When I was younger, what used to break my heart and make me cry was not being loved. Then I realized that when people don't or can't love me, it's not my flaw, it's theirs. What makes me cry now is mostly people who don't recognize love when it's offered to them and people who think those loving them do not deserve decency, civility, and respect in return. Notice I didn't say "love in return," but "decency and respect in return." You can't expect love from everyone you love, but you can, and should expect decency and respect. .
Most of those who don't recognize love don't because they have never learned what it IS. Decency, civility, and respect are certainly part of love, but they aren't all of it. That "chemistry" is certainly part of romantic love. It too, is not all of what love is.
Sometimes people don't know what love is because one or both of their parents had not learned it and couldn't teach it. Some of them have not learned what love is because there is something wrong in their brains, some faulty flow of biochemicals across the synapses that makes them incapable of recognizing reality or prevents those synapses from connecting correctly and producing the emotion the rest of us would have in response to the event. Whatever the cause, it makes me cry to love someone who cannot recognize when they are being loved. I don't mean love just in the romantic sense, but in the relative, friend, fellow human being sense.
It also makes me cry when someone thinks they don't deserve love. People who think they should not expect loving behavior from others because they're too old, too fat, too ugly, too messed up, too SOMETHING. I cry when I see people staying in abusive relationships. Let me define to you what I consider an abusive relationship: any relationship in which an individual is rejected for who they are and experiences verbal, physical or sexual pressures to be someone they do not wish to be..
Everyone wants love and acceptance, everyone. To me, the "right to life" includes the right to QUALITY of life, not just a right to be born and breathe. To me, when we are doing such a terrible job loving each other, what kind of life can we pass on to the next generation?
I cry when someone thinks it's ok not to love someone else because they are black, or don't speak English (although it makes me laugh when the person saying this speaks or writes English badly themselves!), or isn't rich, or beautiful, or "normal" in some other way. Yes, some people ARE hard to love actively -- the mentally ill, the mentally challenged, the disabled, the substance addicted, the old, the poor, the psychologically mixed up (not actually mentally ill, just "troubled" like ,many teens and young people), and those with whom we disagree on just about everything. How much more blessed I feel when I can reach inside and show love to even these.
I have been crying a lot the last few years. Some days it seems to me that most of engage in abusive relationships. I find it increasingly difficult to listen to people put me and my beliefs down without wanting to lash out. Some days I do lash out. I hate that. On the other hand, the constant stream of judgments made about me on the basis of my beliefs and voting choices makes me want to be out of the relationship with the people slinging the abuse. Unfortunately, it is impossible to withdraw completely from the world, although I have done so as much as possible.
Most of those who don't recognize love don't because they have never learned what it IS. Decency, civility, and respect are certainly part of love, but they aren't all of it. That "chemistry" is certainly part of romantic love. It too, is not all of what love is.
Sometimes people don't know what love is because one or both of their parents had not learned it and couldn't teach it. Some of them have not learned what love is because there is something wrong in their brains, some faulty flow of biochemicals across the synapses that makes them incapable of recognizing reality or prevents those synapses from connecting correctly and producing the emotion the rest of us would have in response to the event. Whatever the cause, it makes me cry to love someone who cannot recognize when they are being loved. I don't mean love just in the romantic sense, but in the relative, friend, fellow human being sense.
It also makes me cry when someone thinks they don't deserve love. People who think they should not expect loving behavior from others because they're too old, too fat, too ugly, too messed up, too SOMETHING. I cry when I see people staying in abusive relationships. Let me define to you what I consider an abusive relationship: any relationship in which an individual is rejected for who they are and experiences verbal, physical or sexual pressures to be someone they do not wish to be..
Everyone wants love and acceptance, everyone. To me, the "right to life" includes the right to QUALITY of life, not just a right to be born and breathe. To me, when we are doing such a terrible job loving each other, what kind of life can we pass on to the next generation?
I cry when someone thinks it's ok not to love someone else because they are black, or don't speak English (although it makes me laugh when the person saying this speaks or writes English badly themselves!), or isn't rich, or beautiful, or "normal" in some other way. Yes, some people ARE hard to love actively -- the mentally ill, the mentally challenged, the disabled, the substance addicted, the old, the poor, the psychologically mixed up (not actually mentally ill, just "troubled" like ,many teens and young people), and those with whom we disagree on just about everything. How much more blessed I feel when I can reach inside and show love to even these.
I have been crying a lot the last few years. Some days it seems to me that most of engage in abusive relationships. I find it increasingly difficult to listen to people put me and my beliefs down without wanting to lash out. Some days I do lash out. I hate that. On the other hand, the constant stream of judgments made about me on the basis of my beliefs and voting choices makes me want to be out of the relationship with the people slinging the abuse. Unfortunately, it is impossible to withdraw completely from the world, although I have done so as much as possible.
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