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Let’s Talk About Love
“You complete me.”
Jerry Maguire uttered those words and swept legions of female off their feet. Why is it that human beings seek their other halves? What is it that maintains and fortifies the bond between two people? What is this mystic power that dictates our longing to be ‘completed’? Why do we love? Why do we strive so hard to be loved? Procreation science explains the motivation behind the act, but not the reason that determines the emotion.
I have always believed that we love because we seek an extension of our sense of self. We seek kindred soul to affirm our existence. We seek the emotional fulfilment of, against all odds, finding another person with reciprocal yearning that codifies our desire, that begets our passion, that solidifies our affinity, that substantiates our ego. And who is crazy enough to stick with us through it all because the alternative is substitutory, improbable, and never going to be as good. Or so we fear. Aristophanes’ somewhat comedic hermaphroditic theory (in the case of heterosexual love) on the subject of love is a romanticized version of my belief.
Our need for a sense of belonging is a product of biological and deterministic influence, while our quest for love is a gamble undertaken under poor instructions and guided by instinct. What a lousy predicament! But perhaps it’s the thrill of the search. Perhaps this notion that the very fulcrum upon which our perfection dances is mounted upon a disconcertingly delicate balance is what keeps us alive.
We stand to fall, and then we are complete.