Meditations on the nature of love.

[deathpixie]

Love can suffer hardship
Love is tough and kind
Love is never envious
Or puffed up with pride
Love is always truthful
Love is never stale
Love is always hopeful
And never dreams that it can fail.

"Love Is The Law" - Paul Kelly …nothing but a dream.

I've been thinking a lot about love lately. Why it's so important to people. Why we spend our lives searching for it. The concept that there is a 'perfect one' for everyone. And why it seems that you aren't complete as a person unless you're with someone.

The media and popular culture are steeped in images of love and romance. It's impossible to listen to the radio (or a CD) without hearing tales of love found and love lost. Books, television, movies… we're told right from the beginning that love conquers all, that some day our prince (or princess) will come. We're encouraged to dress to attract the opposite sex, given lessons on how to keep that interest, and advice on how to save a relationship on the rocks, or how to pick yourself up and try again if that fails. Scientists make studies of hormones and pheromones and brain wave patterns, trying to define just why people are attracted to each other, and how that can be replicated. There's a hell of a lot of energy and resources and time expended on love.

See, I have some problems with the idea that love conquers all. I think it's a dangerous fiction, misleading people into believing that if they have love, everything will work out fine. In the movies, sure, that's true. But in the real world, love isn't enough. There needs to be trust, and compromise, and respect and equality in a relationship. There needs to be work, and sometimes even then, things don't work out. Perhaps the increase in divorce rates is a reflection of the way people have their expectations dashed in the face of reality - they meet, they fall in love, they marry (or co-habitate) all under a fuzzy pink cloud of romance. Then things start intruding; she works late a lot, he has family demands, there are bills and illnesses and boring, mundane everyday things. And the fuzziness starts wearing from the relationship, and they realise that maybe love isn't enough, that another person can't 'rescue' you from your old life and make everything all better.

…Suddenly my life doesn't seem such a waste
It all revolves around you.

"Come What May" Nicole Kidman & Ewan McGregor Moulin Rouge Soundtrack

*shudders* Maybe it's just me, but I find this sort of thing really disturbing. The idea of living for someone else… again, it's all wonderfully romantic, but it's a terrible thing, to have so little regard for yourself that you have to identify as part of another person. And of course, it's guaranteed to fail, because that's not a healthy relationship. It becomes boring and insular, and the dominant person can get tired of the responsibility of being responsible for the other's happiness, and the submissive person basically loses whatever spark it was that they had that attracted their lover in the first place.

Now by this stage, my readers are probably shaking their heads and saying, "Poor Rossi, she's gotten all bitter and cynical after her relationship ended." And maybe that's partly true - even seven months on, I still have moments of anger and hurt. Understandable, given the amount of time we were together. But I find it interesting that people tell me that I'll find someone else, my 'one', and then I'll be happy. Because one of the things I found after BRM and I broke up is how liberating it felt to be single - I'm free to be myself, as I want to be, without worrying about what the other person will think. There are no ties; if I want to travel, it's just a matter of saving up and going. I don't have to check plans or have things sprung on me because he forgot to tell me. I can go out and flirt and laugh and dance and drink and not worry about whether I'm embarrassing anyone except myself.

I know that not all relationships are as restrictive as mine turned out to be. But it took me ages to realise just how much I'd changed during that time, how much of my personality I'd repressed. And then I got angry, not at BRM, but at myself: why on earth had I'd been so stupid and so passive, to allow myself to get into and stay in such a situation? The reason? Because I was in love, and love conquers all. Love forgives all. Love is about making sacrifices and providing support and all that other stuff. Love finds a way.

And that's why I don't like the ideals of love that we're fed. Because I believed in them, and wasted years of my life, hanging onto something that should have ended, a year ago, two years ago, even five years ago. I can't believe that there is a 'one' hanging around out there for me, because I thought BRM was that 'one', and I was wrong. I don't want to fall in love again, because when I do love someone, it's a total commitment; they get all of me, and I don't want to lose myself again.

But I also don't want to be alone. Because I have been alone, these past seven months, and it hurts almost as much as the break-up did. It's more than just sex - sex I can get relatively easily, if I want it. I can just go down to Melbourne and stay with Michael. I have a number of male friends who are happy to oblige, when geography coincides. It's the companionship I need, the comfortable feeling of just being with someone. But I know I can't have that unless I'm willing to let myself love again, and I'm not sure I can do that, even if I do find the right person. Which I haven't - I have the worst luck with men. The ones I can get aren't the right ones, like Michael; the ones who do feel right are usually off-limits for various reasons, like my friend Ben. I know it hasn't been long, that I'm still healing, but it's something that I don't seem to be able to escape thinking about. Everywhere I go, I get 'told' that a person without love you're nothing, you're not whole. I'm not waiting for a knight in shining armour to come and rescue me - I'm just looking for someone who will love me, and who I can trust to love in return.

See, this is the conundrum. This is why I give people such mixed signals. I don't want to believe that love is all-important, that love is the be all and end all. But I'm also a hopeless romantic, in my own fashion. I want to believe that I will find someone one day, but even if I do, I'm afraid of making myself vulnerable again. So I try and make myself strong by telling myself that it doesn't matter, that I'm better off being my own person, that friends and casual sex will give me what I need. But I'm not fooling anyone, you or myself. It is important. I just wish I could figure out why.

Comments

*raising the "bitter woman* goblet and toasts*

[trishalynn.livejournal.com]

Hear, hear, Rossi. If I think about it, it's been approximately 1 year, 2 months and a week since my first love relationship ended. If I *really* think about it, the love ended about nine months prior to that. So many things in my life have changed as a result of having once been in love and now dealing with the after-effects of it. I went through a dangerous cycle of freedom that could have ended up with me seriously hurt. I instantly mistrust anyone's interest in me; everything gets passed through the cynicism filter. I can't look at my male friends in the same way.

At the same time, I think I am doing "okay" as far as recovering. I keep making jokes about my recovery, but something tells me that I really do need to approach life after my first love the same way one does life after declaring themselves to be alcoholic. Limit exposure, change your behaviors, admit you have a problem. Sounds easy, ne? It really is harder than it looks. Believe me, I'm finding that out the hard way.

I do remember something Dex said once about 2 am snuggles being the best feeling in the entire world... that we go through the pain of relationships for the warmth and security of the 2 am snuggle. That's something I'm forever going to miss, and maybe something that I'm always going to cherish the most from any relationship I find myself in. That, and the companionship, and being able to go home and have someone waiting for you to hold you...

I'm romantic enough at heart to believe that love does exist. I'm realistic enough to believe that it can't last without basic fundamental strengths in a relationship. I'm romantic enough to believe that people who are different will find ways to compromise for love.

I was not in love enough to compromise. For that, I hope that Cupid and Aphrodite can forgive me.

Re: *raising the "bitter woman* goblet and toasts*

[deathpixie]

You weren't enough in love, and I was too much... that's the kicker, isn't it? Love can make us do such stupid things. Thanks, Trisha, if only for making me feel like I wasn't boring everyone to tears. I know my journal of the past few weeks has been pretty tiresome, but that's just the way it is. I thought I was doing okay, but lately, things just seem harder to recover from. Like I'm worn out from all the stoicism. But I won't start whinging again. Just have to soldier on, I guess. Because what else is there to do?