Reflections on the Heart

Disclaimer: These thoughts are general thoughts, and are not about any particular person, so don't read that deeply into them.

So, I was bumping around online and found this statement, and it made me think:

"Have you ever been in love? Horrible isn't it? It makes you so vulnerable. It opens your chest and it opens up your heart and it means that someone can get inside you and mess you up. You build up all these defenses, you build up a whole suit of armor, suit of armor, so that nothing can hurt you, then one stupid person, no different from any other stupid person, wanders into your stupid life...You give them a piece of you. They didn't ask for it. They did something dumb one day, like smile at you, and then your life isn't your own anymore. Love takes hostages. It gets inside you. It eats you out and leaves you crying in the darkness, so simple a phrase like 'maybe we should be just friends' turns into a glass splinter working its way into your heart. It hurts. Not just in the imagination. Not just in the mind. It's a soul-hurt, a real gets-inside-you-and-rips-you-apart pain. I hate love". – Neil Gaiman


Now, there are aspects of this statement that I can't argue with. Being in love does make you vulnerable. If you're really in love, you do open yourself entirely to someone, and hope for the best. Of course, sometimes the best doesn't happen. There are times where you may not feel like you're no longer in control of yourself. There are times when you feel as if you're whole life hangs on their each and every word. And when things don't work out as you'd like, it can send you into a spiral that's hard to counter. It gets into every part of your being, and drags down all of your thoughts and actions. It tears you apart from limb to limb, and then continues to tear at the bits that are left.

But, does this downside of love outweigh the upside of love? Let's see.

When you're in love, you open yourself completely to someone. You give yourself to someone, and do so without regard. And if they take what you give them and treat it correctly, you feel invincible. Nothing can take you down from the high that you're on. You enjoy hanging on your love's every word, and you take whatever opportunity you can to be around them. You look at them and think that nothing in the world can be wrong so long as you're around them. When you drop the armor around your heart, you feel as though a weight has been lifted from you. You can move freer when not constrained by the armor and barriers that have been built up to 'protect' your heart. You don't mind the access that your love has to you, because you want them to know that a part of you belongs to them.

I think back to something I read a few years ago. C.S. Lewis, in his classic work Mere Christianity, tackles the topic of love. He distinguishes 'love' from 'in love'. 'In Love' is the thrill-seeking, can't live without you feeling that people have in their gut when they fall (and how aptly titled) 'in love'. To be 'in love' takes a lot of effort, action, and energy. On the other hand, the emotion of 'love' is a calming feeling that is more easily sustained and creates a more fulfilling state of being. This isn't to say that 'love' is boring, as it provides ups and downs, just like being 'in love'. He compares these emotions to thrill seeking: "Let the thrill go - let it die away - go on through that period of death into the quieter interest and happiness that follow - and you will find you are living in a world of new thrills all the time."

So, in my opinion, Mr. Gaiman, don't hate love. You may disdain being 'in love', but love opens up a world of new possibilities that can heal a ripped-apart gut and (more importantly) mend the broken soul.

Thus Sayeth Your Haus