Love-A timeless topic I will attempt to write about both in correlation to general views and to myself. Love is mostly viewed as a euphoric feeling one has in relation to another person. For those of you who have seen "Dan in Real Life" you might be familiar with the phrase "Love is not a feeling but an ability". With that said I will consider love in both the verb and noun forms. Love would not be so confusing if we had words in the English language for all the forms of love there are as there is in Greek-agape(Christ-like love), eros(romantic love), and philos(brotherly love/friendship).

 I read a book some time ago. I think the title was "Chosen Date, Eternal Mate" by some guy with the last name Yorgensen. In it he drew out two slopes-one had relationship status' on it and the other had physical activates that displayed affection/love. I will put those below along with one that includes the feelings usually associated with love.

Emotional-crush, infatuation, "in love", "true love"

Status-friendship, dating, steady dating, courting, marriage

Physical-hugs, hand holding, kisses, necking/petting, physical intimacy

 I don't have the book anymore but the general idea is still there. In it he said that the men controlled the status side and the women controlled the physical side. As one side gets deeper into seriousness the other usually follows. The emotions I put there can generally follow that scale also. As pertaining to men controlling the status and women the physical aspect of the relationship there are many exceptions. In fact there have been two separate instances in which I was asked out on a date(one was by proxy but I still count it). Within the physical side there are even varied degrees of hugging and kissing. There’s one handed hug, normal hugs, and hugs that end up groping things. There are peck kisses, more passionate lip locking, and tonsil hockey. Of course there are different degrees in all of the above items-young marrieds/50+ years married, friend/BFF, and many levels of how much you actually like someone. I use "in love" for the kind of love that I referred to in the beginning of this blog and "true love" for the perfect, Christ-like love(although we can all have that love without it being perfect). It is, in my opinion, a love that is the same no matter with whom it is. Whether it be your spouse, brother, or child-it is the same. The only difference is how is got there. That’s what makes husband/wife love so special. Most others you naturally have this love for is family but you didn’t choose them like how you choose your spouse (any of you veterans please help me with this as I cannot personally testify of this if it is correct). I also put both steady dating and courting there in status'. They are usually used interchangeably but the way I see it you can always break up with someone you are steady dating but courtship inevitably leads to marriage. In all three of those aspects of love there are commandments given to guide us in a proper use of them all. Don't date until you are sixteen, abstain from sex until after you're married and only with your spouse, etc, etc. The only thing I can think of for the emotional aspect is to not be attracted to someone of your own gender(here's to you California and Prop 8!).

 My definition of love is the genuine care and concern for someone's well being and happiness. If you love someone you'd do things for them you normally wouldn't do for another person. There's a great book out there I have not read (but still know it's great) that many of you have either read or at least heard of-"The Five Love Languages". Even though I have not read I have heard enough to know what’s in it. Basically it states that there are 5 ways in which people show love and any given person needs 2(based on the person) of those 5 to feel loved. A person generally shows love in the ways that they feel love. The 5 ways are these: words of affirmation, touch, quality time, acts of service, and gifts. Through some introspection I have come to the conclusion that I am words of affirmation and service. I haven't read the book so I can't say I'm 100% positive on that. There's another popular book, or rather a series, out there that’s playing on a good number of people's heartstrings(mainly girls). The "Twilight" series by Stephanie Meyers. Many girls across America have fallen head over heels for Edward Cullen. He's handsome, chivalrous, and a vampire. The character is fictional and has unnatural speed and strength and so on but hey a girl can dream. With that said people are making it seem as if chivalry no longer exist. There are plenty of men out there who still hold those values. No disrespect to the books(I’ve read the first two so far) and they are rather entertaining and even though the main character is a girl I can still connect with the feelings she has. As long as I'm talking about books I'll talk about high school yearbooks. I've been looking through my own lately and realized how superficial they are. Prom, he-says, she-says, and of course flirting. At first I thought "What do teenagers know about flirting?" I then realized they know a lot about flirting but not so much about love.

 Now a little bit more personal. These are some of the things I look for in a girl: they love me for me regardless of my shortcomings/weaknesses, cute, I’m attracted to them (which isn’t always in correlation with how cute they are), outgoing, fun(the definition of fun is different from person to person), good with children, black/brown hair(red hair can be hot too) with blue/green eyes, nice face. Their figure is also something that is notable but I try to focus on the face- the body is usually in proportion to the face. There have been girls that I thought were really beautiful even though they had a larger figure. I’ve also noticed that I really like a girl who can pull off wearing a neon green or orange shirt. I don't know why. Pretty much everyone knows that boys focus more on physical appearance than on personality but I know you girls also love good looking men too. There's something I remember from the For Strength of Youth pamphlet that said that not everyone needs to date. I wonder if that would include me. I don't think it meant ever though. Dating leads to marriage and you can't get married without dating(even in this there is an exception-my sister married and never went on a single date!). My reasoning for thinking I might fall into that category is that I am very quiet. Being quiet allows me to be very observant though. I can sit back and watch people interact and learn a lot about them by just how they act. There is something my brother-in-law said that I remember and it makes perfect sense. He said that I would need to find a girl who talks a lot because having two people just stare at each other isn’t going anywhere. For me a person who talks a lot can be either a good or bad thing. They will either be really annoying or I'll actually be interested in what they have to say. I have often wondered about if I would ever find someone to be with for all eternity. My Patriarchal Blessing comforts me in this as it tells me that I don’t need to worry about it as long as I am faithful and the time and place will just happen naturally(it doesn’t actually say it but that’s the feeling I get from it).

