Love is in the air. On this day, it is hard to avoid being bombarded by hearts, flowers and chocolates–all symbols of love. The word luv or love was used quite often to mean “admiration” or “liking.” Love is a very complex thing. Love has been around for a long time. It wasn’t until 1375 that the terms love and loving were first associated with romantic relationships.
According to some historians, Valentine’s Day comes from an ancient Roman festival called Lupercalia. For centuries, poets, writers and philosophers–from Plato to Shakespeare to modern-day celebrities–have analyzed and tried to define love. Let’s explore a few ways in which people over the ages have defined love:
Love is a very powerful emotion. It can be positive or negative, fleeting or lasting; romantic or platonic, between family members and friends. The word itself comes from the Latin word “amor” which means “to love” in its most basic form: to feel affection towards another person.
In this day and age of instant communication it’s easy for us all to feel like we’re falling head-over-heels in love with someone without ever meeting them first! But what does “love” really mean? And how do you know if it’s real?
This was a fertility festival that celebrated the god Lupercus, who was associated with shepherds and their flocks. It was held on February 15th and involved couples kissing as well as couples trying to guess each other’s names by writing them down on pieces of paper (hence the name “Valentine”).
What is love?
Love is a choice, not a feeling.
Love is a verb.
Love is a journey–not a destination.
Love involves mutual self-giving (i.e., unconditional). It’s not just about the other person; it also requires you to give of yourself as well! This can be physical passion in your relationship or it can be more abstract acts such as doing something nice for your partner or helping them out when they’re down in spirit–whatever works best for you and your partner!
It isn’t always easy but there are ways we can keep our relationships healthy no matter how challenging life gets:
Love is a Choice/Conscious Decision
You can choose to love or not, and even if you do, the choice may not always feel right in your heart. The truth is that unless someone makes a conscious decision to treat you with kindness and respect, then it’s unlikely for them to change their behavior for your benefit.
You may find yourself attracted to someone who does not reciprocate these same feelings; however, this doesn’t mean that they don’t care about you as much as you do about them! It just means that there are other factors at play which influence how someone feels about another person besides just their own self-worth (which isn’t something we should be focused on).
Love as Physical Passion
It as a physical passion is the most common definition of what is love. It’s what you’re thinking of when you say “I love my boyfriend,” or “I’m in love with him.”
Love as a physical passion is a desire to be with someone and have sex with them. This can sometimes lead to the development of a romantic relationship, but it’s not always about falling in love—it’s just about lust being satisfied.
For example, if I see some hot girl at the bar and want her so badly that I can’t wait until we leave together later that night (or even tomorrow morning), then that desire would qualify as “love” under this definition! However, if my desire for her was because she reminded me of my ex-girlfriend (which happened many times), then it would not qualify as “love” under this definition since there wasn’t any real intimacy involved there either way: no emotional connection between them at all except maybe some good memories shared together over social media platforms such as Twitter or Facebook Messenger/WhatsApp etcetera…
Love Is Mutual Self-Giving
It’s not something that just happens without your permission or control, but rather something you make on purpose and with intention.
Love is also a decision to give of yourself—of your time, energy and resources. You may be giving this to someone who isn’t reciprocating (or even noticing), but it doesn’t mean your what is love isn’t real! You might be doing that for someone because they need help or encouragement or inspiration, or maybe they’ve done something for you recently that made them seem like more than just another person in life; maybe their actions remind us of how much we care about our partner(s).
Whatever the reason behind why we choose love over anything else in our lives (including ourselves), there will always come times when we feel like giving up on ourselves entirely—even though sometimes those feelings can lead us back towards our goal: becoming better people overall through self-care strategies such as meditation practice
Love Is a Verb
It is an action, not a feeling. You can’t love someone if you don’t act on it—you may feel like you do, but if your feelings don’t align with your actions then it’s not real love. For example:
You may be in lust with someone and want them to stay with you forever (love). But if they decide that they want out of the relationship because they feel like their time was wasted on something unfulfilling and now they’re ready for something new (not true love), then what happened? The two became so mentally incompatible that there were no longer any good reasons for staying together in this case. The choice was made—they chose “what felt right” over “what made sense.”
Love Is a Journey
It’s not a destination and it’s not a feeling. Love is not an emotion that you feel or an instinct you have. Love is something deeper than all of these things combined; it’s something much bigger than just your feelings for another person or even yourself for that matter!
Love isn’t something you can describe in one sentence, but rather something you experience throughout your entire lifetime as you learn about yourself and others around us (in this case: other people).
In his book Being and Event, philosopher Alain Badiou proposes a model of love that he says corresponds to four types of truths:
Love as a feeling is the first type.
Love as a choice is the second type. This means that one loves someone because they want to, not because they feel obligated or coerced into doing so (for example, if you’re dating someone but don’t really like them).
Love as an action refers to actions we take in our lives; this includes things like helping others or doing something for yourself just because it feels good. For example: helping your friend move into their new apartment; buying yourself flowers after getting rejected by your crush at work; giving up dessert after dinner with friends so they can have dessert together later on in life instead of having together desserts now while everyone else gets hungry again soon enough (and might eat more).
Finally—and this is where Badiou gets tricky—is love as a relationship: “the bond between individuals which gives rise both materially and spiritually.”
There is no simple definition of what is love.
There are many different types of love, and they can be experienced in different ways. Love is not a feeling; it’s an action that you take toward another person or thing (or even yourself!). It’s not just a feeling—it’s something you do through your actions.
When you see someone on the street, what happens? You might smile at them or wave hello! If you see someone who makes your heart flutter with joy and excitement because they are so pretty/smart/funny/whatever else makes them special to you then there was probably some kind of attraction going on between the two people involved (or maybe more than two).
Love is also more than just physical attraction; it involves more than just finding someone attractive physically but also emotionally connecting with their personality traits as well as their values and beliefs around life itself
Conclusion
We may never be able to define what is love with complete accuracy, but we can still learn a lot about it by examining the different ways in which people have expressed their feelings. We hope you enjoyed this lesson on love, and we wish you a happy Valentine’s Day!
