In my brief experience in this wee planet, I’m pretty positive I still have to have the pleasure of falling in love.
My question is, how do you know it’s love?
And I’m not looking for “oh, you just know” because I have definitely been in lust, and definitely infatuated. But I’m wondering what makes it different. There is someone new on the horizon, and I’m not sure whether to trust my feelings about him. I’m over analysing them. :dubious: But there is something unbelieveably special about him, and could I love him?
I like that one, but that could easily describe someone who’s simply infatuated. I think you know it’s love when the lusty infatuation phase wears off, and you still want the other person around and care about their happiness. It takes time.
Add up the number of times that you think about the lady each day. Subtract from the total the number of times you think about yourself each day. If the remainder is more lady, and less yourself, then it’s love. (Peter O’toole in Creator.)
When you look in the eye’s of your lover 30 years later and see the same person. When you hold each other and that funny wobble the spinning world makes goes away.
Love is what’s left (or not) when infatuation wears off.
When you’ve been together long enough (and that could be a couple of months or a couple of decades) that the new is wearing off, and you’ve seen the good side and the bad side of the other person, and they of you, and you’re both okay with each other just the way you are…
you’ve had a couple of good fights, and made up, and you’ve seen each other sick, tired, drunk, pissed off, etc. and it hasn’t made you care for each other any less…
if you’ve picked up his socks regularly and he’s had to deal with your PMS and you’ve had to put up with his tv habits and he’s put up with your cat, and none of these are a deal-breaker…
then there’s a good chance it might be love. YMMV.
I don’t believe in love at first sight, but I remember looking into Crusoe’s eyes a few hours after we met and thinking “Oh, I could be in trouble here…”
After the first flush wore off, though, there was a lot of compromise on both sides to make it work. We had a lot of arguments the first year we lived together, and both of us at times thought about walking away, but the good bits were good enough to convince us not to.
We’ve been prepared - not to change our personalities for each other, but to try and moderate the bits that really drive the other one insane. For example, I used to be the sort of hot-tempered person who flew off the handle at the slightest provocation. Crusoe, being a calm and even-tempered sort of guy, just couldn’t handle it. So I learnt how to control my temper, and to explain to him, in as calm and rational a way as I can, why I’m upset.
Having said that, part of love is accepting the other person’s flaws - knowing all the worst bits of them and loving them anyway.
I don’t think my ramblings have made much sense, but I’ll add one last point nonetheless. The other day I came home from work having had such a bad day that all I was capable of was lying on the bed in a state of mute despair. Crusoe came home, and he didn’t ask if I wanted to talk about it (I didn’t - it’s the same ol, same ol and talking about it doesn’t help), he didn’t try and comfort me, he didn’t even try and persuade me to get up. What he did do was - tickle me. He tickled me mercilessly until I was crying with laughter, and that gave me the boost I needed to get up and carry on with life.
I already knew he loved me, but the fact that he knew instinctively what I needed, reminded me that he understands me better than anyone else on earth.
I’m not entirely sure it’s possible to know within the first few months. The Sweaty Palm Stage tends to cloud your better judgement, much like getting behind the wheel of a car can seem like a terrific idea when you’re drunk off your ass.
When you’re 6+ months in, and you’re doing the nightly phone call thing, and you look forward to each call (as opposed to dreading it), I think that’s a pretty good indicator.
I think a few of the people have hit on most of it, but I have a slightly different view of what love and in love is. I won’t bother to get into my whole philosophy, but it really comes down to something where you can point out when it’s love and when it’s not, but it’s not easy to given a simple definition. FTR, I disagree with the you think about her more than you think about yourself; that’s thoroughly infatuation and/or lust to me.
So here’s some of my observations:
Love always brings out the best in people. Lust doesn’t, and IME often brings out the worst.
Love lasts even if the relationship doesn’t. Lust doesn’t last even if the relationship does.
In lust you want what you think it best for that person. Love just wants what is best for that person (subtle but significant difference).
Lust is a purely physical, emotional, and mental reaction (feelings, thoughts, etc.). Love is spiritual (for the religiously disinclined… I’m not sure what you would use there).
Or, my favorite: Lust is because of something (because she’s beautiful, smart, etc.). Love is despite something (she has a temper/too passive, she’s a slob/neat-freak, etc.).
Really, when it comes down to it, love and lust are orthogonal concepts and, as some above said, are not mutually exclusion. To me, in love just means you’re experiencing both at the same time, and this is what gives it that “you know it when you feel it” quality; everyone knows lust and everyone knows love, but it’s a completely different experience when they’re simultaneous.
Calvin: What’s it like to fall in love?
Hobbes: Well… say the object of your affection walks by…
Calvin: Yeah?
Hobbes: First, your heart falls into your stomach and splashes your innards. All the moisture makes you sweat profusely. This condensation shorts the circuits to your brain and you get all woozy. When your brain burns out altogether, your mouth disengages and you babble like a cretin until she leaves.
Calvin: THAT’S LOVE?!?
Hobbes: Medically speaking.
Calvin: Heck, that happened to me once, but I figured it was cooties!!
My wife and I are 27 years in and still anticipate talking to each other every night. Economics dictate that I spend a lot of time traveling, but we’re as close as an two people we’ve ever known.
well, all your posts made me feel warm inside. Maybe love does exist. So thanks for taking the time to reply to my question guys. I think I will just have to take it as it comes, and stop worrying about what might become of it, and enjoy it for what it is; amazing.
When you feel an ease in your togetherness that is as easy, for you, as drawing breath.
When this person makes you feel more fully who you were meant to be, brings out the best in you, inspires you to be a better person, just by being who they are.
Respect is a big component of love. But love is not just a feeling, love is an action.
I have two definitions of true love that suit me in different moods.
One is that love is a stew. That is, it is amalgamation of four emotions–lust, affection, respect, & trust–with the intellectual element of commitment thrown in.
The other is that love is the state of mind in which the well-being of another person is essential to your own peace of mind.
Right now I’m leaning toward definition B, as it better explains why being in love is frequently unpleasant.
I’ve never had a girlfriend before so I could just be talking out of my ass, but Love is when you cry when you realize the she’s had a serious boyfriend for 10 years and she wants to settle down with him. And she wasn’t sending you signals that she likes you for the three years that that you’ve known her. And you will never get to be the one she loves.
