don't.
As such, I've learned to be very very careful about using this word 'love' with anyone. Because I don't want to be telling anyone that I love them unless I'm pretty sure I really, really mean it... that I know I will give unconditionally to them no matter what. And this applies not only to my BGR's, but to any other relationship.. with my family, with my friends, and with God. I care a lot about most of these people, but I'd feel uncomfortable telling these people that I love them. Coz' when I ask myself how much I would be willing to give up for these people in my life, I have doubts that it will be much. I'm still very much a selfish brat at heart, and though I wish I could do the Jesus thing and love everyone unconditionally all the time, I know I still fall far, far short of that level.
And which is why I am unable to say that I am in love with Stuart, coz' although I think I could give up quite a few things to be with him, there is one thing I would never give up for him.... my faith in Jesus. I probably would be willing to give up living in Malaysia to stay with him in Aussieland. I probably would be willing to learn to deal with our differences in other areas. But I'm not willing to give up Jesus just to be with him...and he's not willing to compromise his own beliefs for me.
Which doesn't mean that we both don't care about each other.... we care about each other a lot and we will miss each other greatly. But whether that care has crossed the threshold to love, I can't definitely say no.... but at this time, I'd think it's unlikely. Perhaps if we had both still decided to commit to each other, over time, we would learn to love each other. But that is something I guess neither or us will ever really know, or have the chance to find out....
Three words
I so want to say it
But not sure if I'd mean it
I feel something for you
But are those feelings true?
So many have used it
And many've abused it
To get what they want to
Don't wanna do that to you
So this game I won't play it
Unless I'm sure I want in it
A committment of two
Between me and you
So the day that I say it
I'll be sure that I mean it
And that my feelings are true
When I say "I love you".
-2 December 2004
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