I Want You vs I Love You

"I love you" in Spanish is "Te Quiero." Translate that back to English and you have, "I want you."

There is certainly that kind of love. I think many times that this way of expressing it is actually far more honest.

I want you.

You are my passion.

You make me feel good.

You hold my heart in your hands.

If you leave me I will be hurt...and then I will learn to replace my love for you with anger and righteous indignation ...

You will still be my passion....for a time.

I will passionately obsess about how you wronged me...or what I could have done to make you stay...or how I was not enough for you.

And then I will feel nothing....for a time.

If we are lucky we discover a new kind of love that is far less selfish. We will value that person's friendship and happiness above whatever passionate feeling that we are addicted to.

A best girlfriend and I had drinks this summer and discussed this very thing. The man that you "want" is not the same as the man that you really "love."

She loves her husband. He helps around the house, takes care of the kids, and although he is not perfect he has made a valiant attempt to work at being a good partner. Theirs was not a "fall" into love...it was a "grow" into it. She supports him and wants the best for him....even though he annoys her sometimes.

"Love at First Sight" more often than not teaches us about what we crave, what we are missing, and how very selfish we are. If love can not evolve past the fire that starts it...it can not survive. It burns hot and bright but it is not sustainable...or sustaining.

Which leads to the question... if it does not endure, is it really love?

I love my family. That will endure. I love my friends. That will also endure. All of these loves will live on because my love for them is not dependent on what these people will do for me. They are allowed to have other relationships besides the one they have with me. I do not own them, nor would I want or expect that to be a prerequisite to loving them. There is no action they could take that would prevent my love. Being angry with one of them does not mean that I withdraw my love. While what they do may or may not affect me, I understand that it is not about me. It is about them...and I support and love them...and that means allowing them to come and go freely.

So can we evolve love from "I want you" into something else?

I think so...maybe that would be a satisfying way to end a relationship that has gone all wrong.

...After a time I have learned how to evolve my love for you.

I allow you to fully discover and pursue who you are independently of me.

I understand that my loving you is how I can support you...rather than what you can do for me or how I think you make me feel.

I accept that I am responsible for my own passion...and that feeding this is my own responsibility...not yours.

I wish you the best even though one or both of us have decided that we can not "want" each other anymore.

I understand that your choices are not about me, they are about you.

I also accept that my actions, thoughts, and feelings are ultimately of my own choosing and have to do with my human experience, not you.

It would be even better if we could  hold on to that mindset (heartset?) and keep it at the center when we enter into our next romantic relationship. How wonderfully affirming and settling to completely embrace the idea that the only person we can control is ourselves.

Sounds like heaven to me. I would love to love fully and completely without strings attached.

I know..there is always a bit of a "want." It's a spark that gets us thinking about each other to begin with.

You know what really gets me going now?

...He makes the bed in the morning and fixes my computer...

I also frequently "want" him when he's doing work out in the yard...or when he is engaging an activity that seems to give him satisfaction.When he does these things I know he is loving me. He is loving me better by doing things that strengthen himself. He becomes a better partner to me when he understands who he is apart from me.

He is also good at loving me through active appreciation. He chooses to support my wants and the life that I enjoy. (He would rather not make the bed or take out the trash)

The fact that it makes me "want" him is sort of a matter of consequence.

He has loved me well, but it really has nothing to do with me. I didn't make him do anything. I do not have the power to control his emotions and actions. He is self contained. He loves me because he does. Not because I, "deserve it" or because he is afraid of what will happen if he doesn't.

Love involves conscious choices. We choose to actively appreciate another and to support who they are. We choose to surrender control. True love is about what we choose to give, not what we hope to receive. Love doesn't hope for change it accepts the other as they are.


This doesn't mean that we don't have boundaries or that we allow ourselves to be mistreated. Rather, I have come to believe that it is understanding our boundaries that allows us to be better lovers. If we know who we are and what we are about we are less affected by those that transgress, and more willing to forgive. We understand that being human can be rough and everyone will have times of darkness.

It's not easy. Who hasn't had their heart broken? I think that love in it's fullest sense however means that we need to understand that it has many forms...not higher or lower... not more honorable or less so. I think there are some loves though that are challenging. They challenge us (sometimes it feels forced doesn't it?) to come into ourselves more fully.

What a gift that is.

If it's, "love that makes the world go 'round" we would be smart to reevaluate what exactly we think that means.