RSSTalking Love
One evening, some friends were having a wine drinking session at the Symposium, a dainty restaurant uptown. After three or four bottles of wine, Sarah pours what should be her final glass of wine. She smiles, “I love you,” at her best friend, Grace.
Grace: “What is Love?”
Sarah: “I don’t know.”
Grace: “How do you know love me if you don’t know what Love is?”
Paul: “I do,” he sips. “There is Common Love and Heavenly Love. Heavenly Love is the love we should chase. It is the closest to virtue.”
Eric: “No, no, not quite,” he sips. “There is Common Love and Heavenly Love. Common Love is vulgar and a disease associated with us. Heavenly Love is divine and brings us into harmony with all that is divine, including virtue.”
Grace: “I think Paul and Eric are both wrong. There aren’t two different types of Love. And Love isn’t vulgar just because it involves us. Love can’t be vulgar. Love can’t be a disease. If those are the conditions of Love, it isn’t Love. So, Common Love is out. Heavenly Love is left and that type calls for perfection. We are not perfect, which means, we will never know Love.”
Aaron: “Okay, okay, I’ll give you that. How about this? I read this story in a book. Human nature originally consisted of three beings. Men came from the sun. Women came from the earth. And the third came from the moon, which was actually something androgynous, a combination of male and female, sun and earth. One day, they decided to take over the gods. The gods then cut the being into man, woman, and the navel… yes, belly button. Love is the constant journey to heal the wound of separation. It is the constant journey to be whole again—This is where the concept of soul mate comes from.”
Grace: “Really? You read that?”
Aaron: “Yeah,” he smiled.
Sarah: “Aaron, your story sounds cute, but I don’t buy it. Your definition rests on the concept of predestination, where a particular man was made for a particular woman. I don’t really like that. I want to have choice. I want to choose my particular man.”
Adam: “All you guys are off. Love is a god. He is the most beautiful and the best. Love is the best guide. Love is the savior. Love is justice, moderation, courage, and wisdom.”
Sarah: “I can’t agree with that either. You put Love in this unreachable place, as if it is something we can’t get. Terms like “most beautiful” and “the best” are terms we can conceive, but they are never terms we can actually be. We are imperfect and those terms imply perfection.”
Diana: “Well…Love isn’t good or bad. Love isn’t beautiful or ugly. Love isn’t intelligent or stupid. Love isn’t mortal or immortal. If Love is good, beautiful, wise, and immortal, Love would not want anything. But, Love wants. If Love is bad, ugly, ignorant, and mortal, then Love would not be Love. How often do we describe Love as bad, ugly, ignorant, and mortal? Love is in between all things.”
Sarah: “Finally, someone I can agree with. Diana represents a Love that is compatible with me…us. It is neither perfect nor imperfect and Love wants—like us. I like her definition, we are Love. And I agree with that. “
Deacon: “Here is my speech and mental experiment: Let’s make the supposition that Love exists, and it is Perfect. Let’s also grant that Love is an idea especial to us-human beings-although evidence for the contrary is either here or there. And let’s make the supposition that Love is Everything. Now, does it follow that Everything has Love? Everything, in this case, is a peculiar sense because Everything is equated to us-human beings. It’s obvious that Everything does not exhibit Love, but does Everything have Love? It appears that the answer is, “Yes.” Although, moving from universal to particular can be illogical (and that also speaks for its converse). However, we granted the idea of Everything being us, universal being particular, and us being Everything, particular to universal; so, the answer seems to follow, though in a weird fashion. Since Everything has Love, I suggest we work on its exhibition.”
They all sit and stare blankly at him. He sips and smiles at Sarah and Grace.
Deacon: “I’m not sure if that’s much of an answer. Experiments are nothing more than attempts. And experiments do go wrong. However, I’d rather have an attempt in error than no attempt at all.”
Sarah: “I don’t know how I feel about that.”
Grace: “Me neither. How about you?”
20 Comments, Comment or Ping
Diana
Wow, a very philospophical post to wake up to during my week of finals. Still, I had to comment. I believe there is a little truth to everything that was said. Unfortunately, that’s not the way our society looks at love because we get our meanings from soap operas and the media. I heard something that I heard recently and although it’s about the love between a man and a woman in a relationship, I want to share it because I think it’s appliacable. “Relationhips and marriages are not about romantic love. It is about healing and wholeness.” I’ll leave you with that..
[Reply]
Alwayswrite reply on May 5, 2008 10:23 am:
So, Diana, I guess you agree with Aaron, given your last statement, “Relationships and marriages….healing and wholenes.” And marriages do involve romantic love, just not entirely. Romantic love starts the process of the healing and wholeness you speak of. My personal philosophy hinges heavily on choice. I fall in line with the existentialist camp of thought. I’m on that boat too, I just don’t enjoy the fact that my choice is extracted in the process.
It’s sad that soap operas and the media are framing our conceptions of love. Most of them are false abstractions. They force you to believe that either love doesn’t exist or that love is easy. Both are false. Love definitely exists and love is not easy.
–Alwayswrite
[Reply]
*SB*
I have to say that I like the flow of this conversation although I do not agree with all of it…its refreshing to see people value love enough to have a healthy debate on it with some educated opinions!!
[Reply]
Alwayswrite reply on May 5, 2008 1:52 pm:
What don’t you agree with? What is your view? Cite it. Write it out. Frame it.
