What's Love?

Probably the second most asked question is "What's Love?" after "What's Life?". It is one of those questions where no perfect answers can be found. Perhaps it is like life, and possesses different meanings to different people.

I do not claim to be a love expert (and I believe no one is either) but if I were to describe what love is, I would like to quote from a song by Fat Joe (featuring Ja Rule & Ashanti): "What's love? It's about us. It's about trust." While people like to offer fanciful and sometimes complicated explanations, I would prefer to adopt this simplistic view (which also happens to rhyme).

From a psychological perspective, when two people fall in love, their egos and individualisms collapse and they have a yearning to be together as one. After the initial attraction, the yearning to be together develops and issues like compatibility and matching arises. Love derives from relationship and the fundamental of any relationship is a certain level of trust. But then again trust itself encompasses a wide scope.

The next element in love is us. Some couples tend to think too much about how a relationship should be that they begin to lose sight of what really matters- themselves. Instead of thinking about the lovely memories together, they harp too much on their differences. A love relationship is about two people together. Sustaining love takes effort and commitment.

To put in cliche terms, love is a many splendoured thing. People in love naturally exude an aura of radiance. Love is a wonderful feeling to have but equally painful when you lose it. The Desiderata tell us: "Neither be cynical about love; for in the face of all aridity and disenchantment it is perennial as the grass."

So what is love? It's about us. It's about trust.