Love, a feeling or a choice?

[Farnaby]

Hi everyone! Happy New year  

I've been asking myself this question for a long time and would like to hear your thoughts on this. Do you think love is something that you either feel or don't feel or is it something that's more of a choice, something you can "cultivate"? Maybe it's our very essence, but it has been covered by defensiveness we needed to develop to cope. 

I'm specifically interested in romantic relationships. We all know there's an initial phase where we just want to be with that person the whole time, think about them, can't wait to see them, etc., and slowly these feelings start getting less intense, although there are moments where you spontaneously feel them again.

So my question really is how do you know if a relationship has reached it's end or if it just needs to be worked on in order to reconnect and get that "being in love" feeling to manifest more often. 

I used to think you either love someone or you don't, and I still think it's true if we only take into account a particular moment in our life. But I also think that if we're completely honest, we don't feel love 24/7, there are many other feelings and things that can get in the way of feeling and expressing this love. 

Thanks for reading

[Meetjoeblack]

Oxytocin and Hollywood. Its w cute notion. Look up the graph of Leonardo Dicaprios dating selection over the last twenty years and scroll through the incel sub reddit. Its telling. Dicaprios just such a incredible person (& actor) who has only dated women 18-25 for the last twenty years. Incels get no love. 

I read ecky. Much of what's deemed love is infatuation or a government contract. Looking at government spending and lies, it's absurd at best. 

If you're happy, keep on. I admire our grandparents. There's character and the women we're tough. There husbands were fighting in wars. There's no technology like today despite the dissatisfaction and unhappiness.  Much of what love is infatuation and Hollywood brain washing. 

[Farnaby]

On 2/1/2020 at 4:29 AM, Meetjoeblack said:

Oxytocin and Hollywood. Its w cute notion. Look up the graph of Leonardo Dicaprios dating selection over the last twenty years and scroll through the incel sub reddit. Its telling. Dicaprios just such a incredible person (& actor) who has only dated women 18-25 for the last twenty years. Incels get no love. 

I read ecky. Much of what's deemed love is infatuation or a government contract. Looking at government spending and lies, it's absurd at best. 

If you're happy, keep on. I admire our grandparents. There's character and the women we're tough. There husbands were fighting in wars. There's no technology like today despite the dissatisfaction and unhappiness.  Much of what love is infatuation and Hollywood brain washing. 

Thank you! I'm sure that we're very conditioned by our culture and Hollywood may very well have distorted our notion of love. By saying this, do you agree that the idea of love they sell is just representative of the phase where you recently fell in love, which can't be felt all the time in a longer relationship? Unless you keep chasing that high by compulsively looking for a new person that can make you feel that way, of course 

[Shin]

[Matt8800]

On 1/1/2020 at 11:52 AM, Farnaby said:

Hi everyone! Happy New year  

I've been asking myself this question for a long time and would like to hear your thoughts on this. Do you think love is something that you either feel or don't feel or is it something that's more of a choice, something you can "cultivate"? Maybe it's our very essence, but it has been covered by defensiveness we needed to develop to cope. 

I'm specifically interested in romantic relationships. We all know there's an initial phase where we just want to be with that person the whole time, think about them, can't wait to see them, etc., and slowly these feelings start getting less intense, although there are moments where you spontaneously feel them again.

So my question really is how do you know if a relationship has reached it's end or if it just needs to be worked on in order to reconnect and get that "being in love" feeling to manifest more often. 

I used to think you either love someone or you don't, and I still think it's true if we only take into account a particular moment in our life. But I also think that if we're completely honest, we don't feel love 24/7, there are many other feelings and things that can get in the way of feeling and expressing this love. 

Thanks for reading

@Farnaby Drugs and chemicals create the feeling of love. Real love is a choice....intentional action and projection of love.

[Farnaby]

On 4/1/2020 at 3:13 PM, Matt8800 said:

@Farnaby Drugs and chemicals create the feeling of love. Real love is a choice....intentional action and projection of love.

 

1 hour ago, Etherial Cat said:

Real love is consciousness. Consciousness is what dictates choices. Consciousness is where your feelings appear...

Thanks for your input! If love is a conscious choice, more than it is the feeling of being in love (which would be more of a chemically induced "high"), would you say that sometimes action precedes feeling? 

What I mean is that sometimes I may feel kind of bored, apathetic and not in the mood to connect with people, but if I make an effor to come out of isolation and push myself out of this comfort zone, I actually start enjoying the connection and feelings of joy start emerging. 

I guess I'm asking this because sometimes when I do this, I have an inner conflict going on that makes me doubt if I'm acting fake or if deeply I long for connection and have just gotten used to disconnection. 

[Shin]

1 hour ago, Farnaby said:

 

Thanks for your input! If love is a conscious choice, more than it is the feeling of being in love (which would be more of a chemically induced "high"), would you say that sometimes action precedes feeling? 

What I mean is that sometimes I may feel kind of bored, apathetic and not in the mood to connect with people, but if I make an effor to come out of isolation and push myself out of this comfort zone, I actually start enjoying the connection and feelings of joy start emerging. 

