I wonder….
You hear beautiful songs of love and see it in movies, but does it really exist?. Are we chasing a fantasy, some make believe idea of love and relationships?
Do people even know how to love these days or are we (I say we in a very broad and general way) so busy in our lives that we want instant gratification, we want to feel good and don’t want to go through the so called hard yards of commitment.
Is peoples’ idea of love actually love or is it just a feeling they wish to feel, is it something they are after, something they want from another person?
Generations back, couples stayed together, they worked things out, they stayed committed to love and their partners. Nowadays as soon as the going gets a little tough, they are out. Why? Are they just wanting or expecting the other person to fulfill certain needs with themselves? Wanting or expecting their partners to make them feel happy or feel this way or that? Having expectations of the other person and when their partner does not give them what they want anymore they leave. They leave and quickly move on to the next person who can for a short time make them feel good. For a short time the new person satisfies their needs and they are getting what they want. All the while thinking it is love. But soon enough the feelings of emptiness, feelings of not being fulfilled, not happy, not getting or feeling how they did at the start of the relationship and they start blaming and criticising their partner, start finding and picking out faults and pointing out where they are not living up to their expectations and tension builds and once again its too hard, it doesn’t feel good, lets leave and find another that treats me right.
And with social media, online dating sites, spam emails it is all too easy to find another, you don’t have to look that hard and you have someone willing to have a shallow relationship with you.
Do people fear commitment as a whole? Do they just don’t want to put in effort? Are they scared to have deep meaningful relationships and connections? Does opening up and allowing yourself to be really seen by another that scary?
Have people just been hurt too much to even try again, that they are willing to go through life living on the surface without any depth and meaning in their lives – without the connections we all truly desire? I think deep down we all want to experience unconditional love and meaningful relationships with deep connections but are too hurt, too scared, too unwilling to go through the uncomfortable feelings, the uncomfortable moments. Not willing to open up and express their feelings, their inner most desires. Not willing to take the masks off and be seen. Afraid that no one will love them if they do. Not seeing or understanding that they are loveable and worthy at the core, on a soul level they ARE love.
Perhaps they don’t understand that to really love someone is to love all of them, the good, the bad, the ugly, to have compassion for their partners, to be there no matter what, to hold loving space for the other person to process and to grow.
Robyn Lemsing
15th April 2019