Is love even real?

sometimes true love works , sometimes it doesn't.

marrying for love as the norm is a recent development. Something that happened during the enlightenment and helped along by the industrial revolution allowing for groom to have the money to pay for weddings without parental approval. Still women would get married as wages and opportunities were not the same back then until idk 50 years ago.

I think we forget that this current society of marriage and childrearing has never been done before. Large amounts of single moms and now large amounts of young people not getting married.
This is an experiment...

True love as I see it does not require another person. Love all things. Even learn to love your hate.
Some relationships last. Some come and go. Get it while the getting is good. Know when to walk away.

Sounds hard what you are going through and brave of you to share. That shows to me that you have a lot of love in you to start of with. Firstly there is an order to love that mostly is unknown and that leads to assumptions. Love is a state and when you are in it you have a deep level of appreciation towards many forms of life. Where we all go wrong is when we assume that other is the same state of love. Perhaps they are temporarily, when we are loving them but happens when we are not? I would say that they return to their average consciousness, whatever that may be. Consciousness is a development and a discovery of different states. The big issue I have found is that when you are relating with another human being a piggy back ride often occurs. The moment you are not giving them the piggy back ride, their consciousness drops and they start looking for a refill in other places, by different means. The true understanding of love, is best understood for me at least via consciousness. The best way to forge a partnership in love is that each participant already is in love. From there we somehow agree to share that space, from our own rich standpoint. Even still, it should not be compared to economic richness, it is sharing of Love. That love is the same consciousness, but each individual is experiencing that in their own particular way. Also Love is not something we should consider as physical in the least. It can be expressed in the physical but even the expression of love is not pure love. Take holding hands, we must view that as an expression of love and that is a very beautiful thing to behold or observe. Now another thing to ask oneself and this can be done via observation of other persons, is this person in a state of desire? Desire in general is a state of hunger, one is hungry to fill a hole. If we just see people as people we are only seeing the surface and we are not seeing the consciousness. If that is the general case we are blind and that way we see people only. In most cases, we see people and project on to them what we would like to see. All we can do with love is share it, but share it we must learn to do it wisely. If not there will be many monkeys waiting to hang of the tree,
a reply to: TechniXcality

Some souls you get a connection with some souls you do not. I have an easier time with the "spiritual realm" and some animals than with most people. The only souls that I now days would think of romance with are the empaths and psychics and those souls seem to be rarer on this level.

True love/oneness seem to be very rare here but there are souls who find it.

"I think, therefore I am" ~Descartes

I feel love, therefore love exists.

a reply to: TechniXcality

Och! Poor puppy! Now I want to hug you. Gave you star and flag instead, hope that helps.

But love is real. You will find it.
It will melt you down to your very core
and you will never be the same as you were before.

See? That rhymes and what rhymes is true.

a reply to: TechniXcality

True love is real. But it's based on respect. Yeah, there's all the chemical stuff that helps in procreation, but I don't mean that. I mean the kind of respect and admiration you feel for someone that brings tears to your eyes - the intimacy expressed between two people and you feel your heart swell - the genuine desire for the other person to experience good in their lives. Oh, yeah... it's real. I think it's probably fairly rare, in that I've only experienced it once (and still am) and it's the best, most important thing to me in my world.

I hope one day, you won't ask if it's real, but will know it is, because you'll be in it.

a reply to: ancientthunder

This was a beautiful and well written response and it reminded me of something a moment in time that made me step back and have a deep reflective understanding.

My sister is a massage therapist, and she just married a man named Tim who is in medical school, and my sister is working on her masters and ultimately her Ph.D. In psychology, on Sunday she often comes to give me a massage and I help pay for her insurance ect (but somehow she still always gets fifty bucks from me)

One Sunday, she came to my house all giddy and excited ,and constantly texting her husband, I was smoking in the garage before the massage with her, and I finally asked her'what she was so excited about? She acted very secretive, and she had a smile from ear to ear, and upon more pressuring ,she finally told me, in a near whisper," I am building a perpetual motion machine with Tim in his garage".

