What is true love...how can you tell?

dennis22554

Have you ever stopped to think about ..true love ..with any deep thought? What is it? How do figure out if you are actually in it? Can it happen almost instantly? What are the signs? Does it actually exist? For me...the answer is yes to the questions and that simple y ouch can answer many of the remaining.

They say true love hides around every corner. I must be walking in circles.

Jubal

" . . . will follow you forever." Wait, does this mean that stalking is a form of true love? That can't be right.

Bear

@Jubal nice, very nice.

Bear

It’s hard for me at times. If I let someone into my inner circle of friends, I usually have an unconditional love for these people. They are usually ones I do energy healing with.

_marC

Cuddlesofcuddle

@craM lol I legit thought of this song when I read the title 😂

One of my favs 🎶

IronicMaiden

What's love got to do with it? What's love but a secondhand emotion?

CuddlesWithCat

They don’t set your nervous system into overdrive, you can be yourself without judgement. They aren’t after your money or what’s below.

WestsideMarc

(Comment withdrawn, but spell check!)

TxTom

true love ... Can it happen almost instantly? What are the signs?

If one opens a door for their special someone.

The sea of love is filled with catfish.

Carrie_Anne

@gem7
lol never a truer statement has been made!

GuyverGordon

Make sure you use reCaptcha and can pass it ... then you should be good ...

Sorry, it was the first thing to come to mind when I read the title

jintx

@Bear

philia
Original Greek: ϕιλία (philía)

Philia is affectionate love. Philia is the type of love that involves friendship.

Philia is the kind of love that strong friends feel toward each other. However, it doesn’t stop there. The Greek philosopher Plato thought that philia was an even greater love than eros and that the strongest loving relationships were ones where philia led to eros: a “friends become lovers” situation. Our concept of platonic love—love that isn’t based on physical attraction—comes from this Platonic philosophy.

From https://www.dictionary.com/e/greek-words-for-love/

Bear

@jintx
Agape then.

Sooson

The Monte Carlo couples on Tik Tok. That's true love.

Runawaycuddles

Quite a bit actually!
My views on love and "true love" specifically have definitely shifted over the years, as I think most people's do, but in my case I've found i'm split exactly down the middle of that binary. 🤔

Fundamentally, I'm both a romantic and a realist in equal measure,
which means there's a sort of endless internal philosophical struggle inside me between the two. 😂

I think, realistically, we're all pretty fucked up emotionally when it comes to love, just based on how love looks in our daily lives.
We're all fed some sort of fairy tale about love in our childhoods, and either those illusions either get shattered, or they become limiting prisons that keep us from finding real, true love.
We're all raised with a very intricate form of "Girls are from Venus, boys are from Mars" that dictates which emotions it's ok for us to feel and show and which ones we need to stuff down and hide.
We all learn shame and insecurities from those around us that make us weird about intimacy and hide what makes us different, the which is just great for romantic relationships, lemme tell ya 😬.
We're taught all sorts of whacky, false and completely contradictory things about love and how to find it.
And, we learn that whether or not we have romantic love in our lives directly correlates to how we're treated socially in was that pressurize the entire love-finding process in deeply unhelpful ways. 🤷🏼

But the romantic in me? That side of me believes that real love is possible, it's just rare.
It believes that our environment does not have to dictate who we become as people. That we can each choose which influences and beliefs we want to use to build our worldview with and which ones we want to decenter.
It believes that humans have the capacity to do better, to learn from our mistakes and the bad examples around us and change ourselves if we want to.
It believes that if I exist, with my fundamental beliefs and values and limits and needs, that means that - statistically - there are absolutely others like me out in the world and I can probably find them, and that's true for everyone, no matter what they're looking for.
It believes also that true love does, in fact, exist, but that it DEFINITELY doesn't look like we're told it does. That it's not one perfect person that will fix everything or heal some sort of "incompleteness". Or that in order for true love to be "valid" it has to look the way our society expects it to, with marriage and kids and a white pocket fence in order for it to be right, because it doesn't.

