Have you ever started out in a relationship with someone and wonder when you will know it’s really love? How do you know if that woman or man loves you? Do you even know what true love is really like? These are some of the questions I think most of us wonder about when we start dating someone and it’s going well after a few months. I know it’s something that I had to find out. I’ll be honest with you (yeah you reading this post lol) I'm not the type of girl that just falls in and out of Love. My definition of Love transcends those butterfly feelings that one gets when they spend quality time with the person they are dating. So I wanted to know in my heart and in my mind a way I could know that what I had with my guy was real. Here's my definition of Love and how most people get caught up in what they think is Love. Hey, it may just help you to figure out if your girlfriend/boyfriend really does Love you or if you really love that person also.What I hope to accomplish my the end of this Love Post lol is to
(a) Define Love, (b)Knowing what isn’t Love, (c)How do you know when you’re in love?
Ok I would like to begin by saying that I’m no expert. I think that Love is wonderful and we all long to be in a relationship that will bring us joy even when things get tough. However, I feel like a lot of us run around wanting to be loved and we tend to get ourselves into relationships that end up hurting us or someone else. Sometimes we carry some of the hurt, and pain into our next relationship and it becomes a vicious cycle.
Why don’t we start off with defining love? I went online and looked up love on a dictionary website (dictionary.com) and this is what it said:
Ok I would like to begin by saying that I’m no expert. I think that Love is wonderful and we all long to be in a relationship that will bring us joy even when things get tough. However, I feel like a lot of us run around wanting to be loved and we tend to get ourselves into relationships that end up hurting us or someone else. Sometimes we carry some of the hurt, and pain into our next relationship and it becomes a vicious cycle.
Why don’t we start off with defining love? I went online and looked up love on a dictionary website (dictionary.com) and this is what it said:
Love: [luhv](n)
1. a profoundly tender, passionate affection for another person.
2. a feeling of warm personal attachment or deep affection, as for a parent, child, or friend.
3. sexual intercourse or sexual passion
4. a personification of sexual affection
5. to embrace and kiss (someone), as a lover.
6. affectionate concern for the well-being of others: the love of one's neighbor.
7.the benevolent affection of God for His creatures, or the reverent affection due from them to God
I don’t know about you but I thought this list was rather fascinating. So why don’t we play a little game on how love is defined by saying Love equals (=) and add that definition above
Love=Passionate Affection, affection is a feeling
Love=Feeling attachment/affection aka feelings again
Love=Sex
Love=Sex
Love=Hugging and Kissing
Love=Concern for others (feelings of affection with action) loving your neighbor
Love=Comes from God that He gives and we return to him.
WOW what a list right. Ok the first two have to do with feelings and next three are physical and the last two essentially have something to do with God.
1. a profoundly tender, passionate affection for another person.
2. a feeling of warm personal attachment or deep affection, as for a parent, child, or friend.
3. sexual intercourse or sexual passion
4. a personification of sexual affection
5. to embrace and kiss (someone), as a lover.
6. affectionate concern for the well-being of others: the love of one's neighbor.
7.the benevolent affection of God for His creatures, or the reverent affection due from them to God
I don’t know about you but I thought this list was rather fascinating. So why don’t we play a little game on how love is defined by saying Love equals (=) and add that definition above
Love=Passionate Affection, affection is a feeling
Love=Feeling attachment/affection aka feelings again
Love=Sex
Love=Sex
Love=Hugging and Kissing
Love=Concern for others (feelings of affection with action) loving your neighbor
Love=Comes from God that He gives and we return to him.
WOW what a list right. Ok the first two have to do with feelings and next three are physical and the last two essentially have something to do with God.
I don’t know about you, but if I had to use 1-5 to figure out if my man loves me based on just feelings he says he has then everyone is in Love lol People can say that they love you but it may not be true. A lot of people can feel affection because you are attracted to that person. But is that really love? As for sex, well we know tons of people have sex for a lot of reasons and many don’t even claim to love the person they are having sex with. So I’m not convinced that love is sex, hugs, and kisses. All that can possibly come from the attraction you physically feel when you are with or thinking about the person which isn’t love.
Now we’re left with the last two options. Ok you may not be a person who believes in God. However, since this definition mentions God I think it would be worth it to glance at the Bible to find out what love is. The Bible says that God is Love. He is the author of love. So if you want to know what Love is all about you’d have to find out who God is and you can definitely read about God in the Bible which I call God's Love Letter (click there for my previous post)
Love is defined in the Bible as the following in 1Corinthians13:4
Love is patient, love is kind. It does not envy, it does not boast, it is not proud. It is not rude, it is not self-seeking, it is not easily angered, it keeps no record of wrongs. Love does not delight in evil but rejoices with the truth. It always protects, always trusts, always hopes, always perseveres. Love never fails.
The description perfectly fits God's love toward us, and should be the way we love each other and God. What I noticed about this definition is that there’s no mention of physical attraction, sex, or having passionate feelings. If not those things, then what does it say love is supposed to be like.
Love=Patience, Kindness these are not things that you feel, but things that you see that the person is exhibiting through actions.
