Love

Let me not to the marriage of true minds
Admit impediments. Love is not love
Which alters when it alteration finds,
Or bends with the remover to remove:
O no! it is an ever-fixed mark
That looks on tempests and is never shaken;
It is the star to every wandering bark,
Whose worth's unknown, although his height be taken.
Love's not Time's fool, though rosy lips and cheeks
Within his bending sickle's compass come:
Love alters not with his brief hours and weeks,
But bears it out even to the edge of doom.
If this be error and upon me proved,
I never writ, nor no man ever loved. 

-Shakespeare


Last week I memorized this sonnet for acting class, and upon learning what it truly meant it gave me inspiration to write about a certain subject, Love. I was looking back on my old blogs from back when I was having troubles with Craig, and blogs from when I first met Taylor and I was thinking about this strange thing we call "love". Shakespeare was right, Love isn't something that can be measured, it's not something that can be explained, and it is irreversible. Once you love someone, you love them for life. There is nothing that can change that, nothing that can break that bond. Love can be lost, people can change and become too different to be able to be together. Or sometimes people weren't good for each other to begin with and they finally give up the battle of trying to force two polar opposites together. But regardless of the situation the common factor is Love.  

Love takes many shapes and forms. The way that I loved one person does not equal the way that I love another. Some people may not understand how or why I loved Craig, but I just did. I loved him because I thought that would save me from being alone, I loved him because I didn't love myself, I loved him to take the focus away from my lack of self esteem and I put all my effort into making him happy and gave up on my own happiness. With Taylor it was completely different, I loved Taylor for who he was and how he made me feel, but I didn't love him because I needed "someone" to love, I didn't love him to distract me from myself. I loved him, and I had found my own path and learned to love myself. I found someone who could share my journey without having to be my whole life. When I met Tay, I didn't have to sacrifice myself and what made me happy in life to be with him. 

"Love is not love which alters when it alteration finds"- You can't change someone to make them be the person you want or need them to be. They can change on their own, for their own reasons but they can't rely on you to change them. That is too much pressure for a relationship, let alone one person, to have to live up to. No one can or should want to change someone, life doesn't work that way. You are who you are and I am who I am and that is how the world is. But if the two of you compliment each other, if you have your own lives but choose to share them together, that is the best situation you can ask for. 

Some people believe things about love that aren't quite accurate. This is what I believe love isn't: Love isn't security, Love isn't happiness, Love isn't a fairy tale, Love isn't easy. Loving yourself is security, loving yourself is happiness, loving yourself should be easy. But you will never find happiness when you look to someone else to give it to you. That comes from within you. Please love yourself before you throw all of your time and attention into loving someone else. Because if you don't love yourself first, you will never be able to love someone else in the right way, and for the right reasons. 

I have found that Love is a choice. Everyday you wake up and you make a choice to Love someone. It's hard, difficult, and every emotion rolled into one. But it's worth the fight. It's worth the tears, broken hearts, and late nights talking. All of those bad things teach us what love isn't and helps us to move on with our life, and if we are lucky find ourselves along the way. But, when you do find that one right person, every thing that you have ever been through is all worth it. Every tear that I have cried over lost loves has formed a river, a river that I built a boat on and began sailing down towards my future, and I was lucky enough to find a man who built his own boat and sails alongside me. I didn't have to rescue him from the river, pull him on to my boat and chance us both falling in, I didn't have to wait for him to build his boat, putting off my own journey to wait for him. We sail side by side, into our futures, and wherever it will take us I don't know... But I do know one thing, I love myself and I love this crazy beautiful life I lead. I wish the same joy and happiness for all of you.