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The Power of Love

Love is by nature exceedingly timid and modest,
but when roused-bold and fearless in the extreme.

~Charles Fillmore~

There is probably more written about love than any other topic. Love is the opposite of conflict and hatred and has many meanings. We think of love as a romantic feeling, warm and fuzzy, which draws us to another person. It has no reason or explanation. It’s just how we feel. We can’t explain it although people have tried in various ways over the centuries.

Love can also mean sexual desire. Love and sexuality can be intertwined in a relationship and complement each other. But it is also possible to love someone without being sexually attracted and to be sexually attracted to someone we don’t love. The two are often confused. Sometimes one partner is motivated chiefly by love and the other by passion.

Love can mean caring for someone. We can wish the best for someone and do what we can to make his or her life better. Sometimes we sacrifice our own needs for the sake of the person we love. The degree of our love for that person determines how much we are willing to sacrifice.

Sometimes our love is not returned. It can be very lonely and disappointing to continue loving a person who does not return our love. Sometimes it is returned and we bond in a life of mutual caring. It is certainly much more satisfying to love a person when our love is returned.

We sometimes use love to mean we like a thing or an activity. My children had a standard joke in reply to my saying I loved something, “If you love it, why don’t you marry it?” Love can be silly at times. Love for things is not the same as love for a person. Things don’t love us back. There is nothing personal in this love. It is just a matter of enjoyment.

We also talk of God’s love for us, love of our family members, our friends and our fellow beings in the abstract. Love can obviously mean many things. For me there are two basic meanings. One is how we feel about someone and the other is what we do about it.

There are many different levels of feeling love. They range from temporary good feelings to lifelong commitment and devotion. There are also many different levels of response to love. We might not do anything at all other than enjoy the good feeling. We might show our caring for another person when it is convenient. We might also put that person’s needs and desires before our own.

Simon and Garfunkel sang “I am a rock; I am an island.” John Donne wrote, “No man is an island.” Where do you fit?

Action Steps

  • What does love mean to you?
  • Who loves you and why?
  • What is the best thing about being loved?
  • Whom do you love and why?
  • What is the best thing about loving someone?
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