What does "love" mean?

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To a NT love is all the warm and fuzzy feelings you get when you're with someone you 'fit' with. Love is wanting to be by their side, helping them, playing with them, working with them, or just being near them. Love is defending that person (right or wrong) to whomever dares to say something against them. (This is by no means an exhaustive list. Any other NT's feel free to add any other defining aspects of NT love.)

What is "love" like for a person with AS? How is it defined? Do you share any of the feelings mentioned above? What would make you fall in love with a specific person?

My love is permanent. A connection
between two beings which cannot
be broken, though it can sour.

I dunno. The only time I would think I actually did love someone though, is if I genuinely cared more about them and their happiness/safety than I would about my own. I dunno if that in itself qualifies as 'love,' or even if you need that for something to be 'love,' but that's part of what it is to me.

I've kept this quote for years. It's Zossima speaking in The Brothers Karamazov, by Dostoevsky:

And this one, from Man's Search for Meaning by Viktor Frankl.



Synthesizing everything I've read and accepted and known of love, I came up with my own definition a few years ago:

To love a fellow human is to place faith in his intrinsic value and his capacity for goodness, to desire the actualization of that potential, and to take actions that reflect that earnest desire with fortitude, patience, and humility.

I'm sure it could be made better though.

And romantic love is just the above with an extra helping of personal devotion, plus sexual attraction. I think.

I always forget how perfectly he puts things.
How can such meaning come through in
translation?



Faith and goodness? Hmph! The connection goes beyond
mere faith, into realms which one knows stronger than
their daily bread. And, goodness doesn't enter into it,
as far as I see. I love for what the other is - be it good
or ill.

Love Makes You Crazy Lyrics by MIKE BATT

I was reading in a history book before the seventh war

They used to have a thing that they called love

that we don't have any more

I don't know the feeling

but I'm told it was an evil thing

It used to make you crazy and fall down

no one knows what it could bring.

Loves makes you crazy

loves makes you cry.

Love made them crazy in days gone by.

Loves makes you crazy - that's what they say:

Loves made them crazy in the olden days.

I must have seized the body and the mind like strong disease

Another plague that science has erased even from the memory.

Or maybe evolution wiped it out

so just the strong survived.

And no-one with that feeling could exist

in the race to stay alive.

Love makes you crazy

love makes you cry. . . .

Love makes you crazy

love makes you cry. . . .

Love= one big farce until the correct person comes to change everything.

That sounds like a pretty dreamy, mystical notion for someone who liked the Dostoevsky quote.

But maybe mine sounds the same way, to you.

And I don't mean to imply that one loves the other person for his goodness. I meant that he desires what is good, for that person. Acceptance of the imperfect reality does not preclude the wish that things were better. Nor does such a wish, nor the aspiration toward an ideal, prevent acceptance and fondness of what is.

It's indifference that leads people to be uncaring of what others do, not love.

I don't know what's at the heart of love, be it mere biology or the very pulse of the universe or something even more ethereal. I don't feel too threatened by any of the possibilities though. Love still seems worthwhile.

Liking doesn't mean agreeing. Nonetheless, it has a
bit going for it. Love REQUIRES work but does not
depend upon it.



Agreed. Which is why love can evolve into hate,
but never indifference. I wonder though if one can
move back to love from hate? Or, if hate can be there
at the start?



Like ice-cream.

Love demands the real willingness to work when the situation calls for it, though.



I wouldn't call that an evolution.

Mainly the difference between love and hatred is in the ends, rather than the means. (I don't think I've said this correctly, because I've left it open to misinterpretation... but I can't think right now how to fix it.)

By that I mean that if you look my definition up there and substituted a hateful word for all instances of loving words (value, goodness, humility, etc.), you'd have pure hatred.

I think hatred might develop when the target becomes a threat (or more perfectly: the antithesis) to something you prize more highly. But it doesn't necessarily come about. It's still a choice.



You made Sarah McLachlan sing in my head. I shall punish you:

[youtube]http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=7I5sixwOQlg[/youtube]

I think a pure love is believing in someone, wanting the best for them regardless of whatever whatever happens to oneself. That kind of love doesn't happen right away but builds over time. Romantic, sexual, and platonic love can evolve into that over time and I assume that's the kind of love that keeps long relationships together.

Well that's my theory anyway.

From my experience I can only apply that definition to one person I've known in my life. I feel like I've trying to find it again ever since.

Mind if I pick at it a bit?

Do you really think that the love itself "doesn't happen right away" and builds over time?

Or do you think that the demonstration/revelation of that love is what isn't immediate?

In terms of a romantic love relationship (husband/wife, BF/GF - as opposed to the generic 'fellow man') what is more important: Chemistry or Compatibility? (or something else??)

What makes the relationship last?

Depends on the individuals concerned. I want both in abundance, please.



The conscious decision to keep one's word and the hard work to back it up.

On both sides, that is.

It takes two people to make a successful relationship.

It only takes one person to make a failed one.

Honestly, I think compatibility is more important.

Chemistry can be found in time. If you are compatible and like each other generally enough, chemistry will be there.

Don't have much experience in this regard... but this is just the idea I've been operating with.

In terms of the original question, love is in the actions and thoughts. It's easy enough to say, "I'm in love... it feels great."

But it's a whole other thing to say... "I love this person, I'm going to work hard to make it work.... no matter how difficult."

Love is the reason and the action... not the gushy feelings.

"Love" is when you piss away your life savings on a 4 pound diamond.