At which point I started laughing and poking fun at her , I started telling her how rediculous that idea is, and explaining the 2nd law and entropy, I even told her that it's the only patent that will not be accepted because simply the machine can't exist. Well she stuck to her guns, and totally was in love with Tim's ideas, and she was very happy, and finally I stopped pressuring her. I realized right then and there, it wasn't about the stupid #ing perpetual motion machine, it was about the time they were spending together in love with eachother and their silly notions, I saw what seemed like true love.

I thought to myself that true love and conquering the impossible together, and making a life that works, is a lot like building a perpetual motion machine. I smiled at her," and said that's great jessy, I am glad you are happy".

thanks or maybe a moment out of time.a reply to: TechniXcality

originally posted by: TechniXcality
a reply to: ketsuko

I don't think it's something sexual and or that sex is the main objective, though watching society you could make that case as well-but romantic love leads to sex, of course. I am asking if it's just a pleasantly a cordial thing oh I love you yada yada, how do you measure that? Do you measure it by the end result, for me it's divorce. So once again perhaps I am jaded, I thought I loved her did I?

It is a true emotion. I've only felt it in quick flashes. Fleeting moments that hit you in the gut and make you ask, "What was that?" It is unlike any other emotion I've ever felt.

Similarly, I've only felt true hatred once, too.

And just because you may not always be consciously feeling that love doesn't mean it isn't there either. It pops up at the most unexpected time.

And don't ask me about hatred. I removed myself from that and have no wish to ever experience that again.

a reply to: TechniXcality

Love is real enough, its trust that's the real illusion.

I understand what it's like to love my family, but I don't think I've ever been in love in a relationship, just strong lust and strong affection. I don't know the exact feeling of love

Is love real?..Poets would say "Yes", Psychopaths would say "No". The rest of us are somewhere in between I guess.

-MM

I think the problem starts with identification.

The emotion that is often misunderstood as Love requires constant fuel to remain alight and to burn.

True Love requires no fuel, it just is, and is as natural as breathing.

The problem is that false Love is so strong, volatile, and toxic, that you lose the ability see or feel true Love, and the sensation pales in comparison. We mistake lust and desire for Love. The fire, the passion, the anticipation, and desire we feel, while delicious and amazing, it is also fleeting and unsustainable.

When the blaze has been consumed and there is nothing left but a few glowing embers that generate warmth that seeps to the very core of your being, and provides you contentment through the worse of any storm imaginable, that is when you have experienced true love.

You have no control over true Love. It doesn't have to have rhyme or reason. You can't kill it and it can't die. The reason that true love appears distant and unobtainable, is because we are so caught up in the lie and the illusion of lust, that true Love just sits is the corner ignored; elusively, allusively, waiting to be found and embraced.

Love is real, only a relationships is like a cup that can not hold it, but share it? that is possible.a reply to: MerkabaMeditation

I wanted to add and clarify that my response was toward the "love" you described, "romantic insanity," and not "real love" which is a totally different thing... the other responses above just clarified that some wise, wise, loving folks post on this board.. . wowee.

I don't even understand the question, to be honest.

I know what's real. Instincts.

Love means too many different things from one individual to the next for me to say with certainty that it does or does not exist.

Here's some questions. Are feelings valid? Are they "real". We have this feeling that some people call, "love", so does their subjective experience mean it's legit?

Now, outside of the feeling is belief. We attach assumptions to this strong feeling. We believe they are absolute.

I don't buy into that. Some people stick to their principals more than others, but to every rule... oh I forget, but got the feeling reality doesn't have that problem.

Oh yea, life experience... that's right... no no, definitely not "real" in my book...

It's real! Doesn't mean you're going to live happily ever after though.

I met a soulmate once. It was mostly a surreal experience. It didn't work out, for a variety of reasons. I guess I can't go into it too much here and now, for complicated reasons that I can't go into here and now. It's left me mostly cynical and jaded when it comes to relationships, like a heroin junkie who had that one good fix that he can never get back to. He just keeps chasing the dragon, but can never catch that same high. Every now and then though I meet a woman that I know I could have a similar connection with should the stars happen to align for us. As it stands, though, I'm not sure if I'll ever marry, as I'm a die hard romantic. Without having that special connection, it wouldn't seem right.

