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other than the fact that it's mainly like 5 people going back and forth, i kinda see his point, though I want to hear what other people think, not just us...

Hmm. I guess I never really thought about how OTHER people write. For me it's ALWAYS over analization (is that even a word?). I love thinking deeply about things, having my writing (poems accepted... those are spontanious) very detailed and informed.

We should start a discussion about how people write. biggrin

Don't we have a rant thread? I should find it and link it.

I think you're all forgetting something. I think all of the mushy types of love have been given their mention, but what about the darker types, or the insane loves?
Like stalker-love. Granted, that's not a nice topic, but you have to admit that even crazy people can love. It just causes deaths sometimes.

And what about love from a distance? The kind that kills you slowly because you haven't the willpower to act on it?
I'm tempted to say that the last one is the most common, but that's probably just because I suffer from it.
Or, at least I think I do.
Oh, look, there's another type: the 'I know it's real! (when it's not)' type.
I hate that one.

I like this Kraal person, debates a bit like I do. I wouldn't say you've outdone me, but covered some decent points. Worthy... mayhaps.

But in response to CariRae first, age is relative to experience. A thirty year old who has stayed in his home town his entire life has more experience than a ten year old. The example is a little drastic since most don't consider there any difference between an 18 year old and a 21 year old, but I beg to differ. In those few short years a person will have undergone hundreds, thousands of experiences over and over again. Hopefully the person learns from them, though some are more just wizened by the events. I had no idea what love was when I was 16 when I started dating my girl friend, I learned what it was over the years. Getting out and having fun is just one level of experience, as is sitting and learning or studying, even watching experiences, as Kraal liked to use the "faked" example, they are still moderate examples of the activities and are still classified as experiences. We can assume that the boy who runs all day in the sun only having fun would inevitably be insecure and morose during difficult times, while we may assume that the other boy who stays in and learns or merely plays the part of voyeur will handle it differently, perhaps better because he has had a different experience.

The first point Kraal brings up is amusing because he's subtly trying to debunk me right from the off. I used a certain level of assumption, Kraal, that people would take "real relationship" for the classical two people in love scenario. I admire the fact you didn't stick to your first conclusion. I disagree though, yes, love isn't always a two way street, but again, I used that same level of assumption because I wasn't expecting people to fruitlessly undermine what I was aiming for. Yes, you can love someone purely without them loving you back, or even knowing that you care for them that way. But that is not the same thing, you are not experiencing the whole relationship, just a part of it, just your side and not theirs. That's what I classify as a real relationship, he loves her, and she love him. If it is just him loving her or the reverse, that's called a one sided relationship, and in my experiences is very unhealthy for the person.

High school sweethearts that never last? So my relationship isn't going to last then? Surely you don't mean to commit the same faults as I have, so I'll ignore that one part. I don't see how the act of love is different for each person, its the same thing that happens for everyone and its what keeps people together. Love is just a strong bond of trust, what's the honest difference between I-want-to-marry-you love, and your-my-best-friend-forever love? The only difference between my relationship with my two best friends and my girl friend is that fact that I'm sexually intimate with her whereas I'm boyishly intimate with my friends. Marrying a woman means you want her with you forever, to trust, its no different than friendship.

I thank you for respecting my opinions and I respect your thoughts as well. My feelings are still the same, despite what you've said. Leavaros will call me the old lion because he thinks I'm stuck in my ways. But really I just haven't been convinced otherwise, I refine myself everyday, come to new conclusions through the insight of others but nothing here has broken any of the ground that I've already worked out.

To be perfectly honest, Love, love, LOVE whatever, is really nothing. If you think about it thoroughly enough. If you've considered it from the thousands of angles that I have, you'll realize that love doesn't really exist. It is nothing but a poetic cushion word for trust. Its all love is, a deeper trust, like someone said before, probably Varos, you let the drawbridge down for people you love/trust. Love is little more than a culmination of intimacy and trust, even if there is no intimacy there, if you can grasp that.