And ya know what, they're both right. 🤷🏼
So yeah, clearly, I think about this shit a lot. 🤣😂
What is it? Both the most mundane, and the most extraordinary thing in the world.
How do figure out if you are actually in it? Therapy, self love, introspection and emotional maturity.
Can it happen almost instantly? Nah, I've experienced "love at first sight", and love is a verb, the phenomena of instant intense feelings of connection and attraction is likely just pheromones.
What are the signs? Healthy communication, actions consistently matching loving words, emotional intimacy, and mutual emotional maturity.
Does it actually exist? I think so, yes, it's just a lot more Gomez and Morticia than keeping up with the Jones's 😂

pmvines

I honestly don't know that I want to have true love. I've lost a lot in my life. I am always grateful for the experiences I've had, good or bad, and don't usually spend too much time dwelling on things that bother or upset me. But the grief from loss and heartbreak is often much more enduring than the love or joy you once felt. I am at a point where I try to minimize things that discomfort me, and knowing that everything has an end leaves me extremely guarded.

lovingspoonfull

Most days my simple answer is you don’t know if it’s true love. You simply choose to believe it is, act as if it is, then invest yourself in it, and find out later.

My daughter told me the motto of her cross-country team is, "Get comfortable with being uncomfortable." I said that sounded like marriage.

dennis22554

@Runawaycuddles ...I found your posting to be thoughtful and quite a pleasure to read!

dennis22554

I think the journey to find true love is worth taking even if you don't find it in the end

dennis22554

Just settling....rarely leads too good outcomes in the end

I believe in soulmates, but I also think that, with billions of people in the world, it's farfetched to think your soulmate is going to live in your town or work at your job. There's a difference between the "best person for you" and the "best person who happens to be close by." Many people end up with the latter because the former might be on the other side of the world.

Carrie_Anne

I’ve been pretty sure my soulmate lives in Siberia or a far away place that I’ll never make it to. It makes me sad if that’s the case. I can’t imagine that anyone who would be my soulmate could live in Texas.

lovingspoonfull

@pmvines your answer felt real and raw to me. I can empathize. Thank you for sharing that.

SunsetSnuggles

True love...

Still constantly finding my boyfriend adorable, and laughing together every single day, seven years in.

Still thanking each other for the tiny things like doing the dishes, feeding the dog, or setting out a coaster for the other on the coffee table.

Still standing at the door and waving goodbye to him every single work day, and hugging him every time he comes home.

Giggling over inside jokes that should have long-since gotten boring or annoying.

Doing anything to help the other out, without ever needing to be asked...drive their car to another state to get work done, take over the cooking for months on-end.

Each loving the other's family as their own, through sickness, distance, and painful circumstances.

Falling into his beautiful blue eyes...looking back at pictures from when we were younger and noticing the difference, but finding him as gorgeous and desirable as when you first met.

Taking hours and days to listen to the stressors, emotions, inner world, and philosophy of the other, and trying to understand, even when you can't.

Feeling as fiercely protective of him as if he were my child or an innocent baby bunny...and yet respecting him wholeheartedly, knowing I am so blessed to ever be loved by such an intelligent, deeply thoughtful, morally inspiring, enlightened being.

Him being my favorite cuddler, out of the myriad of people I've cuddled, because nothing and no one can beat the feeling of snuggling up against his chest and tucking my fingers around his waist. 🫠

~ Sunset Snuggles

🫂 Enthusiast 🐄 Vegan 🫧 Kid at Heart

JoyfulHeart

True love isn't limited to romantic love, I believe.

It's the friendships with people who stick around during hard times and who genuinely participate in joyful times.

It's the people who see us as we are and fully accept us anyway.

It's the people who cheer us on along our journey of growth and healing.

It's the people who "adopt" us into their heart families: In my case, people who call me pop, uncle, brother, or son.

It's my little sister, who annoyed me at first, but became my dearest friend until the end of her life.

True love continues even when the people carrying it have gone. It migrates to new hearts and quietly waits for us to find it again.

TheFunCartel

@JoyfulHeart 💯. I would also say love is highly subjective and slippery in the moment and each individual has their definition of love be it spousal, romantic, parental, etc. True love to one person is another person’s temporary infatuation. True love is work, both literally and physically. Witness a caregiver doing all they can for a critically ill partner, child or parent. They will have the desperation that comes from love etched on their face.

Love is never stagnant and encourages one to be better, to empathize and to sublimate one’s ego. Love isn’t a security blanket, it is a risk inviting possible devastation but offering hope and rewards for taking that chance.

For these and a multitude of other reasons, love is an involuntary reaction to voluntary choices we make of people we choose to be in our life.

Unfortunately, relationships all too often consist of one or both parties figuratively cutting off pieces of themselves to better "fit" with their partner. Then one day they wake up and realize they aren't themselves anymore. That's why post-breakup can feel like such a revelation, as you remember all the things you used to think, feel and enjoy that you gave up and can now get back again.