To Him - Love Languages

I've never really thought much about this, but we cannot feel someone else's love. We can feel grateful or loving or joyful in response to something someone else says or does, but we are not actually feeling their love. We would have to be hosting their heart to do that. What does it mean then when we say we feel loved? It means we perceive that whatever that person has said or done is a demonstration of love.

Ahhh...here's where we can get bogged down very easily. Because what represents love to one person means nothing to the next. Maybe he brings home flowers, and she doesn't seem to care. Or maybe she gives him a warm hug, and he still acts distant.

Perhaps we are speaking two different love languages. We naturally want to show our love for others in terms that we understand as love. But the person we are trying to communicate our love to may not understand that love language, and so they don't perceive the act as loving at all. We think they are rejecting our expression of love, when in truth, it is as if we are speaking to them in a foreign language. They can't receive the message because it is not being communicated in a language they understand.

The five love languages include physical touch, words of affirmation, acts of service, quality time and receiving gifts. If we are not aware of this, we may be giving gifts to express our love when what would really make the other feel loved would be a nice, warm hug. Or we may be cooking gourmet meals when all the other really wants is to hear how wonderful we think they are. It would save us a lot of heartache if we took the time to learn the love languages of others and to communicate our love to them in a way they understand.

If we help the other feel fully loved, we are going to experience a much more enjoyable relationship with them. Plus, we will have happier significant others. Happy people are much more pleasant to be around and their happiness contributes to an atmosphere of happiness wherever they go. It's a viral kind of thing.

Let's learn each other's languages, so that our love for one another is clearly and fully expressed, understood and received.

Love University

I realized a couple things over the past couple days:

One is that some of the things I have said I wanted in a lover are really things I want in myself. For instance, what does it matter if my lover likes to travel? I can travel on my own. It brings to mind the ridiculous song lyrics, "You don't bring me flowers any more," to which I say, "Stop whining and get yourself some effing flowers if you want them."

Another thing I realized is that there are very good reasons that a couple attempts I made at creating relationships fell flat over the past couple years. One is that I honor who I am much too highly to objectify my body. If I can't penetrate your heart and your soul, and you are not interested in penetrating my heart and soul, you don't get to penetrate my body. It's that simple. No one gets to split me into factions and take just the parts they want. Take all of me, or none. That's the deal, in the arena of love. And I also realized that those relationships, if they had happened, would have been just more settling, and my soul won't settle for settling any more. I am now creating what I really want and I intend to live my heaven on earth.

Call it Love University, baby, sister school to Life University. And I'm working on my Masters degree.

What I Want, In a Nutshell

I would love to enjoy Someone who understands that two people interact with one another's souls through one another's bodies. The body is just the vehicle for the soul to experience life.

I want something in between hooking up and being imprisoned by a relationship. I don't want to just use someone or be used, and I don't want someone to think they own my life because we care about each other.

It seems to me that most people who say they want "friends with benefits" usually just want benefits. They don't really want to be drawn into caring about the person.

Culturally we have been conditioned to think that love and attachment are the same thing. I think it's one reason why so many people hold back in relationships. There would be less fear of loving if people could enjoy loving and receiving love and appreciate love without demanding that it remain.

I think it is possible, though it probably happens only rarely, to love someone and yet hold on with an open hand. If it has ever been created by anyone, then it can be created by anyone who really wants it. It would be worth trying, anyway.

To Him - I Don't Want to be Your Everything

"I want to be your everything." I've heard that theme recurringly in songs and sonnets, and I always thought it was a romantic idea. But I've changed my mind.

For one thing, I came to understand quite some time ago that it is not possible for one person to meet all our needs. This is one reason why so many romantic partnerships fail. We look to one person to be our all in all, and they are only one person. Eventually, they feel drained from being expected to fill our every need and grow weary of feeling like a failure for not being able to fulfill all of our expectations.

On the flip side of that coin, one person cannot be expected to receive all that we have to give, especially if we are deeply connected with who we really are. We may have so much to give that we overwhelm a person in our efforts to give them our all. They may have the capacity of a gallon container and we have ten gallons to give away, and they find themselves drowning in the flood of our generosity.