Its strange though how you talk about love Kraal. Like if people don't talk about it, they'll just forget about it. Love is just there, whether you talk about it or not. It will be around as long as there are creatures alive. Heck, love can be seen on the atomic level too, some elements work well with each other, some don't. It bothers me when people talk about it, because unlike you, I see this deep, loving trust I have as personal. Why should others try and refine it? Because they don't understand, because they haven't experienced their ideal relationship? Why would people waste their time debating and discussion and defining and refining personal experiences? Why, when you, or Shadow, or Muse or Cari could just go out and experience it for yourselves? To use Cari's example one more time, why would you sit and talk about the boy outside enjoying himself playing when you could simply go out and join him? That is why it bothers me, because when people talk about it, it cheapens it. You come up with theories and ideas, what it should be, what it should feel like. You experience something without even experiencing it, so when you do find someone you can trust and love, and it doesn't fit what you've talked about, what then? You go back to your drawing boards and rethink things instead of experiencing what simply is.

You make illusions sound like your area of expertise and I'll assume you've told your fair share of lies. Your response will be: who hasn't? I will shake my head because I feel sorry for anyone who puts stock in illusion, cause its all everyone is doing by participating here. Just creating an illusion, even me, because I let it bother me so much that I threw my own two cents into the pond.

Your example Kraal was in truth foolish and quite simply without merit. If you wish to manipulate trust and love, twist it, or suggest that just because it can be that maybe it should be, that is more or less terrible. The fact you can manipulate another into trusting you for the wrongs reasons has no place in this discussion. Why you would bring it up is beyond me. I think for once I might have Leavaros on my side with that point.

Having finished with my reply I'll simply tell you to go to the Writer's Corner subforum and from there, under the stickies you'll find the Writer's Cafe, nearly 80 pages of banter and discussion. I believe what I wrote was on page 76, maybe 77. Its quite the blurb, so it won't be hard to find.

Nymir, I believe what you're thinking of is more or less understood as obsessive infatuation. I've already mentioned the distant, one sided love, sorry, its buried in my first long post. I think you're just trying to classify things now, lol. Judging how people act isn't really what we're here to do, though I agree, that does get pretty annoying sweatdrop .

Justin

Beautiful, absolutely beautiful, Kraal, you are an excellent addition to the guild, I wish it was me accepted your join invite.

I'll keep this short for two reasons. One, because I'd like to write some of my novel before 1AM rolls around. And two, because I feel bad for everyone that we've taken probably several feet to ourselves debating our sides of the story. That's right, I said debating, I'm having too much fun for this to be arguing.

I'll also make a quick point that I'm only going to cover certain aspects of your post, some don't need to be dealt with anymore.


When I say that love is a strong bond of trust, I don't mean to say that love "is" trust. I know what I'm saying teeters on the line but that's ultimately what I mean. Trust I have no reserve to compartmentalize, I know it sounds hypocritical but understand I've put several years of thought into this and not always are the ideas I'm presenting my own by design, I just feel they make the most sense. I don't mean to belittle your appreciation or study of love, but I felt it somewhat necessary information to divulge. If you feel I need to clarify more, let me know.

'To be perfectly honest, Love, love, LOVE whatever, is really nothing.'

Again, misinterpretation, I was being literal not metaphorical. It was a silly mistake since I didn't spend another 4 paragraphs explaining what that alluded to. Don't worry, I'm not going to write it all down, just a quick summation.

What I was trying to get across was that like morals and ethics and happiness and sadness is that it doesn't physically exist. And I will argue that it doesn't exist even by extension that since we can experience it, and we physically exist, that it still does not. What I'm saying is you can't bottle love and happiness, though puppies are pretty close, I'd suggest a perforated box though. I found it relevant because all too often it feels like people are giving such things material value, putting stock in a company that exists only in the minds of the people who dreamt it. And no, you can't argue internet stand alone companies because they exist on hard drives and servers.

Indeed, how dare you insinuate such a thing. The discussion isn't aimed at what one can do with love. Everyone knows what can be done with it, its easy enough to manipulate people, too easy in fact, but maybe I'm just sinister that way.

If I could look you in the eye and tell you that I never had the illusions you still wouldn't believe me. I'll tell you this, not for pity sake, but so you understand a little more of where I'm coming from.

