A long time ago I stopped thinking about myself as the kind of person
who believes in love, or in anything for that matter. Even though I have a
tattoo on my left arm that reads "believe" I only got it done as a
reminder not to believe in anything but myself.
The fact is that life has given me more than enough reasons to stop believing in God, humanity and specially in love. I grew up in a household were love was the greatest absent, I never saw my parents treat each other with what I now understand as love. I never felt loved neither as a daughter, nor as a sister. Love was just something completely unknown to our home.
The fact is that life has given me more than enough reasons to stop believing in God, humanity and specially in love. I grew up in a household were love was the greatest absent, I never saw my parents treat each other with what I now understand as love. I never felt loved neither as a daughter, nor as a sister. Love was just something completely unknown to our home.
My first
experiences of fraternal love were at school and later as a teenager in church.
I learnt to love my friends and to cultivate friendship. That is something -my
friends say so- I am very good at. I enjoy investing time in my friends, building with acts and words indestructible bridges that can endure the longest distances and the hardest times. I find great joy in being able to be there for those I am lucky to have in my life as companions and count myself among those who can always count on their friends being there for them.
Romantic love, on the other hand, is something I had learnt from books, movies and specially telenovelas: an ideal way of loving that wasn't easy to find in real life. Backed with that very little knowledge and experience I started falling in and out of "love" with any prince charming I'd find along my way to adulthood. Looking back, I understand I used to be more keen on the idea of being in love than on the people I was with.
Romantic love, on the other hand, is something I had learnt from books, movies and specially telenovelas: an ideal way of loving that wasn't easy to find in real life. Backed with that very little knowledge and experience I started falling in and out of "love" with any prince charming I'd find along my way to adulthood. Looking back, I understand I used to be more keen on the idea of being in love than on the people I was with.
Later in life I
found a person who would have me just as damaged as I was and I was determined not to let him go. I accepted willingly all the pain, the humiliation and the
sadness that that relationship brought upon my life. I came to think that was
the way love was suposed to feel like. I was convinced that it had to hurt in order to be
actual love. Somehow, after having struggled for years, I found the strength to
put an end to that profundly misconceived relationship and the day I managed to do so, I completely gave up
on romanticism, I stopped longing for love to come my way, prepared to live a life on my own. I began building a wall so high, so that no one would ever be able to hurt me again and started contenting myself with ephemeral pleassure...every attempt to go further would hit that rock hard wall and stay on the surface, away from any deep, meaningful feelings.
And then last
weekend opened my eyes. Last weekend I got to witness, to understand and what's most
important: to feel what love should feel like. Last weekend broke all false
concepts I have had for years about love in a couple, about familial love and even about God's love. I finally grasped that key point: there's a tremendous difference between having
an object of desire and loving someone.
Finding an object of desire is phenomenon we can always see on the big screen. Someone finds that perfect being who embodies everything they always wanted. If we had a wishlist, this person would fulfill every single requirement we ever dreamt of: the perfect hight, the right eyes' color and a weak spot for the same music we like. This person would agree with us all the time and share every single opinion we can come up with. Our object of desire would make us look good in front of everyone, it'd be a status symbol, a thing.
On the contrary loving someone is something that does not occur that often: loving someone is, as I saw and experienced today, wanting to be with someone inspite of any possible flaws, and maybe even because of them. Love is about having the need to support that person we want to share life with, about craving to make that special person's life the best it can be. If we love someone we are able and to revise our thoughts and beliefs and are willing to construct a new paradigme where both people can have different ways of seeing life but are able to respect that each of them has their own mind. Loving someone is not something that just happens, it is a concious choice, an ongoing process of creating and mantaining a bond.
So today, after much time of sceptiscm, I feel I can again find my way back to love, my times of seeing people as an object are over now.Today, for the first time in years, I feel hopeful, I am at ease. I am ready to wait for someone who wants to give love a chance with me.
Finding an object of desire is phenomenon we can always see on the big screen. Someone finds that perfect being who embodies everything they always wanted. If we had a wishlist, this person would fulfill every single requirement we ever dreamt of: the perfect hight, the right eyes' color and a weak spot for the same music we like. This person would agree with us all the time and share every single opinion we can come up with. Our object of desire would make us look good in front of everyone, it'd be a status symbol, a thing.
On the contrary loving someone is something that does not occur that often: loving someone is, as I saw and experienced today, wanting to be with someone inspite of any possible flaws, and maybe even because of them. Love is about having the need to support that person we want to share life with, about craving to make that special person's life the best it can be. If we love someone we are able and to revise our thoughts and beliefs and are willing to construct a new paradigme where both people can have different ways of seeing life but are able to respect that each of them has their own mind. Loving someone is not something that just happens, it is a concious choice, an ongoing process of creating and mantaining a bond.
So today, after much time of sceptiscm, I feel I can again find my way back to love, my times of seeing people as an object are over now.Today, for the first time in years, I feel hopeful, I am at ease. I am ready to wait for someone who wants to give love a chance with me.