I wonder how many relationships are destroyed for this very reason.

It's a good reason for us to cultivate a variety of relationships in which we can give our love away. I am not talking about promiscuity. There are many different ways to give our love away. Everything from giving someone a hug to doing volunteer work to sending someone a note of encouragement.

Let's not try to be everything to anybody, and let's not expect anyone to be our everything. Let's live love with everyone we are blessed to associate with, and be open to receive love from all.

Are you with me? Alright then, let's do it.

If you are someone who enjoys a variety of relationships, who doesn't feel the need to be all things to anyone, and who doesn't expect another to be all things to him, you may be Him. If you are Him, the Universe will bring us together in perfect time and order.

To Him - My Birthday Present

August 12, 2008

Yesterday was my birthday! And I figured out the perfect birthday gift to give myself. I took the time to figure out what I want to give a lover and what I want to receive from a lover. I discovered they are pretty much the same things.

Love is what I want to give and receive, of course, and love is not a feeling. It is an act, or rather, a practice. In order for our love to be experienced by another person, it must be expressed in a manner that is meaningful to that person.

For me, I want to express love and receive love in the following forms: comforting touch that is generous and not greedy, loving words, fun activities, meaningful conversations, attention, quality time, enjoying, respecting and honoring one another, and supporting one another’s happiness, intentions, dreams and growth. I would like for us to respect one another's individual paths, even as we walk together.

The point is, I have decided to give myself the things I want to share with a lover (well, most of them :-). The rationale for this is that in doing so, I will be able to come to love from a position of wholeness, rather than of need. If I am whole and complete already, I don’t need Him to fill me up. I become undisappointable. (I know. I made up another word. :-)

I believe that two people can support each other without being a main pillar in one another’s structures. My structure should stand just as strong whether He stays or goes, and His should do likewise. I believe in holding the lover with an open hand. Now, I know that is much easier to say than to practice, but if we can hold the lover with an open hand, then if they find that they need to move on, they won’t have to pry themselves from our clutching, bleeding fingers to do so.

If He wants to go out for a night with the boys, I am mature enough to be able to figure out something to do that I will enjoy. He shouldn’t have to coddle me, and I shouldn’t have to coddle Him. If I want to go out with my friends, I want to know He can take care of Himself. Two people can depend on each other without being dependent.

If you are whole and complete, you don’t need to be taken care of, and yet you want to share your journey with someone else who recognizes her completeness, you may be Him.

To Him - I Love You

August 4, 2008

I Love You

"I love you, not only for what you are,
but for what I am when I am with you.
I love you, not only for what you have made of yourself,
but for what you are making of me.
I love you for the part of me that you bring out;
I love you for putting your hand into my heaped-up heart
and passing over all the foolish, weak things
that you can't help dimly seeing there,
and for drawing out into the light
all the beautiful belongings
that no one else had looked quite far enough to find.
I love you because you are helping me
to make of the lumber of my life not a tavern, but a temple;
out of the works of my every day not a reproach, but a song.
I love you because you have done more
than any creed could have done to make me good,
and more than any fate could have done to make me happy.
You have done it without a touch, without a word, without a sign.
You have done it by being yourself.
Perhaps that is what being a friend means, after all." - Roy Croft

I look forward to us being this kind of friend for one another.

To Him - The Beginning

I am aware of you. I can feel you in my heart, my soul, my body. At times, I think I have discovered you.

Not that I am searching. I tried searching. It didn't really get me anywhere I wanted to be.

Instead, I am opening. I am inviting. I am allowing, or at least I am working toward allowing.

I know that you are love, and that all love emanates from One Source, and that Source is flowing love to me. I have only to receive.

I know that because you are love, I can trust you with my heart. And I know that I still won't find it easy to trust.

You will have to be up for a challenge, because I guarantee I will be one. But if you can handle it, you will be soooo rewarded.

I won't play games when it comes to matters of the heart. I don't do competition in love. Don't make me wonder whether you enjoy me or not.

I know that we are not really separate. You are within me and I am within you.

And I know that when you come to me, time will disappear. Your love will be worth waiting for.

And the love we make will be heaven on earth.

And so it is.