 Now for chemistry! Get out your textbooks and turn to page 221! No, but really I think "chemistry" as it is called is fairly important. What good is a relationship if the two aren't even attracted to one another. As John Bytheway put it "Where is the mutual craziness?" in reference to his experiences with girls being crazy for him but not he for them and vice versa. One thought I have about chemistry is that it has spiritual roots. When we come across a spirit we knew in the pre-mortal existence and gets excited because it knows that other spirit. Related to that is a talk a general authority gave once. All I remember about it was that they basically said that when we learned about the plan of happiness and eternal marriage we were so excited about it and our spirits can't wait for that opportunity. As long as I’m thinking of it Ill put here the thing about revelation for whom to marry. Men aren’t entitled to that kind of revelation and any such revelation they claim to receive is "hormonal revelation". Only the girl is entitled to that kind of revelation if she asks. That’s the way I understood it. Back to "mutual craziness". I have had my own share of girls who liked me but I didn’t care much for them. I’ve also like girls but never got to the point to find out if their feelings for me were the same. I can recall 5 girls, 4 for sure, who bluntly and flat out told me they liked me(well two of them did, the other two didn’t try to hide it at all). I’ve like a lot of different girls. I think the first time I actually saw a girl and thought of them as cute was in the 3rd grade. I was still way young and girls still had cooties. The next time I had a similar experience was in the 8th grade. Was the first time I told my friends I liked someone. They didn't let me live it down so I’ve kept my interests fairly secret since then. It was some time until I really liked another girl. My brother took me to my first two youth dances. I hated them with a passion. I got the message across one night by hiding under my bed so I wouldn’t have to go. It wasn’t until I was 16 when I started to go again and by my own decision. I think I hold some record right now by having 5 different girls ask me to dance in one night and none of them I knew. Anyway back to girls I’ve liked. The last of girls whom I liked from grade school was senior year. Her name was Erica Rodriguez (yes, I like Mexicans on occasion). The thing that really brought her to my attention was that she was in every single one of my classes except for one. We became good friends and nothing more ever happened. I think she had a boyfriend anyway. Now for the girls I’ve liked in relation to church. Ashley, a young women in my ward in Riverside. All of the other boys in my ward had a crush on Ashley at one point or another. I was the only one in the group that did not like her in that way. Her cousin, Niki, however was a different story. Likewise every other boy liked her too. We were good friends. I never got the chance for any dating with her though as she and my best friend were going out at the time. The next is Jackie. She was a girl in my stake. I met her at a youth conference. I remember we were doing service at some horse place. There were so many youth they didn’t have enough work for us all and the both of us were stuck in the group that didn’t have anything to do. I may be exaggerating but I think we spent the whole weekend together. The horses, the beach next day, and the dance that night. But we fell apart just as quickly as we met. I didn’t see her for almost another year and it just wasn’t the same anymore. The last girl, Rebecca (whom I still like) is kind of funny because I was initially interested in her sister Charlye first. I met her after I moved from Riverside to Ontario. We spent a bit of time sending each other messages asking each other totally random things and end up dating. We are still good friends to this day and it was heart wrenching learning I was moving away to Las Vegas. I thought "Ok, Ill get over her with time and maybe meet someone new." The things is...I’ve found truth in the saying "Absence makes the heart grow fonder". We've seen each other twice in the two years since I’ve been in Vegas. Actually she isn’t the last one on my list-there are girls in Vegas after all. This next girl I met shortly after moving. Serretta and my step-mom, Anna, became good friends and she introduced me to her. She was really cute and all but there was never any opportunity to get close. She’s now married and pregnant. There are so many others I could include here but time is short and the opportunities to get closer to someone never present themselves. There are lots of girls I’ve thought cute and even fewer I’ve been attracted to. That’s just the way life goes. Some come, others go but there is always tomorrow.

 Just as a last note Ill write something about poems and music and their relation with love. I have written a number of love poems. I don’t have them anymore as I’ve thrown all my old notebook writings away as much of it holds negative things of my past. I have even written a song on my guitar. I’m not all that good at it but it gets the job done. One of my favorite love songs is "(Everything I Do) I Do It For You" by Bryan Adams. He also has a few other really good rock ballads. I’m quite partial to acoustic guitar love songs such as Plain White T's "Hey There, Delilah" and Cartels "The Minstrel's Prayer". Ill end here with a line from one of my poems that was actually the centerpiece for the whole thing. "They say home is where the heart is and my heart is yours."

Tags: Love

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