I guess I'm asking this because sometimes when I do this, I have an inner conflict going on that makes me doubt if I'm acting fake or if deeply I long for connection and have just gotten used to disconnection. 

When you feel love for someone, it's actually you checking an item in your "I accept to feel love" checklist.

There is also the "I don't feel loved when X" and "I can't love when X".

No checklist equal full time love  

[Nahm]

On 1/1/2020 at 2:52 PM, Farnaby said:

there are many other feelings and things that can get in the way of feeling and expressing this love. 

Love is one, thought is two. Love is thought. Love is thought itself, and so can not be thought. 

19 hours ago, Farnaby said:

love is a conscious choice

Just as the seed is the tree, and the rain is the ocean, love is a conscious choice. Love is inescapable, love is every escape.

[Shin]

A choice until it becomes second nature (or more exactly, realizing it's your true nature), just like being conscious.

The method is simple, but there is millions of distractions, so it appears to be hard ?

[Leo Gura]

Love is EVERYTHING.

It doesn't matter what feeling you have or choice you make. That is the point. The ego sets conditions on love to suit its survival because it's biased. But love is not limited to that. Love is unlimited, infinite, and unconditional. Whether you understand that is another matter.

[Farnaby]

1 minute ago, Leo Gura said:

Love is EVERYTHING.

It doesn't matter what feeling you have or choice you make. That is the point. The ego sets conditions on love to suit its survival. But love is not limited to that.

I see what you mean, but I was talking about the feeling of love towards someone. I guess a better way to ask it is: Do you need to consciously work on relationships to keep feeling connected and feeling love or once it starts to fade it's unlikely to be felt again?

[Shin]

28 minutes ago, Farnaby said:

I see what you mean, but I was talking about the feeling of love towards someone. I guess a better way to ask it is: Do you need to consciously work on relationships to keep feeling connected and feeling love or once it starts to fade it's unlikely to be felt again?

Of course it can, but it's not a separate love, it's the same.

You only stop to feel love because you have 1 millions conditions in your mind about when you should allow yourself to feel love.

If you had no subconscious beliefs about when love can be felt, you wouldn't stop to feel it.

[Leo Gura]

2 hours ago, Farnaby said:

I see what you mean, but I was talking about the feeling of love towards someone. I guess a better way to ask it is: Do you need to consciously work on relationships to keep feeling connected and feeling love or once it starts to fade it's unlikely to be felt again?

Yes, of course the key to good relationships is constant conscious work on them.

You can't just phone it in.

[Forestluv]

@Farnaby You are asking about relative love, a feeling of love. Relative love is impermanent. It will appear and disappear. There are many degrees of intensity and many different flavors of love. In a relative sense, relationships may involve stagnation or loss of interest. They may involve growth and maintenance. 

When a relationship has reached it’s terminal end depends on the couple and their dynamics. How I sense it will not be how others sense it. We each have our own values and resonance. 

For me, I have never had a connection that was 100% connection 100% of the time. Everyone of my relationships have involved connection, disconnection and re-connection. The amount of cultivation varies among couples. I dated a gal with a very strong connection, yet it was fleeting and she kept disconnecting. I put in an enormous amount of energy into re-connections. I dated another gal with an equally strong connection. We both drift apart at times, yet we both put in effort to re-connect and much less energy for maintenance and growth is necessary. It’s much more natural and flowing. Yet over time, dynamics can change. Ime, it’s very rare to find someone with a strong metaphysical connection that naturally persists over time. So-calked “soul mates” is a rarity. 

[Meetjoeblack]

On 03/01/2020 at 4:41 PM, Farnaby said:

Thank you! I'm sure that we're very conditioned by our culture and Hollywood may very well have distorted our notion of love. By saying this, do you agree that the idea of love they sell is just representative of the phase where you recently fell in love, which can't be felt all the time in a longer relationship? Unless you keep chasing that high by compulsively looking for a new person that can make you feel that way, of course 

Its a high like a drug or hitting the casino. When you "almost win, " your hind brain registers the data as I nearly won. Its farther from the truth. There's nothing in between. You either win or you lose. 

If I was ridiculously good looking,  rich, had a huge horn, sports cars, social status, will I date more or less? There's people beat with the ugly stick.  There's winners and losers in the genetic lottery. It would seek, The better looking people find love and the hungry don't get fed. 

[Michael569]

Every act is an act of love or a desperate call for love. 

[Meetjoeblack]

8 hours ago, Michael569 said:

Every act is an act of love or a desperate call for love. 

Its cucked in the modern era. I've seen it but few and far between. Infatuation is more common and short lived. 

A classic example is marriage. 50% of marriage ends in divorce. 80% of divorce initiated by women lol. 

If you are following the beaten path, the following is ludicrous given i don't need to do any of that for love but its a business. The tactic is shame to "man up" and to "do the right thing." 

The biggest problem is that, people are lazy, and basic. They want a simple solution. Get married. Have kids. Take a circular piece of rare metal on a woman's finger and be complete. Its not like nobody ever cheats and divorce rape is a possibility. 

In rare incidents, i think it exists but it is a outlier. Not the norm. Furthermore, its more often cucked.