“Love is like music, when that certain person is near, you hear a symphony.” – Mark Adamski
There is something really magical between two people who are in love with each other. From the gaze they share right before leaning in to kiss, intertwining hands while walking side by side, smiles that quickly turn to tummy-aching laughs, and the long, reassuring hugs that silently say everything’s going to be alright. There is so much depth to loving someone and I think this is unravelled through the state of vulnerability. The more that individuals can practice openness, the deeper the connection and passion for each other is rooted within the relationship. There must be a level of communication, respect, trust, independence, and responsibility attained for a partnership to be long-lasting. Because of this, I truly admire those who dig their roots alongside their lover and cultivate a life full of sunshine through buzzing energy and unexpected rainfall.
“Love could be looking at a person and just smiling at them as your heart beats faster or you feel so happy you don’t know what to do with yourself. Loving people is a good thing.” – Tegan Jones
“Love is in all the small things, like letting them have the last bite, giving them that extra attention, or being silly to cheer them up. I don’t think there’s exactly one thing that specifically shows that you love someone, but all the small things add up to one.” – Tori Kasto
“To me, love means everything. My life is an ever evolving work of art, and it began as all paintings do; a blank canvas. A stark piece of potential… My love is like vibrant paint. With every one of my heart beats, I hope to use my love to create colourful brush strokes of passion, confidence and light throughout my world. And when two people’s love mixes together, it creates spectacular new colours! In my eyes, deep love between two people outshines Van Gogh, and is even more beautiful than Monet. One day I will step back from my painting and say, “every bit of this masterpiece was made with love”.” – Colleen Hallett
Being in a relationship means that you are willing to commit to someone else and share some of the darkest and happiest moments with each other. There will be many times for silly faces and the feeling of butterflies fluttering in your stomach. There will also be times of sadness when your significant other shall provide comfort and a shoulder to cry on, but it all comes back to vulnerability. I’ve learned that you cannot expect someone to know and understand all the parts that make up who you are if you have yet to accept these qualities as a part of your own being. Once you are able to love yourself, you allow the other person to see the real you and from there build a stable relationship.
“Love is a choice. You must be able to be vulnerable and ok to let someone see you at your weakest point allowing yourself to trust others.” – Brittni McLeod
“Love is flexible; a lover does not force any actions upon their lover. Love is kind and patient; a lover accepts and embraces one’s infirmities and flaws.” – Victoria Han
I think a lot of relationships struggle – especially in the beginning stages to be vulnerable with one another because they’ve worn a masque for so long. Relationships always start by trying to make a great impression on someone, but the idea becomes tricky when it’s time to share the highs and lows of our lives. As humans we all want to love and be loved in return which is natural, but there seems to be an invisible line that people don’t want to cross in fear that they will be disliked. Because of this, people build giant, stone barriers around their hearts until they either feel their partner is trustworthy enough to let them tear the wall down, or they decide to never put themselves into a vulnerable position. This speaks a lot of truth because I most definitely felt this way with my first love. I put on a very mysterious act and I was extremely cautious because I didn’t want to become vulnerable and then have him dislike me.
“The key to saving the world is in love, but the problem we are facing is that people get tired of loving when they are not loved in return.” – Emmanuel Benedictus
“Love is acceptance. You must accept yourself and your lover. You must be free and comfortable to share parts of yourself with someone else.” – Sherry Sankoh
However, this coincides with the amount of comfortability you have with each other. I think that once you are in a place with someone where you can both share the good and bad life experiences and work as a team, it’s worth it. When you are able to reach a certain level of comfort with one another, there is a deeper kind of love that is established. From feeling more like yourself when you’re together, never getting tired of hearing your significant other laugh and seeing them smile because you share the same goal: to be a part of each other’s lives. Comfortability is created when people choose to unconditionally love a person as a whole rather than picking the pieces they like from one’s identity. Even though humans can dislike parts of a person, if we cannot overlook their mistakes and flaws in order to love unconditionally, is it really true love? People deserve to be loved as a whole and I believe that there may be characteristics of someone who you find bothersome, but if you truly love them, how much do those characteristics matter?
