by J. Faith Malicdem // May 15, 2019
Love, while unhinged at times, should stabilize and ground us. It's a feeling and/or a shared emotion that should feel unconditional. Feeling love for someone, or being in love with someone, should bring relief, tranquility, and healing to you. If it doesn't, then the love you're in is probably unhealthy.
To love someone (romantically) ideally is an unrealistic feat early on, as we are still learning to love by experiencing it firsthand. And thus, alas, love typically manifests in ugly and cruel ways-- ways we could never anticipate. It brings out the worst in us, even though it should bring out the best. Been there.
Fortunately, our platonic relationships keep us rooted in our sanity. They teach us the building blocks of how to love someone healthily in a romantic manner. But sometimes things don't just click that way. Sometimes, you'll have a substantial amount of healthy friendships and relationships with loved ones, but your heart still finds ways to twist your perceptions of things and of people, leading to m a s s destruction and probably your 5th breakdown that day.
Platonic relationships aren't the only foundation of how we learn (or fail to learn) to love healthily; a positive relationship with ourselves and our own image plays a vital role as well. Our biological preparedness (lol ap pysch) has predisposed us to love others before we love ourselves so our ancestors could ban together and form clans, relationships, and families. It was a form of survival. Therefore this new "treat yo self, love yo self" phenomenon is more of a challenge than one might think. So when you make progress in loving yourself, give yourself credit. You deserve it.
All in all, there are so many defining factors of love, it's just up to us to define it in our best interest, and on our own terms.
with all the love, ThisDidntReallyMakeSenseImJustRamblingNow Faif
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