<img src = "http://users.esc.net.au/~nitro/BBoard_member_gifs/bowser_anim.gif"> <font color = "red">How Would You Define Love?</font>

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It's all very large.

Love is getting up out of bed at 3am to comfort a child that has had a bad dream. That's love.

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"It was there, at the edge of the black abyss, that I found myself."
-Patrick Ashley

Depends, there are several meanings, in several circumstances;

I "love" the color green
I "love" my family
I "love" my husband
I "love" my best friend
I "love" my cats
I "love" my city
I "love" myself
...etc.

All different. In general, if we're speaking of "romantic love", I would define it as the state of being where the other person's happiness is vital to your own. Actually, I suppose most kinds of love are like that, at least the ones involving living people or animals.

Love also involves sacrifice and compromise, in about every case I can imagine. Like my cats, I love my cats, so I make sure they're healty, well-fed, clean, have a comfortable place to stay, and receive lots of attention. I sacrifice a hair-free house, money for their vet bills & food, time I spend grooming and feeding and cleaning up after them... The returns I get are a friendly "bbrrrrtt!" when I get home, a purring ball of fuzz or two on my lap as I watch TV, four warm bodies to sleep on me in the winter, and the hilarious antics of their play as entertainment. I think they "love" me back, in their aloof feline way, but love isn't always a two-way street. The color green doesn't love me back. My city doesn't love me back.

Pashley's example is a good one, but I think I would say it a bit differently. Getting out of bed like that is in response to a responsibility, the responsibility is a response to the love. I think love caused the action, but is not the action in and of itself, if that makes any sense.

Voluntary servitude.

Hi,
If one thinks back to one`s first emotion of love for a member of the opposite sex, I recall an overwhelming, confusing emotion, that caused me sleepless nights and a yearning to be in that persons presence for all eternity. Yet I could never define that feeling. That emotion almost had a life of its own. That to me has always been "LOVE" ... inexplicable.

As you get older, I find I often yearn for the incredible honesty of that original emotion. What happens though is that life takes you on a roller coaster of dissapointments and reveals the stark and dark reality of base human nature. But I still feel a remembrance of that long lost emotion, and now the closest I can get to defining or putting a handle on the concept of "LOVE" is who would I die for? Unconditionally ... without thought ... to whom would I give my life if it meant saving him/her? Yet it still remians inexplicable.

Take care.

Blue, blue windows beyond the stars ...

I would define "love" as 0-0 in tennis.

Oh! Oh! THAT kind of love! Er, um, uh, ask your mother. I was going to say that love is best defined by those things and people that are essential to our happiness, but that falls short. I mean asphyxiation can't make a person very happy (unless they're really strange), but can I say "I love breathing"?

Romantic love, erotic love, platonic love, the love of a person for another, a parent for a child, or a man for a fine cigar, I think that love is something that we don't know we need until we get it. It comes, it goes, it comes back, and if you're lucky it stays. It's can be a minor infatuation or an all-powerful unstoppable force. It can drive people to deeds of great heroism or despicable villainy. However it manifests itself, who or what you love is probably the best way to define the parameters of your existence.

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I may not agree with what you have to say, but I will fight, kill, and die for your right to say it.

God is love. And love unconditional. Love is based upon the realization that we are all the same in God's eyes; not one better, not one worse than the other. To love is to see God and to see God is to love. Many of us settle for rather poor substitutes though, but hopefully all of us are lucky enough to at some point in life, catch the tiniest little glimpse of what God's love is. That is where joy comes from. How often do we all experience true joy in life? Heart-wrenching, tear-jerking, "Hallmark commercial" type joy? I for one can surely say NOT OFTEN ENOUGH! But I'm still pluggin' away.... :)

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You may think I'm a nut, but I'm fastened to the strongest bolt in the universe.

LORI!!!

Maybe I've just been looking in the wrong posts, but I've missed you! Where and how have you been?

Hi Honey-bun!

I've been on a little roller coaster ride lately. Everything in my life is changing right now. There's been a long period lately where I've been stuck in this mental and emotional limbo, trying to decide what to do, what to do....so I resigned from my stupid, boring, and meaningless accounting job (which I didn't do anything there anyway besides chat with you guys all day), and my husband and I have decided to divorce. I'm beginning to feel "normal" again for the first time in a long time. Most of you are probably thinking "Normal??? When has she ever been normal???" :D LOL! Well, as close as this little lady can get anyway. I'm glad to be back, and ready to fight the good fight, so put up your dukes baby, and let's get ready to rumble!!!!!!! ;)

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You may think I'm a nut, but I'm fastened to the strongest bolt in the universe.

Hi Lori,
Good to see you back. Your`e not alone in what you are going through, and in time, all the heartbreak will seem like a distant memory of a bad nightmare. Hang in there.

Take care

Thanks Stretch, I appreciate that. It's gettin' better all the time. A little forgiveness goes a long way. :)

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You may think I'm a nut, but I'm fastened to the strongest bolt in the universe.