The St(ages) of Love

In terms of emotions, Love is a whole thing. I would vote for love to be categorized as the super-emotion. All other emotions are binary in nature such that they don't give enough room for other emotions to be juxtaposed. But Love lets you experience the whole basket of emotions. This is because once you are in Love, you can experience all other emotions,?even ones you have not experienced ever in your life before. You feel joy, you also feel sadness, you feel hurt, you also feel excited, you feel surprised, you also feel frustrated. No other emotion has the effect of 'giving you wings' and at the same moment makes you feel weak in the knees. Love can make you endure pain and sometimes make you cause?pain.?

?If you are not smitten by the concept of 'self love' then the act of being in love would generally involve?another person. This is why, more than any other emotion, be it - joy, sadness, anger or hatred, Love keeps us all glued together and moves forward the wheels of human civilization. This is also because all the positive interpersonal feelings like caring, respect, compassion, gratitude, trust, appreciation etc. all seem to have a fairy dust of love sprinkled on it. Same is the case with all our social relationships as well namely - family, relatives, friends, colleagues, neighbours, community etc.???

?Love is one feeling that seems to last longer when compared to other feelings. You can be happy, but it won't?last for?more than a couple of days. You could be angry, but that probably lasts a week and you could be in fear but not forever. But if you are in love or you love somebody, it might last much longer, maybe not forever. There are exceptions to this but generally speaking love lingers, for example if you love your parents or partner, it lasts longer than you being angry or frustrated with them. So, it is safe to assume that love is that one overarching feeling which stays with us for the maximum number of months or years. But despite this omnipresence, we always have a hard time finding love, expressing love and the hardest - staying in love. This is probably because through different stages or ages of our life we set the wrong expectations about love and then act on it, clearly resulting in unexpected?outcomes. So, in the upcoming paragraphs let us look at 'when, we love who' can?make all the difference. But before we deep dive on this topic, please take note that there might be exceptions and deviations from the below and it is completely expected.

?The core idea about this concept of St(age)s of Love is that our expectation from love changes at different ages of our life and it is through the lens of these expectations that we perceive, experience and express love. And more often than not, it is the wrong expectations that derail you, even though you might be having the journey of your life. Therefore, let us have a deeper look at what should?be our expectation from and about Love -

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Receive Love (Ages - 2 to 15) -

You start off as an infant and you are showered with love from all possible angles. This is the best period as you are receiving unconditional love from your parents, grandparents, sometimes even strangers on the road. There is not much expectation of giving back love, rather to just fill up your empty cauldron. You experience love in its purest form, with no strings attached, that makes you feel special and believe you?belong among people who care for you. And that is what is required at this stage - just fill yourself with as much love as possible and if you are not getting it enough then ask for it, from parents, relatives, grandparents, heck even your teachers. Imagine you are a reservoir and this is the stage where you are filling yourself up with the water of love. Individuals who do not get enough love during this phase always have issues with it later in life.

?Self Love (Ages - 16 to 30) -?

?The biggest mistake we make at this stage is to?look for love and validation?externally. If you have got your reservoir?filled with love in the previous stage then why do you need more? Your cup is already full, let us just create a storm in it.?Now is the time to love yourself, to show the same love to yourself that others did and deeply believe that you are worth it. And how do you do it? By putting yourself first in anything and everything, not in a selfish way, but in a way that you deserve it. Love yourself to get into the best schools, the?envious job, the?coveted promotions, lovely vacations etc. Make the best of friends but be your own favourite. Look at yourself in the mirror and say that you love yourself. Try it. Create a benchmark of love for yourself, so that in the next stage when you love others, you know how much to expect in return. If you do not set a benchmark, then you will mistake even a sliver of love to be a truckful. This stage is going to be the most turbulent one in your life and as they say when you are air borne - 'put on your own oxygen mask, before you help others', same way first try to love yourself before you expect others to love you.

?Express Love (Ages - 31 to 45) -?

?Now that your cup is overflowing, why not share it with others. Spread the?love. And when you do, do not hold back. Because you have received it and you have processed it. Give?it to your partner, life partner, parents or to the little humans you have created. Become part of the cycle and make sure you pass?on the baton of love. But make?sure you?do not run dry either, because you need to recharge as well. Love is like the money of emotions. Just like when you invest money in a bank, expect to get returns if you invest your love with someone. Will you give your money to a bank for free? Same way, do not give love for free. Demand love in return. Never invest with someone expecting to give love only at maturity i.e., only at a certain point in life, say through marriage or children. There is a high chance here that you might not get your investment back due to moral bankruptcy. Invest your currency of love in people who can give you back more frequently, heck why not daily! At the same time don't let your love still idle, because when you invest it in others, it grows and it grows into a beautiful thing called life.

?Once you have experienced all the three stages, in the same order as above, the remaining years can be a mix and match of the stages, depending on your life situations. If you get train wrecked by mid-life crisis then you want to do a lot of 'Receive Love' as well as 'Self Love'. Or if you are getting challenged by an adolescent teenager at home then maybe a lot of 'Express Love' will get things untangled. Or maybe you are taking up the task of bringing up those little humans in your family then make sure you are not breaking the cycle of love but providing the right foundation for the next generation.

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I am feeling a new found love for butterflies, not because they are born beautiful but because they go through a process to become beautiful. Same is the case with Love. The 'Self Love' stage is like the caterpillar phase where you devour as much love you can find around. Your singular focus is to get as much of it as possible. Then you cocoon yourself in the 'Self Love' stage to look within, introspect and understand yourself better. Others might mistake you for being selfish or self-centred. Don’t bother. And finally, you become that beautiful butterfly which spreads the joy of love around. What the butterfly teaches us is that you cannot turn into something beautiful suddenly, but only when you go through the phases.?

?Cynics will be quick to point out exceptions in this theory and I agree that there will be exceptions. For e.g. if you have siblings while in the 'Receive Love' phase, you can't insist your parents to only love you, lest you end up with sibling rivalry and bullying. Similarly, don't confuse 'Self Love' with narcissism and end up on the wrong side of the road where no one else is good enough for you. There will always be exceptions and we will need to work towards setting up proper boundaries and sirens to warn us. I am super excited to delve into those topics as well, so stick around!

#love #emotions #relationships #psychology