Sunday, 02 August 2009
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I Don't Believe In Love
I see happy couples sitting on park benches, smiling and feeding each other french fries. I notice an exchanged look between a boyfriend and girlfriend while they stand in line at the grocery store. I've even stumbled upon a couple in a hidden nook of the bookstore, kissing each other shamelessly.It makes me wonder to myself - what is going on here?
Sure, they are joyful. Yeah, they are cute. But love?
I've come to see love and relationships as a bit of a cop-out. A person doesn't want to focus on his/her self-growth, so he/she gets in a relationship and falls in love and focuses his/her attention on someone else. It's comfortable and fun and it feels good, but when the relationship ends, you realize that you're in the same place you were when the relationship began. I always find that the periods of the greatest self-growth have been after I am out of a relationship.
Sometimes, the relationship ends up lasting years and people get married. They grown and change, but not in the the way that they could have, had they been alone.
I feel like love is lazy, and a distraction to personal growth. Maybe I'm saying this because I'm a 20-something, working on building my career. Maybe later in life, my opinions will change. However, right now and in this stage of my life, I am perfectly content being single.
Do you think my opinions will change as I get older? Do you think that I'm foolish? What do you think about love and how it affects personal development?
I only have one life to live, and it terrifies me to think of spending all of the time that I could have been focusing on myself and growing as a person...with someone else.
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About the Author
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- From: IntrospectiveOctober@xanga
- About Me: 21 year old student. Will have BA in Journalism. Applying to LS. Seeking like-minded individuals for intellectual discourse. INTP
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Comments (123)
Although you say you learnt most after a relationship's demise, isn't it the fact that a relationship existed in the first place that allowed you to grow?
Sure, people should learn to be independent and be able to thrive on their own. But there are some things you can with another person that you simply can't learn alone.
As for learning most after a relationship is over, it might be because you've traversed over the emotional stage, the cliche thrill ride of the trip, and can now retrospect in a more objective manner.
Just a thought.
i certainly believe in love. i'm in a sort of longer-distance relationship, (like an hour drive, not a HUGE deal, but we only see each other about once or twice a week) and while we love each other very deeply, we're pretty chill in allowing each other tons of space to grow on our own and have our own lives and other friends.
also, we help each other to grow. i mean, aren't there times when you need someone's honest advice? he is always honest even if sometimes its kinda hurtful, but it is what i need to hear. and i do the same for him - its not about babying each others egos all the time.
(just some of the time lol.)
in addition, there were about 5 years of friendship between us where we would only talk in brief segments and barely ever saw each other. basically we came to each other for advice and to share goofy stories.
idk. i think the planet is built in such a way that no creature could survive independent of all other forms of life, especially their own species.
i also think learning to truly love unselfishly is one of the most important lessons someone could learn.
this makes me sound as if i dont believe that being single for lengths of time is important: it CERTAINLY is. personal growth is very key to even being able to understand what love is. but, idk. to live devoid of love is ultimately a sad existence.
I'm a very individualistic person who likes solitude and contemplation. I like to spend a lot of time and effort on improving myself. But...
The situation that allowed me the opportunity to do more of that self-growth was a bad relationship. There's something about love that reveals a person's inadequacies and insecurities with great clarity. And when that happens, we get a chance to work on ourselves that probably would not have occurred had we not tried to love.
So I'd say that if you want to grow even more, love is a great way to go about it. Work on loving not just yourself, but your family, friends, and maybe someone who means even more to you. It just increases your opportunities for self-growth.
Isn't real love developing you as a person in itself? I know what love is and I have it and there hasn't been a time where I ever felt that I haven't grown. Yeah we learn and grow from our mistakes but how do we not from things we are successful in, like a loving relationship? Because I am with someone that I really love, I find that I have explored different parts of my personality and self as a whole to be as happy as I can be with this person. I know that I have grown alot and matured immensely faster than ever before and he's helped me do that in so many different ways. What is the point of growing as a person if you have nothing to put it towards? I always thought that people wanted to develop themselves so they can feel love and success at its best. You can grow on your own but after a point you can't continue without experiencing love; or that's my theory anyway.
I think people learn a lot from relationships. I know my relationships have helped me learn how to become a much better person and how to treat people.
