Perhaps love is not ALL you need....

 Well, you don’t need me to tell you, Christmas is almost here and, as well all know, much as we would love it to be like the TV adverts, where everyone sits around, smiling, wearing faintly-ridiculous sweaters, while chuckling at Grandma’s latest, hilarious (?) antics with her false teeth – it can sometimes be the complete opposite. Now, I am about as un-Grinch-like as you can be, so this is not going to be a gloom and doom post – but I would like to say a few things which, hopefully, will give you pause for thought, perhaps while you try to digest your neighbour’s homemade mince pie. Now, you might be wondering why I’d mention that, but I had an awful experience with one, which was not only grey in colour with a glue-like consistency, it took me about 15 minutes and three large glasses of water to get it down, obviously I mean the mince pie, not the neighbour. Although frankly, considering she manically smiled at me while I tried to chew my way through the horrifying pastry, perhaps describing her as grey and glue-like is justified…

Anyway, so what are these thoughts I have chosen to share with you? Well, many years ago, The Beatles sang, ‘All You Need is Love’, which was pretty ironic really, considering they were multi-millionaires at the time, so love was probably the ONLY thing they needed alongside -allegedly- a never-ending supply of non-prescription ‘medications’, while the rest of the population was trying to eke out a meagre living on poor wages. But were they right? Personally, I don’t think so, of course, love, in all its glorious forms is a wonderful thing, but I am not sure it’s enough.

There have been times, in my own life, where people have told me they loved me, yet, some have shown little respect, either for me or my opinions - others have struggled to even acknowledge my existence when they were otherwise occupied. Now, I am not feeling sorry for myself, in fact, I am glad I was treated poorly, because it taught me many valuable life lessons. The main ones being, telling someone you love them does not give you a licence to treat them badly, alternately, hearing someone say they love you shouldn’t mean, you then have to deal with any bad behaviour they choose to inflict on you.

I have often been saddened when I have witnessed many people in abusive relationships staying way too long, when asked why, the answer is nearly always the same, ‘because I love him/her.’ I do wonder whether the belief we are in a loving relationship does cloud our judgement, as if the fact love allegedly exists, overrides our basic common sense which reminds us, we have a right to be treated with care and respect. I believe we are all shocked, when we see cases of domestic abuse on the news, especially those which result in the loss of life, and yet, hard as it may be to believe, there must have been a time when the couple involved would have been convinced they were in love. I guess nobody other than them can know, how that original, positive emotion became so twisted, it ended up as being completely unrecognisable, but it is a sobering thought. I do appreciate, those kind of cases are not the every day experience, but we can learn from those tragedies and consciously decide, how we want to be treated and what behaviour we won’t tolerate in our own lives.

I hope you can now understand why I don’t feel love is all any of us need- there is so much more! We need time to learn about each other by really listening, instead of occasionally nodding while one eye is watching television. We need space to grow and discover more about the world and ourselves, for me, (corny as it sounds), love should mean freedom, it should be about trusting the other one to have their adventures while knowing, they will always return to you – and no, I don’t mean, sexual adventures with others, I mean visiting new places, meeting new people and having unique experiences. True love is about respect, trust and care – if those aren’t there, what do you have? It took me a long time, my friends, to realise real love needs those three to support it, because, if they are absent, you have little more than an evocative word without real substance.

So why am I writing this now? Well, it just seemed to me, at Christmas, we are all bombarded with the ‘this is a wonderful time of year to show how much you love your partner/child/aunt/goldfish and the afore-mentioned toothless Granny’ and, of course, it is – but, there are better ways of showing your feelings than half-heartedly purchasing something they have never really wanted, wrapping it so firmly it would take a nuclear weapon to blast through the tape, which when they do finally manage to rip through the paper, they discover the melon-baller/ear wax remover/novelty socks etc etc which you bought from the only shop that was still open late Christmas Eve. When they look at you in that sad combination of disbelief, frustration and mild despair, they might well struggle to believe your hastily-written gift card declaring your love for them. So instead, I am suggesting you take some time to find something they will know – without question- you chose with them in the very forefront of your mind – in other words, you gave them your time...you cared enough to want them to be happy because that, in my humble opinion, shows real love.

To have love in your life is a wonderful thing, it adds dimensions you can have no way of appreciating until you experience them first-hand, but, as I have said here (perhaps clumsily), it really isn’t ALL you need – without all those other components -trust, respect and care - it’s just four letters and you, my friends, deserve so much more than a word...until the next time…

Take care out there xx