"Love is a Choice"
Love is a choice.
The warm, fuzzy feeling that lasts a few months is simply the science of attraction. This may serve to kickstart a relationship, but when that chemical reaction fades, love is a choice.
We can choose to love our family, or not. We can choose to love our friends, or not. We can choose to love our enemies, or not. We can choose to love God, or not. Love is not really love unless we choose it; love cannot be an obligation. Hence the reason God allowed sin to enter the world. For how could He truly be loved by us—His creation—unless we have the ability to choose otherwise?
I have mixed feelings on the idea of finding “The One.” While the romantic notion of magically finding the perfect person and having a fairy tale story appeals to me greatly as a writer, neither my readings in the Bible nor my own experiences point to its validity. Rather, I believe that we choose our own “One” because the truth is, both people must choose each other and must have the commitment and perseverance to continue to choose each other every day, through better and worse, sickness and health, for as long as they both shall live.
I hold no illusions that there is only “One” woman in the world I can choose to love. In fact, I believe we can choose to love anyone. We simply don’t. Out of preference—and often out of necessity—we exclude those who have or don’t have certain qualities or values, those who don’t look a certain way or aren’t from a certain area. Yet even after we sort every person in the world through our extensive (or not so extensive) filters, we’re still left with a pool of hundreds, if not thousands, of very viable candidates. So, with the help of circumstance, luck, or fate, we are left to choose and hopefully be chosen in return.
And isn’t that the crux of the matter? In the end, don’t we all want to be chosen? I don’t believe, deep down, anyone could truly be satisfied with forced love from another. To choose and be chosen in return every day for the rest of your life: There’s your magic. There’s your fairy tale. There’s your fate. What could be more romantic than that?
The warm, fuzzy feeling that lasts a few months is simply the science of attraction. This may serve to kickstart a relationship, but when that chemical reaction fades, love is a choice.
We can choose to love our family, or not. We can choose to love our friends, or not. We can choose to love our enemies, or not. We can choose to love God, or not. Love is not really love unless we choose it; love cannot be an obligation. Hence the reason God allowed sin to enter the world. For how could He truly be loved by us—His creation—unless we have the ability to choose otherwise?
I have mixed feelings on the idea of finding “The One.” While the romantic notion of magically finding the perfect person and having a fairy tale story appeals to me greatly as a writer, neither my readings in the Bible nor my own experiences point to its validity. Rather, I believe that we choose our own “One” because the truth is, both people must choose each other and must have the commitment and perseverance to continue to choose each other every day, through better and worse, sickness and health, for as long as they both shall live.
I hold no illusions that there is only “One” woman in the world I can choose to love. In fact, I believe we can choose to love anyone. We simply don’t. Out of preference—and often out of necessity—we exclude those who have or don’t have certain qualities or values, those who don’t look a certain way or aren’t from a certain area. Yet even after we sort every person in the world through our extensive (or not so extensive) filters, we’re still left with a pool of hundreds, if not thousands, of very viable candidates. So, with the help of circumstance, luck, or fate, we are left to choose and hopefully be chosen in return.
And isn’t that the crux of the matter? In the end, don’t we all want to be chosen? I don’t believe, deep down, anyone could truly be satisfied with forced love from another. To choose and be chosen in return every day for the rest of your life: There’s your magic. There’s your fairy tale. There’s your fate. What could be more romantic than that?
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