I love you.
And its easy. No effort, no trying, no overcoming.
Its just there inside me, because you exist.
Love. For you.
That's where we start, where we get the energy to begin.
By using the word in the beginning, it can't be used later for manipulation, or in desperation.
Nonetheless, I use it honestly. I do love you. But I also love my mom, Jeff, trees, photography, all kinds of people and stuff.
So love isn't the problem, or the solution. Its just love, bubbling away inside me, providing energy and inspiration. Its great!
So instead of wondering does he/she love me, lets take that for granted. We do.
What then? When the question of love is absent, what questions are left?
How about does he/she respect me, understand me?
Respect and understanding are hard, MUCH harder than love.
Love is a gift, given freely. Understanding is work.
Understanding takes time, listening, curiosity, attention, and consideration.
The desire to understand you means I want to know you, so that I might fit seamlessly into your world.
Respect is even harder. Respect is life-long effort.
Respect flows from understanding, as a reflection on that understanding.
Respect is admiration for your abilities, qualities, or achievements, according to Dictionary. :)
But its also: "due regard for the feelings, wishes, rights, or traditions of others", and that's the life-long effort.
To respect you is to understand what you wish of me, of yourself, of the world, and the life we share in that world.
And finally, the really hard stuff.
From understanding and respect must come ACTION and WORK. I must actually do things that reflect my understanding and respect for you.
I must actually live the love, understanding, and respect; put them
all together and provide for you the best I can be.
That's hard, and its the fulcrum of bliss.
So.
Love is easy. I was specifically designed to love you. Loving you takes no effort.
The success, or failure, of anything we try to build, will not be due to love's presence or absence.
The success of The Us Project depends entirely on the things that are HARD, that take effort.
And if we are such a good fit that the hard stuff turns out to be not so hard, well, we will indeed owe [a friend] big-time.
Thanks for today.
We only get a few days on earth, and it sucks to waste 'em.
-Him
