The human heart is one of the most complex organs in our entire body, second only to the brain. If that’s so, then why is it always drowning out all the logic my head spews out in favor of something so completely senseless and delusory?
Let’s face it: love is a trap we’re all too happy to fall into.
Sweaty palms, flushed cheeks, accelerated heart rate… seems more like an illness rather than symptoms of something that’s supposedly “beautiful” or “everlasting."
I don’t mean to sound like a pessimist, but how could I not be with the way modern love is set up? In this world of online dating and Tinder, we are presented with immediate gratification just with a simple swipe. With so many choices, option paralysis is evident – so many selections at your disposal and it’s so overwhelming that you end up not making a decision at all.
Disregarding that, say you do get into a relationship. Say you actually really enjoy it (good for you). Soon the reality will sink in.
You’re either spending the rest of your life with that one individual or you’ll eventually part ways to find someone else better suited for you. Here’s what’s scary about that: in a relationship, love is rarely ever shared equally. One person will inevitably love the other more.
What if you’re convinced that person is 'the one', your honest-to-God soulmate, but you’re just a passing fancy for them, soon to be discarded and left behind as if you were nothing?
All of this was a philosophy I had elaborately created as a result of my disastrous high school relationships. I’m extremely passionate and would end up devoting all of my time, energy, and heart to whomever I was with at the time. All I ever got in return were headaches and heartbreak.
Eventually, I decided love was just one of the most elaborate hoaxes of all time and all of humanity has been effectively conned for the past hundred years with the greatest distraction known to man. Still, that’s not to say that I gave up on relationships. I still had them (a girl gets bored every now and then) and yeah, I enjoyed myself during the whole thing. But I never entered a relationship without knowing that I would leave sooner or later once the fun was gone.
That was, of course, until I finally fell for someone.
God, what a feeling. It’s like having the heaviest weight placed in the bottom of your stomach while simultaneously setting your heart in flight. Totally nonsensical, unless you’ve actually been in love. It’s whenever they walk into the room and everything suddenly brightens because they are the sun your world revolves around.
It’s feeling lost and empty all day until you finally get a chance to see them and that missing chunk of you is finally made full because, with them, you’re home. It’s feeling alone in a room packed with people until you see their face smiling back at you because they’re your person, the one that understands you better than your own self. Nothing had terrified and intrigued me so completely before.
As time, that fear slowly disintegrated as I let myself dive deeper. It was the best kind of drug – addictive, yet instead of ripping something away, love adds. Love fills and fills your heart to the point where you think it’ll burst, and yet, it just expands, growing bigger to accumulate all of that good feeling you just can’t get enough of. And I promise nothing else could ever compare.
So, I guess in the battle between head vs. heart, sometimes you just have to let your head take the fall. Nothing is as fulfilling as meeting someone who’s completely designed for you, unzipping yourself and baring all to be warmly embraced and accepted for all your little flaws and eccentricities. If I knew how love could radiate warmth and bliss through your whole being, I wouldn’t have been so closed off before.
While my philosophy on modern love might take a while to dismantle, falling in love has definitely thawed the ice casing I was under and opened my eyes to the idea of something long-term. If this happiness could last even longer, I’ll do everything in my power to make it so. Nothing else has been worth fighting for.