Why I won’t love you forever
If a woman asked me “Will you always love me?”… I would have to answer no. Or maybe. But definitely not yes.
I cannot know if I will always love you. I love you now. Maybe one day I won’t love you anymore. Then hours, days, weeks, months may go by and I will love you again. It is likely I will fall in and out of love with you. And maybe I’ll fall in love with you over and over again. So I won’t promise to always love you. I would be lying. To you. And to myself. Most of all, I would be putting too much pressure on myself, on our love. And love doesn’t survive under that kind of pressure.
Love isn’t made of expectations, or obligations, or promises. Love is two people experiencing being true to each other, willing to experience and fully accept the other person in their beautiful imperfection and try to see the other as who they really are — not as we would like them to be or behave. Because sometimes we think we are in love with a person but we are in fact in love with the idea of being in love. Or in love with how we imagine this person to be or who this person could become. Or in love with an image of that person without their flaws because we see them in a biased way.
And that’s why I don’t want you to ask me that question again, because I will be giving the same answer — nor will I ever ask you that question. You could ask me “Do you love me?”. And depending on the moment, on how I feel, I might say Yes! Or No!. There may be hard times, but that won’t change the fact that I choose to be there with you in that very moment.
People change. Love changes too. You allow yourself to fall in and out of love. To fall in love with the person they become, day after day. Or otherwise, if you fall in love with the image of a person at a given time, and you hold on to this image, to these memories, to “the one” you have fallen in love with, and when you’re not ready to see them change, then you’ll be disappointed at times when the person doesn’t live up to that standard anymore. This happens when the wonderful beginning of a relationship becomes a basis of comparison. You start to resent the other because things have changed. And you are too busy resenting, and being stuck in comparing and trapped by these memories, to notice the person as they are, that they have changed… Too busy… to be able to fall in love with them again.
Change is inevitable. Our willingness to experience it, to keep our eyes open to what’s happening now, is crucial. We have to be willing to learn and keep learning. To experiment with life. To be more interested in discovery than carefulness. To depend on our alertness more than our certainty (or necessity) to be right. To be more interested in learning than in protecting our beliefs. To be engaged in a relationship as a matter of choice and not as a matter of security. To not be engaged in a relationship based on a promise from another person not to hurt your feelings. Because shit happens. Inevitably. And because hurt, sadness, anger… are inevitably part of life in the same way joy is. You wouldn’t be able to recognize joy if it wasn’t for sadness, hurt or anger!
« At this level of consciousness […] the encounter of two beings is what love is. At this level of being where love is, one-night stands are just as good as lifetime relationships. The place where energy is simply playing with our bodies, or where the beings that we are play with each other, is a nice place, and you can go there with anybody, any time. » (from the book “Radical Honesty”)
I would like to end by sharing a quote that adresses the question “How do you make love stay?” and that inspired me to write this text.
« How do you make love stay?… You don’t. You let it come and go. Then there is a new opening for new love. Otherwise the space for love no longer exists, being occupied with ashes and bullshit. »
— Tom Robbins (in “Still Life with Woodpecker”, as cited in “Radical Honesty” by Brad Blanton)
Of course, this all depends on how you define love. If you define it as an emotion, a feeling, then all of this applies. Though, you could instead define love as an action. Love feelings come and go — you can’t do anything about it. But an act of love is something you can do, no matter how you feel.
« Instead of trying to control your emotions, try to control your actions. »
— Russ Harris
Feel free to share your thoughts by sending me a message or posting a comment on the facebook post or on instagram.
PS : I took this picture in Hong-Kong. This couple stood still for a couple of minutes, just watching the cityscape and the waves — leaving me time enough to immortalize the scene.
PPS : For a french translation of this article, check the facebook post.