Relationships definitely don't hold people back from growing.
The more trouble I have in my relationships, the more I doubt a human's ability to love someone with absolutely everything they have...and the more I believe that real love is something only God can give. Now don't worry, I'm not going to start off on a big sermon or anything, but looking back at the number of times I've gotten mad at my ex for not always being there when he said he would, not saying the right things, etc, the more I think that real love (the kind that exists after the fuzzies are gone) is almost impossible to obtain. Or maybe I'm just too picky. Who knows.
I just don't like feeling dependent on other people for my happiness and self-worth. But perhaps the real issue is with me, and not with the guys I date.
I think you need to be in love to believe in it. Or is it the other way around?
I think quite the opposite. In a relationship you learn more about yourself than you would have alone. When committed to another, you have to truly learn to coexist and learn what you like and what you do not like not just in a significant other, but other people in general. Learning to grow with people is essential because no matter what you do (unless you have sociophobia) you will be surrounded by people.
i can tell from your xanga screenname that you're introspective. :D
i thought this was going to be about how "love" is a chemical imbalance or something. that i might buy, haha. but i do believe that an integral part of one's growth comes from interpersonal relationships, and i think it is completely possible to nurture one's personhood/career/ambitions while being in a mutually supportive relationship. plus, they make people feel good, and happiness in one aspect of life surely can aid in the fulfillment of others.
I think that 'love' you see other people having is lust. that's why people are able to get over one another and move on and grow. it's all a learning experience until you find the one person that you're truly in love with and want to spend the rest of your life with. check out marines08. one of his recent posts talks about it and it makes more sense than how i just put it.
i think perhaps that you're looking at love from the wrong perspective. it sounds as if you believe that love is about NEEDING someone else in your life, and that's absolutely not the case. or, at the very least, it shouldn't be. i've said this before, but here's the gist...
being with someone who needs me is insulting; kept around for another's
necessity just as much as staying for it. when someone loves you
because they need you, there is no hope for a mutual compassion. as
soon as they have taken all that they needed, there is no longer a
reason for you to be around.
i would much rather be with
someone who wants me. i would like to know that if i'm in a
relationship, it's with a person who could very much live without me,
but openly chooses to live with me instead. someone who is not
completely dependent on me but who is independent and elects to depend
on me as much as i do them, and not more. when you're wanted in a
relationship, you aren't afraid of being discarded as soon as you've
lost your usefulness. you're with someone who starts every day by
choosing you because they want to be with you.
i'm not saying
that i've got relationships figured out. i just feel that after
screwing a few up, i've got one very important piece of the puzzle in
place.
I'm a very independent person, but I'm still able to have a relationship. it's just like friendship, except they have to put out. :)
A healthy relationship doesn't interfere with personal development. If you find yourself giving up the things that make you happy for this person, then you probably shouldn't be dating them.
As you get older, I think your opinions will change. After you establish a career or whatever you goal is, what will you do then? some people are spouse oriented - some are work oriented. different strokes for different folks.
like I said, I see r-ships as a different friendship, so are you close to other people? are your parents divorced?
aww, love just needs to catch you by surprise, without you even realizing it! it just like magically happens i tell yah,.
That may be true for some people, but I've found that my relationship with my husband has caused me to grow in ways I never would have if I were left on my own. And, incidentally, I'm still able to do my own self-growth with him in the picture. We have one of those lovely relationships where we love each other, and we spend time together, but we're still our own separate people, with separate friends, and separate interests. We don't limit each other to being just a part of a couple...we bot hknow we're so much more than that. The fact that I'm his wife is important, but it's not all that I am, and the fact that he's my husband isn't his entire identity either. Not once have we lost ourselves so much in our relationship that we can't continue our self-growth in at least the same way we would have before. So saying love is a cop-out sounds like plain old fear to me. You can do the whole self-growth thing in a relationship just as much as if you were on your own, only now you have someone there to support you while it happens. Getting into a relationship with him wasn't a cop-out for me. In fact, I wasn't even looking for someone when I met him. I was at a point where I'd have been happy on my own for an indefinite period of time, but I was also at a stand-still in my personal growth. Then he kind of just dropped into my lap and I wasn't willing to let him go. Still, we've never let our relationship get in the way of being who we are, or becoming who we're meant to be.