–Alwayswrite
[Reply]
*SB* reply on May 5, 2008 3:43 pm:
I guess i dont agree with their being a common love and heavenly love…I just believe there is just love and various degrees of love…like a father has love for his wife and a different degree of love for his child…
The ugly, bad love referred above is not a type of love…but the individuals actions and twisted sentiments that make it ugly or bad…
I guess I agree with Malia…i believe love is pure…
[Reply]
Malia reply on May 5, 2008 3:49 pm:
Bad and Love are oxymorons…so that one got lost on me as well…..
[Reply]
Alwayswrite reply on May 5, 2008 4:03 pm:
I don’t believe there are two different types either. Ugly,bad love is a perversion of Love. You’re right. I would be careful of stating different degrees of Love though. Then, when does one degree, say, love for a father and his wife, change into the love for his child? Where is the demarcation? That would be a problem in explanation for you.
[Reply]
*SB* reply on May 5, 2008 4:10 pm:
I cant determine where one degree of love ends and another starts but I dont believe that all love is the same love…one example is the difference from loving someone and being in love with someone…thats two different degrees of love…ya feel?
[Reply]
alwayswrite reply on May 6, 2008 1:07 am:
Yeah…kind of. I don’t even know the difference between “in love” or “loving someone.” I consider being “in love” as weaker b/c when you fall into something, you usually want to get out of it.
[Reply]
Malia
It’s all a little over thought out to me….but I guess it’s all in the perception.
Love is a choice!!!! In every second of every day we choose to love or not to love. When I’m mad at TROUBLMAN and I go off in here, it doesn’t make me love him any less.
When I give myself to someone and they don’t reciprocate my feelings that doesn’t make my love ineffectual.
When someone loves me and I hurt them by my actions that doesn’t minimize their love for me.
Love is presence, love is trying, love is listening, love is pure……
It grows in it’s depth, but first it always comes through CHOICE….
“MALIA - PSYCHE 101″
[Reply]
Alwayswrite reply on May 5, 2008 1:51 pm:
So…it wasn’t over thought out, right? You clearly agree with the choice aspect of one of the characters. “Love is pure…” what does that really mean? That’s the purpose of the conversation, to discuss and get educated feedback. Definition is an important practice for everything. The conversation is about definition. “What is Love?” Define it. We have all the conversation for Love’s definition. We have all had the conversations for definitions with many subjects. Not over thought out. Just on a search for definition.
–Alwayswrite
[Reply]
Malia reply on May 5, 2008 2:49 pm:
PURE——my love for you! My love for Q! My love for SB! My love for A MOM! When you do something for no reason at all. When you don’t have clandestine motives behind your kindness! When someone believes in you even though the odds are against you, when you answer emails and phone calls not because you feel obligated but because you really want to….
[Reply]
Alwayswrite reply on May 5, 2008 4:13 pm:
I think Love does have an attachment of some type of obligation or duty. Obligation or duty doesn’t have to take the negative connotation that I think you are ascribing it. For example, I feel obligated to be faithful to my wife. That is an obligation I’d certainly accept and not feel bad for accepting. Obligation isn’t necessarily a chore. I think you’re using obligation in the sense of it being a chore.
Still, your definition of Love being pure is vague. Giving examples of something isn’t defining it. Examples reference other things. For example, basketball player, Michael Jordan, Kobe Bryant, Rip Hamilton, those are examples of ballplayers. But, they aren’t the concept of basketball player.
Love is pure. Okay, what properties make it pure?
[Reply]
Q. reply on May 5, 2008 4:25 pm:
man, i see TROUBL is not playing.. try to give an answer, and y’all ain’t having it.. let me find out comments are becoming thesis papers!! i ain’t mad.. forcing more intelligent dialogue and analysis.. i see y’all!!
[Reply]
alwayswrite reply on May 6, 2008 1:10 am:
Good. Mental exercise. I don’t just write just to write. There’s usually a point to my shit. Plus, thinking is fun to me.
[Reply]
Q. reply on May 5, 2008 2:00 pm:
i didn’t even know ineffectual was a word!! i’m adding that to my vocab.. good looking Malia!!
[Reply]
Malia reply on May 5, 2008 2:42 pm:
What?!?!?! I taught the master something???? No wayyyyyy!!!
Sure you can have it…there’s more where that came from!!!!
Just showing some love!!! LOL-PUN INTENDED!!!!
[Reply]
Q. reply on May 5, 2008 4:26 pm:
the master?? stop playing!!
the love is appreciated and returned.. nice pun.. that’s about all i can add to this subject..
[Reply]
Diana
I don’t think it’s that people are not satisfied with the answers but that each persons opinions and beleifs are different from one another. For example, when my friends talk to me about their relationships and call it love, I may call it being posessive or jealous and vice versa. As a society we definitely have not grasped the meaning of love and it’s sad. It’s become superficial, monetary, physical, and fantasy like. People are always seeking to feel what the media portrays as love, but don’t realize that it doesn’t exist. Love is a beautiful thing and should be treated with respect!
[Reply]
alwayswrite reply on May 6, 2008 1:12 am:
Okay. I can see that. I’m not satisfied with the answers. I think we need more dialogue to come up with an answer.
[Reply]
Reply to “Talking Love”
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