love

everything gets less complicated if you think love is just "a hormonal reaction".*

let's see what notable people said about love:

theodor seuss geisel:
you know you're in love when you can't fall asleep because reality is finally better than your dreams.

taylor swift:
when you are missing someone, time seems to move slower, and when i'm falling in love with someone, time seems to be moving faster.

kim kardashian:
i think you have different soul-mates throughout your life, that your soul needs different things at different times. i do believe in love. i will always believe in love, but my idea has changed from what i've always thought.

oprah winfrey:
lots of people want to ride with you in the limo. but you want someone who'll help you catch the bus.

william watson purkey:
you've gotta dance like there's nobody watching,
love like you'll never be hurt,
sing like there's nobody listening,
and live like it's heaven on earth.

elie wiesel:
the opposite of love is not hate, it's indifference. the opposite of art is not ugliness, it's indifference. the opposite of faith is not heresy, it's indifference. and the opposite of life is not death, it's indifference.

william shakespeare:
love all, trust a few, do wrong to none.

neil gaiman:
have you ever been in love? horrible isn't it? it makes you so vulnerable. it opens your chest and it opens up your heart and it means that someone can get inside you and mess you up.

lao tzu:
being deeply loved by someone gives you strength, while loving someone deeply gives you courage.

chuck palahniuk:
the one you love and the one who loves you are never, ever the same person.*

paulo coelho:
when we love, we always strive to become better than we are. when we strive to become better than we are, everything around us becomes better too.

one is loved because one is loved. no reason is needed for loving.

mahatma gandhi:
when i despair, i remember that all through history the way of truth and love have always won. there have been tyrants and murderers, and for a time, they can seem invincible, but in the end, they always fall. think of it, always.

where there is love there is life.

sarah dessen:
love is needing someone. love is putting up with someone's bad qualities because they somehow complete you.

oscar wilde:
never love anyone who treats you like you're ordinary.*

plato:
every heart sings a song, incomplete, until another heart whispers back. those who wish to sing always find a song. at the touch of a lover, everyone becomes a poet.

john krasinski:
when you're lucky enough to meet your one person, then life takes a turn for the best. it can't get better than that.

katy perry:
first and foremost, self-love, and then give love away.

fyodor dostoevsky:
above all, don't lie to yourself. the man who lies to himself and listens to his own lie comes to a point that he cannot distinguish the truth within him, or around him, and so loses all respect for himself and for others. and having no respect he ceases to love.

edgar allen poe:
we loved with a love that was more than love.

sigmund freud:
psychoanalysis is in essence a cure through love.

losing someone hurts. envy hurts. everyone gets these things confused with love, but in reality, love is the only thing in this world that covers up all pain and makes someone feel wonderful again. love is the only thing in this world that does not hurt.

(see: mesa selimovic)

love is a choice. not a feeling.

love doesn't just sit there, like a stone, it has to be made, like bread; remade all the time, made new.

rabbi abraham twerski talks about the difference between selfish love and true love, which must be a love of giving and not of receiving.

transcript:

"'young man. why are you eating that fish?' the young mans says, 'because i love fish.' he says, 'oh. you love the fish. that's why you took it out of the water and killed it and boiled it.' he says, 'don't tell me you love the fish. you love yourself, and because the fish tastes good to you; therefore, you took it out of the water and killed it and boiled it.'

"so much of what is love is fish love. young couple falls in love. young man and young woman fall in love. what does that mean? that means that he saw in this woman someone who he felt could provide him with all of his physical and emotional needs, and she felt in this man somebody she feels that she can write, that was love, but each one is looking out for their own needs. it's not love for the other. the other person becomes a vehicle for my gratification.

"too much of what is called love is fish love. an external love is not on what i'm going to get but i'm going to give. we had an ethicist rabbi dessler, who said, 'people make a serious mistake in thinking that you give to those whom you love, and the real answer is you love those to whom you give.'

his point is if i give something to you, i've invested myself in you. since self-love is a given, everybody loves themselves, now that part of me has become in you, there's part of me in you that i love. true love is a love of giving, not a love of receiving.'

here are a few famous quotes on love from some of history's most notable philosophers:

— "love is composed of a single soul inhabiting two bodies." - aristotle
— "love is not consolation. it is light." - simone weil
— "love is the expression of the one who loves, not of the one who is loved." - soren kierkegaard
— "love is the affinity which links and draws together the elements of the world... love, in fact, is the agent of universal synthesis." - pierre teilhard de chardin
— "love is an endless act of forgiveness. forgiveness is me giving up the right to hurt you for hurting me." - beyonce giselle knowles-carter
— "love is an act of endless forgiveness, a tender look which becomes a habit." - peter ustinov
— "to love another person is to see the face of god." - victor hugo
— "love is an untamed force. when we try to control it, it destroys us. when we try to imprison it, it enslaves us. when we try to understand it, it leaves us feeling lost and confused." - paulo coelho

"i opened the book, picking a passage at random, and came across a tale about alexander the great. the emperor, as the story went, received as a gift some wondrous glass dishes. he liked the gifts very much, but smashed them all nonetheless. "why? are they not beautiful?" he was asked. "precisely because of that," he answered. "they are so beautiful that it would be hard for me to lose them. and with time they would break, one by one. and i would be sorrier than i am now."

the tale was naive but it still astonished me. its lesson was bitter: one should renounce everything he might ever begin to love, because loss and disappointment are inevitable. we must renounce love in order not to lose it. we must destroy our love so that it will not be destroyed by others. we must renounce every attachment, because of the possibility of regret. this thought is cruelly hopeless. we cannot destroy everything we love; there will always be the possibility that others will destroy it for us."

trying to be the best version of yourself.

love can mean so many things. it could mean the little jump in your heart when their name pops up in your notifications. it can mean your willingness and desire to please them in every way possible. it can mean the outpouring of support for that special friend. it can mean the smile that creeps across your face when you think of that one text, moment, conversation. sometimes it can be the way your heart aches because you’re stuck between two. sometimes it can be the wandering imagination of a lonely moment.
love seems to be the most complicated thing in the universe, and i’ve studied the universe.

love is letting someone hurt you.