Much as I hate to admit it, I still carry this huge torch that I'm not sure will ever burn out. It's really bizarre, in a way. I don't even know this woman that well, and the relationship was never consummated if you know what I mean. Still there are these overwhelming intense emotions that I feel, this connection that will not die, decades later, and unencouraged and undesired from the other end as near as I can tell. Like I said, it's bizarre. I try not to dwell on it too much because there's really nothing to be done for it.

We are most of us, at least in the western world, programmed from a very young age to believe that love is the be all end all experience, to be sought out at any cost. I think some of us (myself included) can get a little too caught up in this notion, seeking to fill some hole within ourselves that we ourselves created due to the stories we heard from others and the way in which we interpreted them. Part of my personal journey, then, is to try not to worry about it so much; to just go and live my life, and worry about love when it finds me rather than trying to seek it out. I just wish I had figured that out twenty five years ago, instead of about ten years ago. It would have made the last twenty five years a lot easier.

I guess I just managed to summon up your answer there, then, with my deluded rantings. It's real, but if you have to wonder about it at all, really, then it's not true love, in my opinion. True love will be a deep sort of knowing that you can't shake off. (Sarcastic comment follows) You see, my love is sooo much lovier than your love! It's like, the loviest love ever!(/sarc)

If you know who you are are reading this, please don't take it the wrong way. This is not some veiled guilt trip or overture. My burdens to bear are mine, they are not yours. I'm okay with who I am, and my trip is really about me, not you.

I hope some of this helps. I dislike giving relationship advice in general. It's all so subjective. My personal truth is not necessarily your personal truth, so please take everything I say with a big grain of salt.

As to the infidelity, I'm reminded of Steinbeck's "The Grapes Of Wrath", where the preacher character is talking to the main character about how he would give these great sermons and then end up sleeping with some random girl later that day. He beats himself up about it for awhile, then eventually comes to the conclusion that (paraphrasing here) ,"there ain't no right or wrong, there's just stuff people do."

Not entirely accurate, in my opinion, as there is a right and wrong. I think, though, that we as a society are much too proper when it comes to the notion of monogamy. We are biological creatures, after all. We're wired to procreate. Doesn't mean you and the ex should get back together and just be polygamists, or that she would even understand it if you tried to explain it to her that way. It does mean that you can take this understanding and try not to beat yourself up too much about it, and try not to hold it against her too much for being human. We're all wired that way, though we've been programming ourselves for monogamy for centuries at least.

On the other hand, we feel how we feel, so if that doesn't feel right to you, then I think you will probably go with that, and I wouldn't blame you. See what I mean, it's all so subjective. I'm going to stop writing now. I'm starting to confuse myself at this point.

Enjoyed reading the various and diverse responses to the OP. I feel sad for you Technixicity, and what you went through. And surely you have received some good comments and different perspectives on love.

But would like you to stop and think for a second...what is love? What is it really?

The most profound and perfect definition of love I've ever found is this:

(1 Corinthians 13:4-8) . . .Love is patient and kind. Love is not jealous. It does not brag, does not get puffed up, 5 does not behave indecently, does not look for its own interests, does not become provoked. It does not keep account of the injury. 6 It does not rejoice over unrighteousness, but rejoices with the truth. 7 It bears all things, believes all things, hopes all things, endures all things. 8 Love never fails.. . .

Have you found a person impatient? They are lacking love. Are they unkind? They are lacking love. Are they jealous? They are lacking love. Do they brag? They are lacking love. Are they arrogant, buffed up? They don't have love.

Do they behave indecently? They are lacking love. Do they look out for "number one". Themselves first? They are lacking love. Do they become provoked easily? They lack real love. Do they keep reminding you of your faults and sins? They are lacking love.

Do they enjoy unrighteousness? They lack love.

Are they able to bear everything that is given them? They have real love. Do they have all hope beyond all reasoning? That is love. Can they endure anything? They really have love. Do they believe all things? Do they believe in you and you? That is love.

Love never fails.

You see. If you find a person like this. And they can be found. Then you have found true love. And you can find it, in a friend, in a stranger. If you look for it before marrying, then you can find it in a partner, one you can share love with, for life. Romantic love must be there, but true love,love that never fails is what binds everyone together. And it is found in noble and honest and humble, beautiful hearts.

There are very few people on earth who cultivate love, and show it though. I doubt most people on earth even understand what true love really is, or how to display it.