Is it beauty, fun, kindness? Is it sex, liking the samethings, or experiences shared? Is it commonalities, differences, or the energy you feel when you are with the person? Is it their actions, words, or that their words and actions match? Is it consistancy, compatiblity, tension or comfort?
Is it inconsistancy, uncertainty, excitement, thrill, or danger?
Different things attract the inspiration to love. Some of the attractions are healthy and some not. Sometimes, it’s a mixture of the good and the bad? Some people think they love someone when they feel like they felt with their parents or caregivers. They attract to the familiarity of whatever they experienced then, so it ‘feels’ like love, ‘like home’, when perhaps, it isn’t. It’s just familiar, like a habit, but it’s what ‘feels’ comfortable, like an old shoe and so they think it’s love.
If the past was healthy and nurturing that is great, but if it was one of discord, addictions or dyfunction, not so great. Those imprinted patterns are difficult to break and they can guide either to goodness or destruction.
So, ponder what inspires you to love and attracts you to someone as it’s the basis of the relationship, its journey, its joys, its pain, its success, its harm, or failure.
“But does he who loves someone on account of beauty really love that person? No; for the small-pox, which will kill beauty without killing the person, will cause him to love her no more.
And if one loves me for my judgment, memory, he does not love me, for I can lose these qualities without losing myself. Where, then, is this Ego, if it be neither in the body nor in the soul? And how love the body or the soul, except for these qualities which do not constitute me, since they are perishable? … We never, then, love a person, but only qualities.” Blaise Pascal’s “Pensees”
The above is an example of shallow love…
We all lose our ‘qualities’ eventually and when we do, is when we will know if we are loved and if we love.
The awareness, blessing and grace to love without the distraction of qualities and traits is a genuine gift and if we love sincerely love will eventually evolve into this.
What attracts you to love someone? Ever really thought about it deeply, beyond the face, figure, abs, smile, etc?
“Never love anyone who treats you like you’re ordinary.”
Oscar Wilde
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Ayn I love how you write and think. This was wonderful. Thank you.
Brilliant as usual and gets people to think. I think it’s superfical things at first that attract but after that it has to go deeper into the psyche if it doesn’t it falls apart and accurate that many are attracted to the negative things from their past.
Having love like that is a gift from God. Ayn I love your site.
Good article.
A beautiful woman of wisdom. U hit a home run everytime
Can you look any cuter and lovelier?
cuteness, beauty and brains — the Triple Threat!
Love your wisdom, Ayn.
Thank you Happy Thanksgiving!
Ayn I love your writings, so positive in nature and inspirational much of the time.
Ayn, you are an extremely talented writer and editor.
I have told you this before, I think, but upon occasion your photo lifts my day as much or more than your great pieces posted.
“Love is comittment; All else is poetry.” – William Mouncey
Ayn, i love your articles
Brilliant words