Love is a funny thing

Love is a very funny thing. Exciting when it is new. Making us barely able to breathe because we can’t get enough of the passion and sensation that run through our bodies. At first it is a physical thing. Very surface. And despite the red flags we may feel about the person we have fallen hopelessly in love with, we dismiss them. Store them away. Too infatuated to want to spoil the moment. Because we are too giddy with the physical attraction of love.

Eventually the passion starts to wane. We settle into more of a routine. No longer seeing the physical traits of the person we love. Moving beyond the surface to a deeper more challenging love. At this stage we begin to see the very thing that attracted us to the person in the first place is the very thing that begins to repel us. Starts to grate on us. Irritate us to no end. Until we realize the reason why it does is because it is reflecting back to us the very thing we need to work on.

True love is just that. We attract the person into our lives that has the trait or traits that we need the most. In other words, the person we choose to love and to remain with is the person who is our greatest teacher. They are the ones who will challenge us the most to be the best we can be and also the worse we can be. Because that person gets to see the most intimate facets of who we are. The person behind the façade that goes out into the world.

The person that hurts about certain aspects of life. The person who has phobias about certain things. The vulnerable person only meant for the true love of our lives to see, love and nurture. But in some instances, particularly with puppy love, that love is not sustainable. It is a love that is meant to show us how capable we are of loving. It is to introduce us to love and to heartache. To grow us from being a child into an adult. So when those young loves don’t last, even though we think the world has ended and we will never love again, we will. And what we discover is the next love will take us to an even deeper place within our being. An even deeper place of love than we ever imagined. Because our hearts have been opened to the possibility of love.

Love is a very funny thing. It is not like the fairy tales where everyone rides off into the sunset and lives happily ever after. It is more enduring than that if we allow it to grow us. Happily ever after means sometimes getting it wrong. Sometimes realizing we are not ready for the lesson our love brings and walking away. Sometimes feeling like we will never love again. Or wondering why we love.

But at the end of the day, there is no greater feeling than the feeling of love. That feeling that makes us feel invincible. Like we can walk on water. Like nothing is impossible. Like the world was designed just for us. So the question becomes would you rather have loved than never to have loved at all?

I know my answer is I am glad to know love. To have experienced the loves and hurts along the way to arrive at the love of my life, my husband of 21 years, who still challenges me on a daily basis. As I do him. But I know he is my love. As I am his. And I would not trade us for the world. Because love is a very funny thing. A beautiful thing. A love thing that we don’t understand until we allow it fully into our hearts, minds and soul. Expanding the possibility of who we are. Because love colours the world differently. Allowing us to see the beauty and tragedy in everything.

After all we are born of love. Creatures of love. Without it, there would be no us. So how could we not allow ourselves the pleasure and pain of that which grows us -Love. And only love.