Wednesday, October 26, 2011

What is Love?

          This last week in class we talked about preparing for marriage. I really loved this topic as this is something I have been trying to do for along time as I am not yet married. Marriage is something that I value greatly and once I am married it will be the greatest blessing of my life. I think there is nothing more important- next to your relationship with Heavenly Father- than finding an eternal companion. I learned a lot of things this last week that I feel has really helped me in many ways. We talked about expectations in dating and expectations in marriage and how we can prepare for it and we talked about love. I feel like in the world today most people find it hard to understand or define love. Many people misinterpret love or think they know or are giving love when they aren’t. We talked about a few different types of love that can help us understand the different aspects or kinds of love. I had never heard them before but Brother Williams listed some of these and we talked about what each of them stood for. They were Eros, Storge, Phileo, acape. Each touched on the many different facets of love, romance and sexual attraction, friendship, spirituality, unconditional, parent to child, etc. Brother Williams then asked us what percentage of each of these kinds of love we wanted to exist in our marriage. I Think love is all encompassing and it grows as we develop in every areas of our lives with another person. Intimacy increases romance and companionship, friendship increases intimacy and unity and unconditional love. Spirituality increases unity. I feel all these different kinds of love build off one another and are not limited to fostering one things alone but each foster the same things that make a marriage fulfilling and successful. All of these factors of friendship, unconditional love, spirituality, intimacy and romance are essential. For me, I know my marriage isn’t going to be perfect but I feel like love isn’t just one way or consists of one thing. I want my husband to be my best friend, my lover, my companion, someone who I can share in all my emotions, hardships, faults, sorrows and joys. I want a marriage of unconditional love, passionate love, romantic love, spiritual love, and growing love. So I feel in my marriage I want to work towards a balance in all of them.
   
    Brother Willaims also asked us what we would want more predominant in our marriage: companionship or passion. Again, although I feel like companionship is more important than passion as I feel it entails unity and two people who are working together in the same direction as a team, However, I do feel that there can be a balance. You can create a companionship relationship and still have a balance of a great sense of passion within it. I feel that passion is very important. It doesn’t just have to do with things of a sexual nation but we can be passionate about our spouse, who they are, what they do and just about life in general. I am a very passionate person and its what drives me to succeed and to try to be better. In a relationship if you are passionate about it, it can drive you do and motivate you to always do better and be better. I do believe we can have a passionate companionship in our marriages. I loved a quote in the introduction to this last week that attempted to define what love really is and I feel it does so beautifully "Love is the will to extend oneself for the purpose of nurturing ones own or another’s spiritual growth."


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