What is Love Anway?

In my Oxford Canadian Dictionary, love is defined as: 1. An intense feeling of deep affection or fondness for a person or thing 2. Sexual Passion 3.Sexual relations, along with some other definitions that have no bearing on what I'm about to discuss so I've excluded them. These days, no one word has a singular meaning. With all the slang out there, its no surprise that what we used to refer to as the English language is now call Modern English. I wanted to explore these multiple definitions to see where they would lead us, and to answer that vital question "what is love?"

1. An intense feeling of deep affection or fondness for a person or thing.

I had to study this one long and hard. On the surface, it sounds simple and straight forward. But I began to wonder about the series of "loves" we experience in a lifetime. It’s then I realized that this definition as inaccurate. We often associate love with monogamy and although we may succeed in practice, we fail in the emotional department. How can I make such a bold statement? Easy: the ex-husband/wife + children scenario. Some men and women can easily say that they still love their ex, because they are the father/mother of their children, yet move on to other "loving" relationships. So if we're staying true to our Oxford definition, we are certainly not demonstrating love. Why? We've added an extra person. But life has shown us that we are capable of loving more than one person and in varying degrees. So now my question is: Should the definition of love be redefined or should we exclude it from our dictionaries because it is simply too complex to be reduced to one or even several particular meanings?

Ridiculous as this may sound, I find it impossible to love things in its form. The only reasonable explanation for loving any thing is the symbolism surrounding that thing. A good example is a family heirloom; usually an object of great importance. The love you feel comes from the connection you have with those who are associated to the object. Other than that, we only love things for as long as we own it. Whether we lose it, it breaks or it’s stolen, soon enough we forget about them or we replace them.

2. Sexual Passion & 3. Sexual Relations

Sexual passion refers to the desire to have sex. Sexual relation is just a classy way of defining sexual intercourse. To me, this has little to do with love and more to do with physical intimacy. However when it comes to women, we often misinterpret physical intimacy for love. We often use sex or lack thereof as a barometer for whether or not a man loves us. We even at times egotistically assume by establishing a physical connection, we are only steps away from a loving relationship. This is simply not true; many of us, including myself, can testify to that. The experience of being in love is likely to create sexual passion and not the other way around. And acknowledging that sexual relations has a definition of its own, it should not be under love, since having sex with someone doesn't result in a fairytale ending. Some may disagree and are in their very right to do so. But I must ask this question: How do you explain those who wait until their wedding night to consummate their relationship? Can we say that because they haven't had sex that they are not in love?

My Conclusion

Love is whatever you want it to mean as long as the person you’re with agrees. All I know is no matter what definition of love you choose to believe in, there's someone out there who believes in the same thing. The quest to find that person is what keeps Love alive.

Shamira

Do you have a story to share or a topic you'd like me to write in my next post? Feel free to email me: thaluvchild@gmail.com