But maybe that's just us.
-Katie
you sound like the girl from the movie paper heart. she finds love in the end. hahaha.
to each their own. But IMO, when love is truly there, you both can grow together as a person. But I understand where you're coming from, because a part of me is not sure about marriages and love and children. I mean it's nice but with me and wanting to get ahead in my life, i think those things might hinder it.
I believe this is complete and utter bullshit.
I've been in relationships before and I've been in love once previously. I've grown calloused and mature afterward, like I'm sure you feel you have. But now that I consider myself taken once again am I not going to mature anymore like I used to? I'm not going to do things for myself, to advance myself and to progress as a person? Maybe that's how relationships work for you but they sure as hell don't for me. Falling in love is the gilded coating on the lives we live. It's something you cannot feel alone and something totally natural and human and like nothing else in the world. I'm still focused on what's important in my life. I still expect my girl to stick to her dreams and her goals. I won't stop her or let her stop herself because I'm in the picture. But we have each other to support one another. Now don't think that I'm saying I'll cry to her for support when times get tough, hell no. I support myself in tough situations. I pick myself up independently and never let her see me falter. She's one of the reasons I am strong. And I know she's the same way towards me. She won't let me see her down, broken side too often, because she is an independent woman. When I say we support one another, I mean more than just when times are bad. If I'm doing something tough, without even me seeking support she'll tell me how I can achieve anything.
Love is a partnership. 50/50. We are independent people who've learned to appreciate and care for one another on a level beyond, obviously, the comprehension of people like you.
Quit being so damn depressing.
Yes, you are being ridiculous and foolish. (But a lot of people are at some point.) The thing with love is, how do you prove it exists? You can't. And yet, its impossible to actually believe it doesn't exist when the concept of love has been such a great influence on history, literature, culture, and society. It's hard to know what love is, and perhaps even harder to find it, but the thing is....you have to find it to know you've found it.
Plus love is different for each person. Just as people have different intellectual capacities, so does each person have different capacities for love. So its impossible and foolish to judge other people's concept of love through your own eyes. You can only judge what love means to you.
And even when you figure that out, your concept of love will change.
As far as personal growth. It works both ways.....while you can hinder your personal growth in a relationship....you also hinder your personal growth never ever being in a relationship. I think its always a good idea to get married later than sooner. (And statistics will back that up.) And a big reason is that you need to grow as an individual as well. But you will never understand life fully until you find someone that is more important to you than yourself.
Im going to have to argue that people get into relationships to focus their attention on someone else. People tend to forget that we as "HUMANS" grow through the bonds we establish with other people. We do grow and learn on our own but thats only part of self betterment, the other part is sharing how you've grown with other people via it be through giving, LOVING, or just lending a ear.
When you cut something as important as LOVE out of your life your severely handicapping yourself. We live on EARTH with other HUMANS who when they get around each forge bonds ergo leading to LOVE in some way shape or form.
I find this to be true. After a break-up, my friends are like domesticated pets let loose into the wild. It's like dropping your poodle in the Amazon jungle. It takes them a while before they can function again properly on their own. Some people cope with this by constantly finding bfs/gfs to attach themselves to or by "making it work" and staying in crappy relationships just because they are afraid of being alone.
I think your feelings will change. But if they don't, that's fine too. I guess it's possible that not everybody's meant to fall in love.
I don't either.. ever since my dad had an affair I completely gave up on love. if they don't love each other they should not get married at the first place. I saw my dad beat my mom. when I was little.. People think it only happens in dramas but they are wrong. sucks to see other parents so caring of their child when my parents just fight everyday.
I think once you find love, your thoughts will change. At least that is how I feel about it these days. However, I disagree with the comment about being back to where you were when a relationship ends. In each of my relationships, their ending has been a growing & learning experience for me. I don't think I was ever in the same place I was before I met that person.
I also think you need to be with the right person.. a person that allows you to grow. Relationships need a balance. You don't have to always focus your time & attention on them just because you're together. It's good to be able to do things on your own as well as together.
hmm... this makes me think. :\