Love=Rejoices in Truth which means that if someone says something and you can see through actual evidence that it is true then that’s an indication of Love on their part
Love=Always Protects, Trusts, Hopes Perseveres, Never Fails
I know that we are not perfect people. No one can perfectly meet everything on this list without God helping us to do so since he is the author of love. However, if you are trying to figure out if you love someone or if that someone loves you. Please PLEASE PLEASE look at their actions. See if what they say matches up with what they DO. Actions speak louder than words. I am not saying that words don’t speak loud..lol But Actions speak LoudER!
So if you want to know if you are in love. Don’t depend on sex, passionate feelings or attachment to someone because that stuff can only entertain you for maybe 3months, 6months, maybe a year. But you will know if it’s love if both of you tell each other the truth, you will trust each other, you both will be patient and kind, you will want to protect each other from all kinds of hurt meaning you feel hurt when they get hurt, and it’ll be something that you hope will go through the test of time (perseveres.) Only time will tell you all these things so don’t rush into anything. If it’s true love then you’ll get through hardships, trials, or tough times together because you want the love that doesn’t give up and never fails.
Before I wrap up I also want to point out what LOVE IS NOT (≠) according to the author of Love (God).
Love ≠ does not envy- being envious means that someone can be jealous, spiteful, resentful towards you
Now we’re left with the last two options. Ok you may not be a person who believes in God. However, since this definition mentions God I think it would be worth it to glance at the Bible to find out what love is. The Bible says that God is Love. He is the author of love. So if you want to know what Love is all about you’d have to find out who God is and you can definitely read about God in the Bible which I call God's Love Letter (click there for my previous post)
Love is defined in the Bible as the following in 1Corinthians13:4
Love is patient, love is kind. It does not envy, it does not boast, it is not proud. It is not rude, it is not self-seeking, it is not easily angered, it keeps no record of wrongs. Love does not delight in evil but rejoices with the truth. It always protects, always trusts, always hopes, always perseveres. Love never fails.
The description perfectly fits God's love toward us, and should be the way we love each other and God. What I noticed about this definition is that there’s no mention of physical attraction, sex, or having passionate feelings. If not those things, then what does it say love is supposed to be like.
Love=Patience, Kindness these are not things that you feel, but things that you see that the person is exhibiting through actions.
Love=Rejoices in Truth which means that if someone says something and you can see through actual evidence that it is true then that’s an indication of Love on their part
Love=Always Protects, Trusts, Hopes Perseveres, Never Fails
I know that we are not perfect people. No one can perfectly meet everything on this list without God helping us to do so since he is the author of love. However, if you are trying to figure out if you love someone or if that someone loves you. Please PLEASE PLEASE look at their actions. See if what they say matches up with what they DO. Actions speak louder than words. I am not saying that words don’t speak loud..lol But Actions speak LoudER!
So if you want to know if you are in love. Don’t depend on sex, passionate feelings or attachment to someone because that stuff can only entertain you for maybe 3months, 6months, maybe a year. But you will know if it’s love if both of you tell each other the truth, you will trust each other, you both will be patient and kind, you will want to protect each other from all kinds of hurt meaning you feel hurt when they get hurt, and it’ll be something that you hope will go through the test of time (perseveres.) Only time will tell you all these things so don’t rush into anything. If it’s true love then you’ll get through hardships, trials, or tough times together because you want the love that doesn’t give up and never fails.
Before I wrap up I also want to point out what LOVE IS NOT (≠) according to the author of Love (God).
Love ≠ does not envy- being envious means that someone can be jealous, spiteful, resentful towards you
Love ≠ does not boast- being boastful means that you’re showing off things about yourself, and saying all you have to offer all the time
Love ≠is not proud aka prideful- is also connected to boasting about yourself, pumping yourself up or telling that person they are lucky to have them in your life
Love ≠ is not rude- we all know what being rude is which is being discourteous, impolite, vulgar, offensive, having no manners towards you
Love ≠is not self-seeking- only looking out for yourself love is about looking outside of yourself and looking out for someone else.
Love ≠is not easily angered- meaning getting upset very very quickly. It doesn’t say you can’t get upset. It says that you don’t get mad at the drop of a dime.
Love ≠no record of wrongs- You shouldn’t have a long list of things he/she has done wrong and throwing that stuff in their face. Love is about true forgiveness. If you can’t forgive then you don’t love the person or vice versa.
Love ≠ does not delight in evil- that means anyone who is hurting you physically, emotionally, mentally that is not love its being evil or wicked. Love is not supposed to HURT!!
So there you have it Ladies and Gentlemen. There’s your checklist that I hope you can use. Write it down on a piece of paper. Watch the actions of the person you are dating and see if it matches up. Oh and don’t forget to use the checklist to figure out if you love that person based on your actions after you have spent some serious time with that person. Sure you can have sexual attraction, you can have butterflys, you can certainly have a great time hugging and kissing. Those things are fleeting. But when you have a problem will sex, butterflys and empty words of affection really be there for you. Maybe for a short while you think it can help you forget the problem. However, if you are interested in true love that comes from the author of Love (God) I think you’ll have a better chance of having a wonderful relationship that will last for a long time. Sure it will be work. I never said it would be easy…But love is definitely worth it..If its real love.
I hope this helps and that God will teach you the love He has so that you can demonstrate that to someone else. Ask him, he’s always there to listen.
Thanks for reading!!
Just_Wondering
