What Does It Really Mean to Love Someone?

Yesterday was Valentine's day.  Normally that would have been an exciting time for me.  For years Valentine's Day meant flowers, dinner, romance and of course, pretty much guaranteed sex.  I mean it was practically an obligation.  Everyone has sex on V-Day.  It's like a right of passage.  I thought that for a long time.  I didn't see anything wrong with it either.  I honestly thought that's what Valentine's Day was all about.  It feels a little hollow to type that all out now. 

I work in retail.  So for the past 7 days I spent huge portions of my life helping people find the right card, flowers and gifts for the one they love.  I saw giddy couples planning their dates and holding hands and walking through the store arm in arm.  It was an entire whirlwind of emotional triggers in a bright red Valentine's package.  It was really hard at at times.  On one level I enjoyed helping people make the holiday special.  But on another level it was one painful reminder after another that the one I love currently has little or no interest in being close to me on that level.  It caused a lot of angst and fear.  I did a pretty good job of surrendering it and discussing it with others but it was so constant and so immediate that it was hard to not get sucked in at times.

Ultimately Valentine's day ended up being pretty okay.  Knowing that Valentine's has been a huge trigger for her over the years, I actually surprised her a week before with some gifts and then got her flowers on Thursday.  I was very cautious to stay away from things that were outwardly "lovey dovey."  No red roses or cards dripping with I love you.  Not because I don't feel that way about my wife but because I am trying very hard to be sensitive to her feelings and triggers so I was trying to balance expressing the depth of my feelings without making things uncomfortable or triggery for her.  I also made a point to put a note in with the card explaining where I was coming from.  I was accountable for the way I acted on Valentine's Day in the past and explained that I was trying to learn from that and do things differently.  I think things turned out pretty well.  She seemed genuinely happy.  It felt good.  We also ended up spending some wonderful family time on Saturday evening.  It wasn't a romantic evening with flowers and soft music and there was zero physical contact of any kind and the whole family was involved not just the 2 of us.  But you know what, it was still pretty awesome. 

It made me reflect a lot about what love really is.  What does it really mean to love someone?  To be in love with someone?  Is it comfort, trust, appreciation, deep friendship,  physical intimacy?  Is it a balance of all of these?  And as I pondered this things I thought to myself, "I'll go find some amazing quote about love and post it and let that be my answer."  But that wouldn't be what I have learned about love.  It wouldn't be from me.  So here is what I believe love is and should be.  What pure and true love should look like.  This is what I want in my relationship.

Love requires understanding.  It means being willing to understand that the other person isn't having a great day but to love them anyway.  It means being willing to accept that they are processing something hard and need space but love them anyway.

Love requires respect.  It means being willing to respect that the other person is feeling things I don't understand and that maybe I even see differently but to love them anyway.  To try to understand their feelings and be sensitive and caring about them.  It means not only respecting her intelligence, her feelings and her ideas but also to respect her body.  It means to teach my children to respect her and to do so by example.  It means being the first one to stand up for her when someone else disrespects her.

Love requires patience.  It means being willing to serve and wait and hope and trust that there is a bright future ahead even if it doesn't feel like it today.  It means respecting boundaries with patience even if you don't understand them or like them a whole lot.  It means trusting the Lord to get both of us where we need to be on His timeline even if His timeline is different from my timeline and her timeline. 

Love requires support.  It means loving and caring about the things that are important to her simply because they are important to her.  Because if they are important to her it means they are part of her very being.  It means I can't truly love her or be in love with her without respecting and caring about things that are important to her.  It means being a support to her emotionally, temporally, physically.

Love requires openness.  Not just honestly about my struggles and fears but also just being open about where I am.  How I am feeling, how my day went.  It means being willing to share about my life with vulnerability and transparency. Trusting that doing so will not make me appear weak but rather will open me up to greater levels of connection and bonding.

Love requires work.  Cute little houses in the country and white picket fences require a lot of hard work.  Life and love are not a destination but a journey.  A journey with detours and wrong turns and lots and lots of potholes.  But it means being willing to not only weather the storm but have fun along the way.  It means being willing to do all the little things, the uncomfortable things, even when I am tired, stressed or just don't want to.  It means being willing to go the distance.

Love is a powerful thing, a hopeful thing, a healing thing.  It is a gift from God.  But it only truly exists when He is involved and at the helm.