A quote by Mik Everett reads, “If a writer falls in love with you, you could never die.”
Within pages of many novels, characters that live and breathe within the story have all, in one way or another, been inspired by a kind of love from the writer’s personal life. The way a character moves—as smoothly as water—to the way they speak—in monotonous rhythm or with quick-wit—and their perfume scent, their interests and jobs could have all been inspired by a particular love, and not only from romantic love.
Just like a library full of books, love has a mass number of genres and sizes for people—for love of family, friendships, a significant other, ourselves, and even for our life. For the month of February, we explore ways to view the most prominent enigma: Love.
Love’s Many Faces
“There are as many different kinds of love as there are people in the world.” Not one love is the same. Partners with an age gap, distance apart, different cultures or religions, or opposite personalities fall into common ground. Love tailors itself to suit each unique fingerprint. We define love with our own personal understanding and strategy.
Love simultaneously raises the stakes of peace and heartache, and your bravery to face your fate in love determines your outcome. When we are honest about love, we face vulnerability, but we also reach the possibility of being accepted for who we are and for what we want to do in our lives. Love pushes us to challenge our ordinary lives—to chase our dreams, to choose a partner, to be present with our family and friends and to help those in need.
Where to Find Love
Love is in the simplest things and the biggest treasures. Love is found in laughter, heard in a beloved’s voice and hides under happy memories and honest conversations. Love dances in eyes and hugs broken hearts. Love is the secret in food, the joy in our passions and the connection we feel with people. Love is the most challenging emotion to attain but the easiest to hold on to—nobody is sane enough to let it go.
What to Do with Love
Love is not what happens to you, it is what you do with it. Like everything in life, love requires action. A passion for painting will not create the images in your mind. A love for someone is not love unless you act on it. In love, we desire harmony and to feel like we matter. With love comes sacrifice, and in love, balance. Love is meant to grow and to encourage you to evolve as well. Love should not be stagnant or dull, it is passionate and powerful enough to change you—and its ultimate purpose is to change you for the better.
Love Demands Logic
However, love demands logic. Love does not pay bills nor provides health. Even though love is perceived as a complex emotion, it does force you to think realistically. Sometimes, love can easily be a lesson more than anything else can. Is your love practical or solely euphoric? If love is only a joyous adventure, is it enough to suit you and your needs and to give you a life capable of living? Or have you found the better, balanced hand of happiness and stability in love? Are you staying in love because it is comfortable and familiar, or have you indeed found it to be real enough to help you grow?
Love Makes Us Human
What would our world be without love? Distressful? Lonely? Maybe even empty? Love can bond us; without it, we would be in disparity. Love creates common ground and inspires respect. Without it, we can face great inequality. Without love, we will not connect on a deeper, emotional level. Love is the fuel that drives our passions into lifestyles, our desires into reality and our souls into worthy beings. Without love, we would not be human enough.
Love in the End...
Love tailors itself to suit every unique fingerprint. When love is found between people, it shakes souls awake to face the coming change—a change for a better life, a healthy relationship, to pursue our dreams. It dances in the eyes and hugs broken hearts. With love comes sacrifice, and in love, balance. Love demands logic. In a realistic world, our inner romantics are forced to see the good and evil in love and to work through it logically.
It is up to us to perceive love as the life-changing affirmative emotion it can be. In the end, we all savor the moments we have with love to feel at peace within ourselves and less alone in our big, chaotic world. It helps us write our own extraordinary stories. It makes us reach our human potential and feel more than mortal. In the end, without love, we would not be human enough.
- Written by Nora Al-Taha
