Love is something we all have. Love is something we are lucky to experience. Love is something that is talked about day in and day out. I love you should be overused in the right ways instead of the wrong ones.

It is growing with someone without a timeline, without an age, without any conditions attached at the end of it. Loving someone means loving them for who they are and taking them as is. Not trying to change them, but growing together and not apart. Loving each other along the way. Showing gratitude and forgiveness when someone messes up or does something the other doesn't like.

One thing I have learned over the years and over the course of my relationships is not everyone is going to have the same heart as you do, so not everyone is going to love in the same ways that you do or will. Someone might give gifts to show their love, others will give you words of affirmation, others will show it and that is okay. Not everyone loves in the same ways.

Another thing I have learned is that people are going to try and stand in your way. When you truly love someone, no matter the cost, believe me, any obstacle is ALWAYS worth it. You're going to argue about dumb things, you will not agree on everything and that I can guarantee you. It is important that you remember during these arguments or fights that you love each other and why you do. Don't let it get too out of hand to the point that you say or do something you can never take back.

Love is working through those difficult times to get to the best times in your life. When those hard times come again, you know how to handle them and better than ever. The purpose of God giving you difficult times together is for you to work through them together so you can grow together, not for someone to walk away and give up because He never gave up on us. Remember that.

See what kind of love the Father has given to us, that we should be called children of God; and so we are. The reason why the world does not know us in that it did not know him. 1 John 3:1

Nothing in this life was promised to be easy or simple, sometimes loving someone can be very difficult, even when they aren't even trying to make it that way. Some of those difficult times are the times when they need your love the most. When they are fighting you about something that has nothing to do with you, don't argue back, just hug them. When they are screaming at the top of their lungs and crying, hold them. If something they're doing is continuing to bother you, tell them and talk it out. The person who seems the most unlovable needs love the most.

Communication is also key to loving someone. I don't understand why this has become so hard for everyone the older I become because I feel like I'm constantly having to ask for it, but it is the most important thing. Without communication, your love is simply just lust. You have nothing to discuss.

Looking at each other, lying with one another is not going to get you a future. When someone can open up to you and you can have conversations about deep topics: the future, family, jobs, children, life, death, schools, moving, houses, cars, parents etc. you've found someone to keep for forever.

Let me tell you something else: If someone still checks up on you, still does everything they did for you even after you broke their heart, you lost a very good thing and possibly the best thing for you. When someone is willing to go through ALL of the ups and downs of life with you and work through them regardless of the situation, why throw that away?

Our generation is more worried about what our significant other is doing when they quit responding to our text messages, or they aren't the best boyfriend if they don't call you. While I think it is the sweetest thing in the world to see someone post pictures of them and their significant other all over social media, it does make you wonder sometimes how they really are doing. I've always said though, pictures are great; because the situation and the people may change, but that photo never will. So is that what it has come to? The only way we know someone loves us now is the number of posts they make?

You know what I love? Dates. Actual dates. Going out to eat, bowling, movies, cuddling up on the couch by the fire drinking hot chocolate, writing letters instead of texts, phone calls, surprises at my door, flowers. If you have found someone that loves you for everything that you are and does all these things and more, keep them. Don't them go.

If you have someone to put up with you when you aren't easy to deal with, someone that you can road trip with and sing to the craziest songs at the top of your lungs, when strangers see you in public they can't help but smile at you two, your friends are jealous, but happy for you at the same time. Do not let that person go. Hold onto them as tight as you can. Love them with every ounce of your being because if you don't someone else is going to love them the way you couldn't and no one is going to love you in the ways that they did.

Pray for someone that is going to do everything that you do for them. Pray for the person that loves you without an agenda, without conditions. Pray for the person that loves Jesus first, you second. Pray for the person that makes you a better person than you were yesterday. Pray for someone that is going to support your dreams, not tear them down, even if you don't know what they are yet. Remember they are walking a journey, too. You are in this together, so walk this journey together, don't make the other feel like they have to do it alone.

Love is being there for the other person regardless of the circumstances. If you're mad, get over it. Love them anyway. Life is gone in the blink of an eye. Don't take what you have for granted, because you don't want the saying "You don't know what you have until it's gone" to become your reality, do you?

Love is one of the purest things we have on this earth. Don't throw it away. Keep it. Cherish it.

Love is patient, love is kind. It does not envy, it does not boast, it is not proud. It does not dishonor others, it is not self-seeking, it is not easily angered, it keeps no record of wrongs. Love does not delight in evil but rejoices with the truth. It always protects, always trusts, always hope, always perseveres. Love never fails. But where there are prophecies, they will cease; where there are tongues, they will be stilled; where there is knowledge, it will pass away. For we know in part and we prophesy in part, but when completeness comes, what is in part disappears. When I was a child, I talked like a child, I thought like a child, I reasoned like a child. When I became a man, I put the ways of childhood behind me. For now, we see only a reflection as in a mirror; then we shall see face to face. Now I know in part; then I shall know fully, even as I am fully known. And now these three remain: faith, hope, and love. But the greatest of these is love. 1 Corinthians 13: 4-13