Empoweredlady1's Blog

I was thinking about the word “love” and what it means.  How do people know when they are in love?  I read this article about Siohvaughn Wade the soon to be ex-wife of NBA basketball star Dwayne Wade.  Mr and Mrs Wade are divorcing and the divorce has become a very ugly one.  Mrs. Wade has become so bitter that she is suing her husband’s mistress; actress Gabrielle Union.  Siohvaughn Wade is citing Ms. Union for dissolving her marriage, and performing sexual foreplay with her husband in front of the couple’s children while they were on an unsupervised visit at their father’s home and a host of other things.  All of that sounds really terrible and I do have my opinion on that, but I want to know about love.  How does love go from being a beautiful thing to a nasty bitter feud between two people?

Why do we use the word “love”?  If someone loves you would they cheat on you?  Would they destroy your image?  Would they sue you?  Would they hurt you physically?  Would they hurt your children?  Would they drag the third party through the mud just to humilate their partner?  How can someone love you one day, and then the next they don’t?

Do people just use the word love like a slang term that we insert just to end a sentence?  Do people just say the word for a loss of a better word?  Or is the word “love” just a euphemism?  What if I say I love my shoes; am I in love with my shoes?  How about if I say I love white grape juice?  Or, I love going to the theater?  Am I truly in love with things or is it something else?  Are there two or three kinds of love?  If so, the first one would be the love you have for family (mother, father, child or sibling).  The second one would most likely be the love you have for your husband/partner/significant other.  And the last one would be the love that you have for material things.  Is there an extent to love?  I mean can you measure it?  You know when you have a small child you ask them how much they love you and they answer” this much” and spread their arms as wide as they could.   Should we measure love that way or maybe with a 12 foot tape measure? 

How about if we took a tape measure and gave it to our husband or wife/partner/significant other and we ask them how much they loved us?  The person proceeds to pull out the tape; if he/she pulls it all the way out until it doesn’t go any further it means you can marry him/her.  If he/she pulls it out six feet it means you can date him/her.  How about your love for family and your love for material things; can they be measured on a tape measure?  I ask this question because I have had people tell me that they love their partner to a certain extent.  Does that mean that you love a person as long as you are holding them in your arms and once their gone so is that word “love”?     I’ve heard people say “I love my sibling, but”.  Does that mean that the love for your sibling has conditions? I’ve also heard people say I love my car or my money?  What kind of attachment do we have with material things that would make us express an emotion such as love?  What does the word “love” mean?  Are we all just using the word “love” too loosely?  Should we worry that by using the word “love” that we convey false meanings to others?  When we tell someone we love them, it makes the other person commit themselves to a union that may very well be false.  Is it a simple case of two false positives that create a negative? 

I have two hundred and one pairs of shoes.  It’s safe to say I have a thing for shoes.  Let’s say that someone told me I had to get rid of every pair of shoes I own except the ones on my feet.  Wait, let me put on my favorite pair of shoes (LOL). 

Side note:  I just took out what I thought was my favorite pair of shoes and put them on.  Then I looked in another box, and another, and another, etc.  I couldn’t decide which pair are my favorites, but for each pair I remember saying to myself when I purchased them “I love these shoes”.

Okay, someone says I can’t keep but the one pair of shoes that I have on my feet and I have to get rid of all the others.  I’m not allowed to buy another pair of shoes until this pair is worn out.  Would these shoes become the worse pair of shoes I have ever owned and will I start to mourn the others?  Would I die because I can only have the pair of shoes I’m wearing?  What kind of a sacrifice would I make in order to get another pair of shoes even though the ones I’m wearing are perfectly fine?    How about when it comes to money?  People con others out of millions of dollars even when some of the people they are conning are supposedly friends.  Look at the elderly woman that conned her friends out of thousands of dollars; for some of these people it was all they had in the world.  Did she love her friends or did she love the money?  Obviously, she chose the money because she committed a serious  crime.  But, if you have friends don’t you love them?  Don’t you care about their well being?  Why would you hurt them?

When you love someone and you decide to marry and start a family; at what point does one person get to say “I don’t love you anymore” and then walk away?   Is it okay for one party to say “this family was fine and I loved it when I had it, but now I want a new one”?  Were these people actually in love or were they just going through the motions until something better came along?  Do we get to just discard relationships at the drop of a dime?  How about when a person cheats and stays in their marriage and they say they love their spouse and the person they are cheating with?  Does the person get to keep both?  I get to have all two hundred and one pairs of shoes.  That clearly shows that I have an affection or an addiction to shoes.   Does greed, lust, gluttony and selfishness motivate us to use the word “love” to describe our feelings towards people and things when it suits us?  Or is it truly love that we feel?  How do we know that what we call love isn’t just a case of “I really like” or “I really enjoy” or “this just feels good”?  Are we so self indulgent that we don’t stop to think about how our words affect others? 

Love as defined in the dictionary has many meanings. 

1.  A profoundly tender, passionate affection for another person.
2. A feeling of warm personal attachment or deep affection, as for a parent, child or friend.
3. Sexual passion or desire
4. A love affair; an intensely amorous incident; amour
5. Affectionate concern for the well-being of others:  the love of one’s neighbor.
6. The object or thing so liked:  The Theater was her great love.
7. Strong predilection, enthusiasm, or liking for anything:  her love of books.
8. Sexual intercourse; copulation.
9. (initial capital letter) a personification of sexual affection, as Eros or Cupid.
10. The benevolent affection of God for His creatures or the reverent affection due from them to God.

I understand these meanings and I’m sure everyone else that can read and comprehend understands the definition of the word love.  Since we understand the definition of the word “love”; is it time that we choose our words more carefully when conveying such a strong emotion such as love? 

Go back to the beginning of this post when I spoke about the article on the Wade’s.  Now tell me if you love someone can you be unfaithful?  Would you destroy your ex-partners image personally and professionally?  Would you hurt your partner physically?  Would you hurt your children mentally or emotionally by degrading their mother/father and denying them access to the other parent?  How do we know when we are in love?  How can we be sure that its love that we feel?  Maybe my question should be if we love someone, is it possible that our love can die?   It’s funny that we are quick to say we love someone or something, but we have a hard time saying that we hate someone or something.  You be the judge.  Tell me what love means to you.