A google search on the word Love generates about " Results 1 - 10 of about 1,630,000,000 for love [definition]. (0.15 seconds)" - more results than those elicited by money, war, sex, drugs, rock and roll and britney spears. The one word that beats it is Life itself.
So, love does really drive this world of ours. Its a pity science can break down love into hormones and chemicals, while poets chose to break it into smiles, glances, tears and sighs.
So love is the best thing possible that can happen to anyone, with the possible exception of winning a lottery and becoming a billionaire overnight or the like.
But whats all the fuss about? With Valentines Day approaching there is way too much love in the air.
Why do we make such a big deal out of it? Why do we bemoan and whine the lack of a love life? I do and I know all those who claim not to, also do.
I have some views about this thing called love and as far as I know only one person seems to agree to it (Well being the only person to be aware of my views..) Thank you, BD :) http://aditya.wordpress.com/
First thing first, I do not believe love is unconditional. It CANNOT BE UNCONDITIONAL. If it were, you would be loving everyone, literally everyone. By the very virtue of knowing someone, liking them and so on do you come to love that person. The very condition for love to happen lies therein.The primary condition to love is to be a condition.
And no, love is not selfless. In fact, I think the very word Selfless is a misnomer. What exactly is selflessness? If you were to be selfless you'd be dead possibly. Because, our survival depends on the fact that we are selfish and look after ourselves and seek to propagate our genes. That is probably the reason we all( well quite a lot of us) hail Darwin's Theory of Survival Of the Fittest. So going on with the whole idea of love being selfless, I think its a lie. When you love someone it is because you feel happy about loving that person or that person makes you happy and so you love that person. Ultimately its your own happiness that decides who, when and how you love. And if we consider those movie-like sequences where love always gives, cries and sacrifices, I think it can again be related to selfishness or rather the lack of any intentional selflessness involved in the sacrifice whatsoever. Its that feeling of being elevated to a higher form or status when we sacrifice that makes us go for sacrifices. We achieve what is described as a sense of being bigger because we can forgive and we can give away what is most valuable to us. But then, surely if it was that valuable and we could sacrifice it, its value decreases accordingly.
By all this I do not say love is not wonderful, beautiful and all those amazing adjectives.
I think, love is even more beautiful. Because, despite all the selfishness involved in love or anywhere else, the by-products of that selfish ambition disguised under a so-called selfless aim does manage to hoodwink many and keeps the illusion of life believable and worth liking, a bit.
Though we do it for our own happiness, the happiness sort of is also shared with the other person. In our own selfish goals we manage to help others in their selfish dreams too.
People in love are too busy floating in the self-induced bliss that comes with it. That is why probably people in love sing songs about being lost, in heaven, day dreaming etc. They are way too happy with themselves. Then after a while you begin to veer towards rationality and reality bites. All this while you were so busy making yourself happy... no wonder break-ups are so messy, we just cant reconcile to the fact that we are selfish bastards/bitches.. Its only us miserable people, who understand this too well will now tread carefully. We know we'll be doing everything for our own good only and we'll prepare ourselves to play the role of an ideal loving person much better.
I think love is selfish, and rightly so.
First love is self love. Only if you love yourself can you love others. Be happy with your own self to make others happy and so on.
Have a nice Valentine's Day with yourself first. No, not really.
