Love and emotion

"It's so easy, to think about Love, to Talk about Love, to wish for Love,
But it's not always easy, To recognize Love, Even when we hold it .... In our hands."
--Jaka Love is emotion in motion, evolving consistently into higher forms. The moment a relationship of faith is made by this evolutionary principle, it becomes a relationship for life.
"For ever it was, and ever shall befall
That Love is he that all things may blind,"
Geoffrey Chaucer

Love is something that just happens to us. Remember your first crush: how you were swept off your feet and were in complete ecstasy (joy)? So much so that you never argue with the extraordinary formula. On the contrary, you would always wish to add novel ways of thinking about love per se.
Love is more than an activity, the only light, as philosopher J. Krishnamurti called it. It's also, in essence, emotion in motion. Which explains why there are multiple definitions of love, why they coexist in harmony, and why each person chooses the definition that suits him/her best at any given time. You would also notice how these denotations—including responses from your beloved—change with circumstances such as time.
According to Patricia H. Taylor, a noted counselor and relationships researcher and author of The Enchantment of Opposites (Traveling Artists Press, USA), love encompasses an attachment where people are actively and continually creating their experiences. They are thinking of themselves and their partners as refreshing, interesting and lovable persons to be with. In the process, couples consciously decide to be the kind of people who often explore what they want and how they wish to connect. They affirm to communicate with each other about roles and rules. The bottom line, according to Patricia, is that couples must become increasingly willing to write, and even rewrite, their rules of relating on an 'as-needed' basis.
"I love you, not only for what you are, But for what I am when I am with you."

--Roy Croft
Just ask anyone to list qualities necessary for a great relationship and you will be flooded with a host of commonplace answers—vitality, frolic, spontaneity, more than just conjugal bliss, meeting of the minds, mutual cheering club, soul mate, warm family life. The list is endless. You could add on a few more, if you like.
But the point is that the reasons for a relationship change over time. Which also explains why our representative list encases most of the sought-after qualities and roles for our times. That's not all. These are also qualities that successful couples tell others to embody.
Simple? Not really, because it needs a man and a woman to play the first partnership game—a pledge that allows us to explore and discover who among us is attuned to the psychical chemistry of the opposite gender. This is also a primary reason why a marriage of these differences creates a lasting alliance—notwithstanding a few 'jerks' that may take place during the course of any relationship.
Patricia places the idea thus: "Men and women bring their own special skills, desires, and differences to the partnership." Perfection, says Patricia, "is a starting point, a state of being that exists already”. The best way to find someone you want to be with forever, she adds, is to become that person yourself. Put simply, this means you have to imbibe the qualities you seek in others. Then, and only then, will you be able to attract a like-minded person. The golden rule, Patricia elaborates, is to believe that no matter how good our lives are, they can always get much better than most of us ever dare to imagine.
Add to that the importance of treating each other like successful singles on a date for life, and you have a truly great relationship in front of you—one that has come to stay. Such a relationship not only complements the feeling that you and your partner are doing the best you can every minute, but also works as a magical potion to develop security. It loves and receives love.
Great relationships don't contradict individual rules. It does not matter whether we are really biologically different. Indeed, our identities as male and female are not just anatomical interpretations but also culturally distinct. So, there it is!
Any great relationship needs to be personalized with an element of natural design, and more than a prospect of an attached sense of detachment. To find that 'space'—both within and without. To recognize how willing you are to start creating the relationship you want, how inclined you are to become the type of person who is deeply desired, what actions you can take now to start making yourself, and your partner, even more alluring. Great relationships also evolve in the mind. Even strings, as philosopher Marsilio Ficino extolled, seem to respond to strings that are similarly tuned, and one lyre resounds in answer to another, or a solid wall would echo to one who calls.
I think that Love is something like the two sparrows flying outside your window, accelerating in an instant into an ascending, intertwined spiral of their 'enchantment of opposites' jig. It's also a fine symmetry of the spirit. One that denotes life as a relationship, the most vibrant, beautiful, and mystical framework of this universe—with love per se being its essential and most basic principle.
Anyone who thinks love is not an emotion cannot possibly ever have been in love. Love may "originally" have been a driving factor to procreate, but with the social "plays" of humanity it has gone beyond that. I think it is much like the wings of a penguine. Originally it was for flying, but as the animal evolved further the wings are now used for swimming. Just the same, sex is not mainly used for procreation among humans, and love is more than a driving force to have sex.
The one time I was really in love with a girl, I didn't even think of sex. The love I felt was beyond that. Of course I wanted to have sex with her, but there were other things I wanted to do more. I just wanted to be with her, see her, smell her and hear her voice. That's real love I think -- the rest is lust, and lust is rather different from love as far as I'm concerned.
Our closest relative, genetically, is the bonobu or monkey. In their society everybody has sex with each other (women with women, men with men, mothers with daughters, etc). This is how they build up relations, and because of this, they live in peace and have no wars. This is in contrast with their bigger relative, the chimpanzee, which is a very violent species. The bonobu, so to say, makes love instead of war, and I don't see why humanity would be any different in this respect (except that we are not just as promiscuous and that we are the most devastating war-maker on the planet.)
So sex, love and procreation have some relation, but they should not be confused with each other because both sex and love can have a higher value than just "a physical urge to procreate".
When our emotions and our intellect are at odds, invariably we find that the language of our body and the language of our intellect are communicating conflicting messages. When our heart says "No" and our intellect says "Yes" we rarely wind up achieving our goals. By better understanding the primal messages of love and emotion that our body communicates, we can meld our emotional and rational desires into one comprehensive whole. Often instead, we deny our emotional longings by telling ourselves what we "should" be doing. Our intellect says we "should" do this or that, and our heart says "No thank you." and soon we have a stalemate. We simply are not designed to have our rational mind tell the body what to do and how to feel. We cannot command ourselves to secrete the various enzymes necessary for high quality digestion, and we cannot willfully direct ourselves to no longer feel heartbroken, depressed, or incompetent. To change our emotional experience, we need to speak to our body in the language of love and emotion. By stabilizing and calming our heartbeat, breathing, posture, hormonal flow, and visual focus, we can begin to affect changes in our overall mood, health, perception, and identity. As our enteric nervous system, and our reptilian and limbic brains orchestrate changes in our physiology, we change the structure of our thinking and emotions, and we change the physical structure and activity of our neo-cortex as well. Our somatic intelligence initiates the changes that lead to our emotional and physical well-being, and our rational mind will do well to honor such wisdom. Deny or denigrate the wisdom of the body, and you will find yourself constantly at odds with developing the conditions for health, happiness, and loving relationships.
Each human being has a primary set of internal relationships that make up the self. Indeed we can say that the primary unit of "self" IS relationship. No one part of the system of self is the commander in chief. No one part of the system is any more intelligent than any other part. Living a fulfilling life is a team effort. We need to cultivate a deep appreciation for the vital communication that emanates from the body, and communicate to the body in a supportive life-affirming manner. How to do this? "Speak" to your emotional self in the languages of poetry, music, dance, and visual arts. Take the time to exercise, breathe freely, and appreciate nature. Form supportive intimate relationships with friends, colleagues, and loved ones. Meditate, perform community service, and play with a child or a pet. Enjoy life, and appreciate the few moments you have to spend on this wondrous planet.