What does it mean to love? I mean, really?

You often hear it. People go, “Oh, I simply can’t bear to live a single day without him/her.” And we all say, “Awww….”

So many songs on the radio speak about one’s dependence on another, and they quickly get shoved into the category of ‘love songs’.

But is this really love? Why should we be so dependent, so needing of another person in order to know that we’re in love? Put it another way… Why should we call this dependence ‘love’?

Or is it deeper? Is it the knowledge that you have to sacrifice yourself for that person, necessarily remove yourself from their lives if they really need it?

I once heard that in order to love, you need to be whole first. It’s hard to love when you’re broken, because you’ll probably end up trying to find what’s missing in your life in another person. And you’ll probably always be disappointed. And if not, you might end up demanding too much from the other person, smothering the one you ‘care for’.

In my recent breakup, I realised that the predominant feeling within me was not just of loneliness and missing the other, but also of guilt. Guilt that I had left someone behind. Guilt that I had left someone to deal with life when I had featured so clearly, when I had been so clearly important to that other. But I had to ask myself… Was I really feeling love? Somehow, it didn’t really feel that way. It felt more like a one-way relationship where the other seemed to gain more from it more than I did.

It’s still slightly messy right now, but at least I’m clearer on what the relationship really was. Perhaps something might happen again in the future, when there’s enough the both of us have grown more.

Perhaps love, in its most beautiful form, is best described when both individuals give freely to each other, knowing that they’re both fully functioning independent beings.

But I want to know… Why would you care for another? Why would you qualify your feelings for another as love? Is it because they provide something you’re lacking? Is it because they provide some company in your life? Do you love the person, or do you love what the person provides?

I apologise for the many questions asked in this single post. But I just had to pour quite a lot out…