Love, full stop

In the midst of a global pandemic, it may seem untoward to write about love. Yet, from my experience over this past year’s digital trysts with maintaining the semblance of connection and community with family, friends, coworkers, and all other characters in our fragile lives, I can hardly imagine writing about anything else. Faced with all of the turbulence within the world, against all odds of recovering our pre-2020 lives, what else is giving people a reason to hold on and to build meaning into our lives?

The Harvard study tracking men from youth to age 75 concluded that the secret to “happiness is love, full stop.” Having read that finding several years ago, I thought it was a rather trite statement. It has really taken me until now to fully comprehend that the ultimate gift and joy of life is to love and be loved in return.

What is love?

There is platonic love, sure, and I have felt pure affection for my dearest friends, for whom there is loyalty, admiration, and mutual support.

There is romantic love too, of which the experience is deeply visceral, but often come with qualifiers (they might have a deep appreciation for art or a similar view of the world, for example, and let’s not forget the idealization of each other as ‘my person’).

Then there is the love of humanity. With the circumstances in the world this year, it has become painfully clear that we must love one another. Love of humanity has a grittier quality; it is marked by sacrifice, commitment, and selfless acts. This Higher Love, as embodied by respected figures in human history, can bring us to tears.

‘Love, love is a verb,’ Massive Attack crooned.

To love is to act. There are small acts, like squeezing someone’s hand in encouragement, saying ‘you choose,’ or picking up a phone call from someone in need of a friend.

There are bigger acts, like forgiving someone for causing you harm, visitations at the hospital, and the statements “I see you,” “I understand you,” and “I accept you.”

Then there are the Big Acts, the ones where we forget ourselves in service of another, and when we do the right thing even when it may not be the thing we want selfishly. It is embodied by our frontline medical workers, risking their lives to treat patients every day. It is embodied by our teachers, working hard to educate our siblings and children. The love of humanity requires Big Acts from us; admittedly this often might demand of us more than we are willing or able to give. It is something to strive towards.

In experiencing our collective terror in the world at this moment, the big and small acts of love that we experience are all the more precious and harder fought for. The acts we bear witness to, from strangers and lovers and friends and others, hopefully can inspire more acts. It is the beauty amidst the terror, happening simultaneously.

In the dawn of the world re-emerging from our collective year inside, we can be grateful for love, of all kinds. We are in this together. We are not alone, we have each other. We are loved. We are loved.