1 of 3 Series: 14 Lessons on Love, Loving, and Relationship

I came across an old post while cleaning up and emptying my old blog - my Valentine post last February 2011. When I wrote that post, I was in a relationship. And now, a lot has already changed. 

I've broken up with my then boyfriend (after five years and five months of being together), enjoyed being single for almost a year, got involved with one of my girl friends, and now she's my girlfriend (we're turning one year this coming April).

Some of the experiences I've had since writing the said article have validated the lessons I included in the post while other experiences proved some of the lessons wrong. In this series of 3 posts, I will be posting the 14 lessons I enumerated and how my views about them have changed (or remained).

So, here it goes.

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Heart’s day is just around the corner, and there are already a lot of Valentine decorations around. So, I guess there’s no better post than something about – err, love – today. I’m not the type who goes all mushy over this topic. And for this occasion, let me simply post some random lessons that I have learned about love over the years. Here goes…

1. That love is love, only when it is allowed to grow naturally in the heart – no planning about it, no forcing it either. > I still agree. Love sometimes enters our life when we're most unprepared - no plans, no whatever agenda. And even as it starts to take control of our life, it's important that we do not rush things - that we think things over and over, that we take the time to see whether that love is bound to grow over time or whether it's bound to perish after a while. When the time is right, love will fully bloom.

2. That love needs to be nourished, cared for, looked after like a young plant in a garden. At. All. Times. Even the strongest of love needs tending. Otherwise, it dies a slow death. > Yes! No matter how strong love is, no matter how passionate, no matter how real, time (and the occasional storms) can tire it or wound it. And without utmost care, it may slowly wither (and we might not even notice until it's down to its last breath!). So I would say, loving needs conscious effort. Yes, it's easy to drown in the feeling when we're at the height of this emotion, but half the time, we need to make a conscious effort to make things work and drive things forward. With true love, this should be easy.

3. That love isn’t all about romance. It’s also about dreaming together, moving forward together, growing together, enriching each other in faith and in values – together. Without all these, love withers. > Now this one's difficult. Half the time, we find someone we love so much - only that person doesn't share all of our values. And that's okay. After all, we're all created to be distinct individuals. But, amidst all the differences, it takes real effort to find a common ground, some sort of balance, to keep things smooth and even. Because converting one person in the relationship into the beliefs and values of the other person doesn't work (especially if the reason for the conversion is wrong). So yes, we may have differences. But then again, it's important to make a conscious effort to thrive in a healthy, balanced relationship.

4. That true love isn’t blind. True love understands. True love knows. True love comes with awareness. > True. Even when we choose to get involved in a wrong relationship, we are aware. We know the consequences. We know the challenges. And we know we could end up in a mess. But, what we do is dig out the good possibilities from an ocean of bad possibilities. And even if we believe we've been blinded by love, the truth is that we only decided to close our eyes and plunge... Because there are risks worth taking when it comes to love.

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I'll be posting the second part next time - Lesson 5 to 10.