“Love is forgiving. It’s realizing that people make mistakes. Love is realizing that someone is human, they can’t be perfect.” – Kiara Emily Rose“Love is being able to forgive. It’s being able to say sorry and to accept someone for who they are.” – Jerri Adamski
Although the term love is often recognized as a feeling, there isn’t a great deal of meaning behind the phrase ‘I love you’ if there is no intent to show your partner how much you love them. There is a huge difference between saying you love someone versus showing your love for them and I think people often mistake the two because everyone has a different way of sharing their love. Therefore, when two people don’t share their affection the same way, they begin to worry that the love isn’t there and in turn, walk away. However, just because the ‘other’ is currently not serving to your highest good, does not mean that the relationship won’t ever improve.
For example, I had an argument with someone once about the desire to be loved and how I hope that someday when I meet my future husband, he will love me as much as he loves the world. I was told that I was selfish for wanting to be loved that much, but in my family we express our love for each other by saying, “I love you to the moon and back”. So I grew up believing that it’s possible to love and value someone with such a strong consistency. For this reason, I don’t believe it’s selfish to desire someone who can show affection in that way because I know I will give an equal to or greater amount of love in return.
Following this thought, there are two separate viewpoints of how people in relationships fall in love. The first is the natural way of being ‘swept-off-your-feet’ and relationship wise, this is how I’ve experienced falling in love. I’ve found that whenever I’m not searching for it, suddenly I meet someone and it just happens. Although, I’ve only ever fallen ‘head over heels’ in love once in my life, I can say that there was never a point when I decided to love him for everything that he was. Instead, I subconsciously accepted the good and bad qualities of him and unconditionally loved. I could be wrong in believing that people simply fall in love as if a magic wand was cast on them, but I think as we get to understand our partner, love is swept over us. On the contrary, there is the idea that we can make the decision to love another person. Similar to how we decide to love our friends, we can decide to be in a relationship with someone and to unconditionally love them. This thought is sparked from the words of a university professor I had the pleasure of interviewing for this project:
“We can talk about being in love and being swept up with it as though it is not a decision it just happens to one and I think maybe there is an element to that. But I think we make the decision of how we want to see people and how we want to think about them and how we want to feel about them. And we obviously don’t have the capacity to love hundreds and millions of people, but I think when we’re in the presence of someone we can make that decision. And I think it’s a pretty easy decision to make because I think we have the human impulses to love people. People say it’s hard to love someone, but I don’t think so. I think we need to decide to withdraw or love.” – Lloyd Kornelsen
Aside from these different perspectives, people should always strive to find someone who makes them excited about life. I praise people who have high standards when it comes to relationships because there is no time to waste when looking for a life partner. I think one should never settle for someone who is not supportive and committed in the relationship. Furthermore, it is important to recognize that finding your true love may take time, but time is not a measurement of how much you love or are loved and there is an outstanding difference between these two concepts. It may take years to find your best friend in life, but it’s worth the wait when you do. Secondly, you could be in a relationship for years and not be madly, deeply in love whereas you could know someone for six months and experience a much deeper connection. Therefore, I don’t believe that someone has to wait till x amount of time to express their love because when you feel it you should ultimately waste no time and show it.
“I feel like relationships are like ‘don’t tell someone you love them until it’s serious’, but you have to live in the moment. If you love someone, just f*cking tell them in that moment because you never know if you are going to lose them… You should be able to say you love someone whenever you want to.” – Berrigan Harms
Lastly and possibly the most important, never lose sight of who you are whilst being in a relationship. This has been an issue for me either during or before a relationship has begun and I have seen this among my friend groups as well. In some relationships, there may be one person who feels a sense of dominance over the other and because of this, they become very controlling. Suddenly, respect and supportiveness are thrown out the window and the relationship suffers. This is why many people, including myself have a need for autonomy. Apart from your significant other, you still need to be your own person and have the right to freedom and independence. Overall, one cannot rely on the other as their only source of happiness and rid them of their self-identity.
“We all have a need for connection. We all have a need to find completion in someone else, but we also have an equal need for autonomy. To be separate, to be independent and as soon as I feel I need to be something for someone else I pullback because I need autonomy.” – Lloyd Kornelsen
“As for relationships don’t lose your identity. You should always come first and love everything about you before you love someone else.” – Jennifer Badgely
Written by Tessa R. Adamski
Life in Colour 
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