LOVE

Open Hands, Open Heart: What Do I Know About Love?

“It ought to make us feel ashamed when we talk like we know what we’re talking about when we talk about love.”

~ Raymond Carver

That stayed with me.

I use the word love with enormous confidence, but how much do I really understand it?

Maybe much of what I’ve called love throughout my life has been mixed with other things:

• Longing.

• Attachment.

• Expectations.

• Desire.

• Chemistry.

• Fear.

• The need to be chosen.

• The fear of losing what I’ve found.

• The desire to hold onto something beautiful because I don’t know how long it will last.

None of that means the love isn’t real. It means I’m human. Expectations are part of that. Learning not to turn them into demands may be part of learning how to love. Maybe the work isn’t figuring out what love is. Maybe it’s learning how to love:

• To love without possessing.

• To care without controlling.

• To stay open without demanding certainty.

• To honor someone else’s sovereignty without abandoning my own.

• To tell the truth instead of trying to create the outcome I want.

• To remain present when fear tells me to grip tighter or run.

I don’t know exactly what love is, and perhaps admitting that is part of understanding it. But I know what I want my love to look like:

• Open hands.

• An open heart.

• No guarantees.

• No demands.

• Honesty.

• Trust.

• Freedom.

• Presence.

• Patience.

• Curiosity instead of certainty.

• Sovereignty without distance.

• Intimacy without possession.

The willingness to stay when staying is honest, and the willingness to leave when leaving is honest. Maybe I will never completely understand love. There is no shame in that. Perhaps the only shame would be pretending I do. I would rather remain a student of love, learning, stumbling, opening, letting go, and still have the courage to keep loving anyway.