Is love just a word?

Question

I know we have feelings for people and people are capable of eliciting emotions in us but how does love come into all this?

I've had people confidently tell me that I can't have been it love with so and so because of such and such. Whereas they have experienced love and are therefore in a position to judge based on the words I have used to convey my feelings towards somebody. Are these people just full of you know what? Are you one of these people?

I suppose I was talking about romantic love.

Answer 1

When I say the word "home," we both think of different things. I think of the freaky geodesic dome I grew up in, and you think of whatever home means to you. Love works the same way.

If you believe that you were in love with someone, then you were. If someone else says you weren't in love with someone, then, perhaps by THEIR definition, you weren't.

Your definition of love can change, too. Maybe in ten years, you'll see love differently, and you'll say, "Golly, I really wasn't in love." Maybe not.

Love, by itself, is just a word. It takes YOU to give it meaning.

Answer 2

The word love is over used these days. Catch the eviction in Big Brother and they're all yelling I Love you, I love you all too each other when two days before they were slagging each other off. On the other hand the true love, the love you are talking about, where your life, your whole being is tied up with another person is much much more. It is a feeling in the depth of your soul and spirit that you KNOW is there. You cannot convince somebody of it unless they want to believe and nobody can ever say if you have it or not. So ignore you friends and listen to your inside, your heart, your soul, your spirit, only then will you know the truth.

Answer 3

People tell you that you have not experienced true love and they have because love is such an insular emotion. When we are in love we feel as if we are the only person who can possibly feel so deeply, no-one else has ever loved as we do.

Your idea of love may be different from mine, you may express it in a manner I would not comprehend and vice versa.

Love may be a social phenomenon, it may that we are conditioned within our societies as to our expectations of love, love may simply be a bunch of chemical hormones rushing around our bodies so that we mate and make babies, and love can certainly cause us the worst pain, make us do or say crazy things and has even been used as defence in criminal cases, I did it for love, it was a crime of passion!

Love is different every time, I love my children but not in the same way I love my husband and I love my friends but differently from my parents. Love is not just a word, it's a word that we use to describes a range of emotional bonds between beings (I say beings not humans because I also love my cat, purely from an emotional veiwpoint though, dont go calling the RSPCA).

But when it comes right down it none of that matters. If it feels like love to you then it is love to you, its all relative.

Answer 4

Love is just a word that can mean many things to many people:

To some it is a just a word that can get them into somebodies pants!

To others Love refers to an emotion that they can use as a tool, a tool to manipulate and confuse.

While to some Love is a word that refers to an emotion, an emotion of giving and selflessness...

I think there are so very few people that are truly experienced in love. Just because you have experienced receiving love once or twice how does that qualify you for being an expert in giving love?

Answer 5

If it was just a word, then all the emotions which come about this word are meaningless. Remember this "Sticks & stones may break my back, but words will never hurt me!" If love is just a word then all the emotions people fell between each other are meaningless & all those who've been hurt by love are fools of a word? Tell that to millions of people that love is just a word. Whether romanticaly, relationaly or simple infatuation Love is more than a word. Love comes via attraction of some sort, physicaly or mentally.

Answer 6

Love is a condition or phenomenon of emotional primacy, or absolute value. Love generally includes an emotion of intense attraction to either another person, a place, or thing; and may also include the aspect of caring for or finding identification with those objects, including self-love. Love can describe an intense feeling of affection, an emotion or an emotional state. In ordinary use, it usually refers to interpersonal love, an experience usually felt by a person for another person. Love is commonly considered impossible to define.
The concept of love, however, is subject to debate. Some deny the existence of love, calling it a recently invented abstraction. Others maintain that love exists but is indefinable; being a quantity which is spiritual, metaphysical, or philosophical in nature. The views that love does not exist or is indefinable may underlie the fact that approximately 13 percent of cultures have no word for love. The remaining 87 percent attempt to define this abstract concept and apply it to everyday life. Love is one of the most common themes in art and often times is an excuse for " bad art". Some psychologists maintain that love is the abstract action of lending one's "boundary" or "self esteem" to another.
Here is a scientific veiw! Just to confuse you !
Throughout history, predominantly, philosophy and religion have speculated the most into the phenomenon of love. In the last century, the science of psychology has written a great deal on the subject. Recently, however, the sciences of evolutionary psychology, evolutionary biology, anthropology, neuroscience, and biology have begun to take centre stage in discussion as to the nature and function of love.
Biological models of sex tend to see it as a mammalian drive, just like hunger or thirst. Psychology sees love as more of a social and cultural phenomenon. Psychologist Robert Sternberg explains that love has three different components. Intimacy is a form where two people can share secrets and various details of their personal life. Intimacy is usually shown in friendships and romantic love affairs. Commitment on the other hand is the expectation that the relationship is going to last forever. The last and most common form of love is simply sex, or passion. Passionate love is shown in infatuation as well as romantic love.

Answer 7

Good question.

Love is a verb not a noun. For me, is the constant, unqualified wishing for the good of someone. If I love a person, I want them to be happy, good, kind, unselfish, just. I might say difficult things to them in order to help her get there. I will not let them lie to themselves, hate themselves or damage themselves. If I love them I will protect them from everyone, including themselves. I may also feel romantic feelings toward them or not - and these are related for me (I do not want romance without love), but romance is not necessary to love a person.

So, for example...if I love her only if she loves me, I do not love her by this definition.

If I dote on her and tell her everything she wants to hear and do not help her grow, I do not love her by this definition.

If she wishes to be free and I do not let her go, willingly and with a full heart wishing her happiness, I do not love her by this definition.

That's my idea of love. And it's a bugger! :-)

Xan Shui
Philosophic Philanthropist, Honest Man

Answer 8

No one can tell you what YOU feel about love or what it means to YOU. (it's subjective because not everyone is at the same maturity level).
Romantic love is the stuff of movies and novels. It's not reality.
You're the only one who can tell where you're at in your life and what you are feeling.
As an example, teenagers aren't capable of feeling mature love.
That comes with experience, maturity, and years of hurt as well as happiness.

Answer 9

love is just a word which has lost a lot of meaning over the past few years, people use it far to casually - but only YOU know if u feel the way you do - love is a strong word, it always was and it always will be - unfortunately people underestimate that and this is where people get confused :)

Answer 10

I have always thought that a better word forlove would be 'sacrifice' because when you truly love you do sacrifice not just yourself, but any other thing for the person you love.

This is why when my daughter says her boyfriend 'loves' her but he is more interested in things for himself than anything she may need....its a joke.

Those in love sacrifice, and it comes from both sides, equally, and with feeling.

Im sure those that know love agree

Answer 11

Love is not a word at all. Love is what is left when all the questions and words drop away. It is unconditional, true, and perfect.
Romantic love is conditional, based on attachment or unfulfilled neurotic longings.