A Love Letter

What is love?

It is a feeling and an action.

Love is caring - wanting the best for someone and the best of someone. Wanting to foster their personal growth and self-actualization, whether that entails your presence or absence.

Yet love is also unconditional acceptance of another’s flaws. Not simply tolerating one’s imperfections but cherishing them; finding the merit in every blemish. Without our weaknesses and quirks we are merely one homogenous population - it is our imperfection that makes us interesting, and our constant striving for better that defines our character.

Love is openness and understanding, willingness to listen and truly hear another’s voice. The ability to empathize and exercise compassion. It is accepting someone as they are but pushing them to their potential - as sometimes you see more in them than they will ever realize.

But sometimes love is letting go - knowing that another must choose their own life trajectory, that you cannot inject yourself into someone’s life and that they may be better left undisturbed. It is drawing the boundary between self and other, the lover and loved. Respecting their will and independence by allowing them to learn from their own mistakes.

“The opposite of love is not hate, it is indifference.” Because even our rage holds a seed of care, acknowledging that another’s existence exerts a force over our feelings. It is when we fail to recognize another’s humanity and sentience that true evil occurs.

The world needs more care, more compassion, more acceptance, more understanding.

The world needs more love.