Long Relationships

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There is a saying that it is better to have loved and lost than never to have loved at all. But to have loved and lost means painful negative emotions such as hurt, disappointment, betrayal, depression, anger and the feeling of being abandoned may take root in our hearts. This is true especially when a relationship sours. On the other hand, if there is no love affair, we don’t have to put ourselves at risk with these deep unhappy feelings although life may just be more monotonous.

So for Love Q #4: Is it really better to have loved and lost than never to have loved at all?

I absolutely agree with the statement that’s it’s better to have loved and lost, but I have a sort of optimistic reasoning for it, strangely enough.

As much as I admire the romantic qualities of going out with one person in school and eventually marrying them, I think that only works for a small part of the population. Many more of us change too much in a lifetime to stay with the person we date in school.

I mean, think about the person you went out with in school – would you date him/her now? Would you mesh? Are you at all the person you were in school?

Loving and losing, while it hurts, teaches us what works for us and what doesn’t. I was never one to let a relationship experience go to waste and took at least one lesson from each of the relationships I had. While it didn’t help me avoid the relationships to follow that didn’t work out, I did ‘move up’ in the dating guys world until I met my husband.

So while I don’t condemn first love, only love relationships, I think it’s healthy to get out there and learn about not only what you want in relationships but about who you are in relationships.

Be sure to stop by and see what Mae has to say.

***This post is part of the Long Relationships 100 Comment Contest. Click on the link to find out how you can win.***

The beginning of my relationship with my husband was a bit weird all around.

I was in an online relationship with a guy named Steve at the time. We’d done the picture exchange, the nightly phone calls, we were planning on flying to see each other…

I was having a bad night when one of my online friends introduced me to his online friend, B. B and I talked, got me through my bad mood, and we ended up having a lovely conversation. And a spark.

It wasn’t long at all before we were admitting what was there – a very great and nearly instant attraction even though we were half a world apart and with an age gap to boot. Those things didn’t matter though. We were in love.

A question a lot of people ask is, “How did you know it was love?”

The last think I want to do is say some vague phrase like, “I just knew.”

The thing was, I did know. Why? Because from the beginning I knew I wanted to face the challenges of life with B. I think being with Steve at the time only made it more definite in my mind that I had fallen in love with B; I didn’t agonize over which man I would end up hurting – I always agonized about how hurt Steve would be. (Which he was, but he was also extremely angry, which I didn’t like.)

Beyond that, we talked about and knew we’d have to face a lot of challenges to make things work. B was unemployed at the time, we were (and are) at an age difference to raise eyebrows, I was in university, and a lot of other things.

However, we talked, and we talked a lot. About all the possible problems. Even so, we decided that it would be much better to be together and face problems than be apart and face nothing. He and I both knew it was love.

I think that’s when B and I truly went from falling in love to loving. As former author RA said, “…falling in love simply happens to someone. It’s a passive activity, like falling into a pool. It’s a mistake, not intentional. Loving someone, however, is a conscious decision. It’s an active state of caring for another person to the extent that one’s actions change to that end. It’s diving into the pool.”

That’s what having a long relationship is about. Making the decision to love and to be with someone.

So when did you know it was love?

When JG and I were dating, I remember asking myself if I was in love. I also remember feeling guilty because I didn’t know. Wasn’t that a bad sign? I felt like I was missing out on some grandiose sensation, during which music should swell and slow-motion should take effect. I approached our relationship rather pragmatically – as I did with most other issues – so I looked for evidence that would help me come to a conclusion. What did “being in love” entail? What were the behaviors involved? What criteria would lead to a positive result?

But then, I wasn’t sure I even wanted to be in love. I polled my college friends about this concept and they all described fluffy feelings that weren’t attractive to me at all. I didn’t want my head in the clouds, my feet walking on air, or my heart leaping all the time. It sounded rather like being under the influence, if you asked me.

Finally, I asked JG if he thought he was in love with me and what he even thought that meant. He considered my (rather loaded) question for a little while and said, “I don’t think it matters whether I’m in love. I just know that I love you.”

Huh. Well, that was an answer I didn’t expect, but I appreciated it much more than any alternatives I had considered.

See, falling in love simply happens to someone. It’s a passive activity, like falling into a pool. It’s a mistake, not intentional. Loving someone, however, is a conscious decision. It’s an active state of caring for another person to the extent that one’s actions change to that end. It’s diving into the pool.

These days, I don’t care whether I’m in love; I know that I love JG and I’m trying everyday to show that to him.

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couples, being in love, love

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