Before I met my girl friend, I wanted nothing to do with love, I didn't want anyone to love me and I didn't want to love anyone. I was purely objective in my research of those around me who shared with me stories and problems and I learned, for many years, about typical delusions that people had. And I watched movies where the characters loved and lost, but that grand illusion never germinated in me. True, my life has been dark and filled with the deaths of very close family members like my father and grandfather, and the stiff realization that the parents I have aren't actually mine but adoptive ones.

The girl I'm with now is the first girl I've ever been with, I've had no other relationship with anyone besides her in this way. Why, you'll wonder, if I was so dead set on not wanting to be loved would I accept her feelings risk my sanity on a whim. Simply put, the whim won the argument and I risked everything. What I was able to experience was and what I still experience is something very natural and unclouded. I don't know if I've realized what love is in the sense you're thinking of, but I've learned what it really is, I think, in part because I never had such delusions to begin with.

You could argue that my objectivity inspired curiosity in me, and it may have, but it doesn't mean that it subjected my opinion of the experience in any way to the stories and farces that others went through.

I hope this isn't too long, sorry everyone if it is.

Justin

Thank you. ^^ I have my moments. You're good at this yourself. =)

XD This is fun. I agree.

'What I was trying to get across was that like morals and ethics and happiness and sadness is that it doesn't physically exist.'
---Okay, I can understand that. That makes sense to me. While I'm free to agree or not with that, it is very understandable, though I do believe I said somewhere love doesn't have a physical manifestation...
You sneaked puppies into this. XD I believe I'll have to quote that now.

'If I could look you in the eye and tell you that I never had the illusions you still wouldn't believe me.'
---I tend to give people points before I know them. I like to give people a chance. If you say you really haven't thought of love at all in your life like the way most do, then I can believe you.

We seem to have reached a point where we are agreeing on most things, whether or not it's agreeing to disagree. That made my post shorter...bla.

Although, I'm still not sure what you mean by your trust love comparison.

What do other people think about this?

I still humbly disagree with Cari, because you seem to be trying to disagree with what I'm saying by using my argument. Experience does come in the experiment, discussion, I don't believe is experimenting. An experiment would be going out and falling in love and then having it end, granted it wouldn't be "successful" but then again if the experiment was successful then, awesome.

I'm more than willing to bend some on my "Trust" theory, and I seem to be glinting a further, deeper explanation into what I'm trying to say, but like always, its frigging 3AM and I'm typing... So with that said, I can understand where you can trust someone without loving them, but like I was trying to say in my last post, love isn't trust, it just gets wired into trust and is "usually" caused by trust, withholding that love at first sight business. I don't really think what you did was entirely honest, even if you were trying to not hurt him, but in the long run can you sort of see why it just seems hypocritical? Anyway, I'm not judging you, I'm just pointing out the obvious.

Thank you Kraal, for understanding, or believing I guess. I don't know if we're agreeing mostly or just coming to the realization that we've ironed out most points and are resigning the others since there's no point in really beating them against each other.

As for the love trust thing, its hard for me to explain. I feel that love is a by product of trust, or can manifest itself in-spite of trust. Granted, "love thy enemy" throws that a little out of sync. I haven't got it quite ironed out 100% yet, and I thought I had, because it makes sense in my head but on paper its like drawing a road map. Base line idea, love forms out of trust, or can. I can also take Muse's biology into my calculations by saying that given the hormone excretion of two people in regards to the amount of said chemicals reaching the brain at certain points it can be debated that love is only possible when the other people fulfils a certain chemical equation in the other. The main problem with Muse's biology is that it takes the philosophy out of our discussion and replaces it with hard evidence of what really happens.

My question for Muse though, you never defined the outcomes of the study found when the woman was tested at each stage in her relationship. Sure it doesn't matter much, but I'm curious, was she reacting more to it when she was the girlfriend, the fiance or the wife? Also, did they measure her at regular intervals during each stage, when they first hooked up, x months down the road, right after proposal, during the down time, pre-marriage, post marriage soon and post marriage long after. I'm just curious, since I'd like to know, I don't have much time left of being the boy friend.