“The best love is one that makes you a better person without changing you into someone other than yourself”
This is one of those quotes about change and love that makes me ponder. Does love really change us? And should it?
With such powerful emotion going on, love is bound to change you a little bit – the best description I heard for that process is that it “makes you softer around the edges”. If you become a little bit less cynical about the world (because good things DO happen), a little bit more confident (because HE loves you) and a little bit more cheerful and supportive to those around you (because you are in such a fantastic mood) then that has to be good. But love can also have a negative effect.
When You Fall In Love
Love doesn’t necessarily change who you are, just how you behave, or at least that is often the case in the short term, when you are in the infatuation stage. When you first fall in love, it affects what you think about, what you feel and what you do in all kinds of unpredictable ways.
When in love, some become ultra-happy and feel more in tune with the whole world, wanting to spread that happiness about. It brings out the best in them.
Others become incredibly selfish at first, thinking about their love and no one else, forgetting friends and family.
Some become more responsible and knuckle down to create the kind of shared future that they envision with their partner.
Others lose themselves in the love of their life to such an extent they forget about their own goals and dreams. Their only goal and dream is to be with the one they love. Lovers have changed careers and countries to be with the one they care about, giving up a whole lifestyle. If nothing else, love will often cause you to reshuffle your priorities. Before you met him, you had one set of ambitions and goals, and after you fall in love with him, he becomes part of the equation.
And if you look at extremes, in the course of history you’ll find some who are driven by love and jealousy to violence or murder, while others are driven to look after the one they love, even giving up their own lives in the process.
I think romantic love (the kind we call “being in love”) probably brings out the best or worst in who we are. Everything gets magnified with all those emotions shooting about.
Enduring Love
As for long term true love changing us, I hope it doesn’t. Otherwise, to me, it’s not true love. The best love is unconditional and should provide a safe haven, where you feel free to change and develop as a person. You shouldn’t feel the need to hide parts of your personality from the one you love. If you want to change, it should be because you want to change, and not because he wants you to change. I don’t think anyone should try and change another. That is not love, that is control.
What do YOU think? Have you ever changed as a result of being in love? Do you think love changes you?
