Calling love

Calling Love

By Lumina Lee

What is love? When hearing this enchanting word, numerous images pass by. Romantic serenades-at the balcony, obviously-, Mendelssohn’s Wedding March, altruistic, caring parents, Jesus Christ’s “Love thy neighbor.” and much more. Love is sometimes considered as the holy angel who has come to save one’s life, and interestingly, sometimes as a wicked demon determined to ruin the world. Ever since the birth of humankind, love has been one of the most fascinating subjects of philosophy, literature, and everyday gossip. Love has swiftly enchanted, eluded, incited, fooled our soul, and tens of thousands of souls pondered upon the true meaning of it. Despite the diligent pursuit, however, love has constantly defied any sort of categorization. By what reasons does this simple, one-syllable word contain so diverse a meaning? Has there ever been, is, or will be any right way to love? 


Society’s immediate answer would be an enthusiastic ‘yes’. Love must be giving, unconditional, fair, passionate, serene, impartial, special, the-meaning-of-life, says human culture. One shouldn’t be obsessed with love, but at the same time, prioritize it above all. Love must be the most private realm, and also a shared, universal value. But do any of these criteria behold actual meaning? 


The modern concept of love has its roots in Romanticism. Love is considered to be a craft of feelings, where the individual emotions take precedence above all. Although we find this interpretation so natural, love actually has come a long way before becoming an emotional illustration. During the primitive stage of love, or more accurately, relationships, the purpose of marriage was pure self-interest. It was something about land, kingdoms, and power. Later on, a sense of moral duty was imposed on love. One type of love was responsible for taking care of one’s family, and one for being part of humanity, which respectively are called Philia and Agape by the classical Greeks. But soon, love started to focus on individual interactions(i.e. Courtship), moving away from the grand scale of community. At the wake of Romanticism, love started to be considered as the communication of pure emotions, and even further, souls. And today, although grounded on the Romantic view, practical matters—for instance, rents, bills, salaries—came into account, bringing us to the post-modernist epoch. 


Marriage is no longer considered as a pure craft of love, but rather, a sort of partnership, perhaps even a business. It is regarded as unprofessional to be carried away by love, foolish to let one’s heart make the decision. Society constantly reiterates that one must think about the future, that one must take into account all the details (e.g. income, medical history, political inclinations, etc) before signing the contract, or in other words, before making the vow. 


Ironically though, as much as we tend to think it is naïve to let love decide one’s life, it is love that flows through everything—from individual to family, from lovers to humanity. As it is seen in the legalization of gay marriage, love is the underlying premise of human culture, something that answers most of our worried doubts about the world. 


The Homo Sapiens of 2020 define love as ‘strong affection for another, arising out of kinship or personal ties,’ ‘ warm attachment, enthusiasm, or devotion,’ and even, ‘a score of zero (as in tennis)’[Merriam-Webster Dictionary].


As much as we consider love a luxury—something quite pleasant but not necessary for life— it is love that we long for. Childhood kindles one’s nostalgia not because one simply misses giggling in the playground- but because one craves for the sunshine called parental love, something that kept one from any harm on earth. High-teen films make one’s cheek rosy, not because of the outstanding attractiveness of the heroine, but because it brings back the memory of first love. Love songs predominate the music chart all-season, since we are all—no matter how fiercely one may rebut this claim— waiting for the one to whom we are going to sing that melody. Love is the shelter we so desperately seek, a warm place that, even for a moment, spare us from the chilling, sorrowful loneliness. Love, an affectionate face, a sense of connection, often gives us enough courage, enough meaning to face the rageful waves of reality. Loving, being loved, let us forget how fragile we are, what a speck of dust we are within the vast galaxy. A subtle kiss on the cheek makes you feel infinite. 

 

Living in an era of uncertainty, —where there’s no firm moral standard to rely on; where even science seems questionable (consider quantum physics); where one’s success, future, and happiness remain murky–no matter how hard he worked and worked that day–; where there’s not much time to dream; where one constantly hears a sad tune, which whispers that one is not good enough;—can love perhaps be the answer? Is this invisible, intangible, abstract, mathematically unprovable thing something we can cling on? 


One might say no. That love is just a midsummer night’s dream, that one must deal with reality, like any rational grown-up would do. That love is just an illusion, that it may make one’s heart beat faster, make eyes twinkle, but something that doesn’t last. 


But the true beauty of love is not that it increases your heartbeat, nor that it causes shining eyes. What makes love so powerful, so charming is its very contingent nature, the fact that its definition is so diverse, the fact that there’s no such right way to love. The freedom to decide what love means for oneself makes love so difficult, so fascinating. The elegance of love is not the mere fact that it makes your heart beat, but that you can choose what makes your heart skip a beat. ‘Love is an activity, not a passive affect; it is a “standing in,” not a “falling for.”’(Fromm 2006,21) 


What is love? Whatever one’s response may be, that doesn’t explain everything about love. It is this lingering, enormous question mark at the end which makes love love.


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