Those Who Wake Up in Love

Love seems to be growing rarer and rarer in this world, doesn’t matter which kind I’m talking about. There’s vitriol and hostility everywhere — on all sides. I get it, I suppose. Love in every form requires vulnerability and courage. These days everyone on so many levels is tired of feeling vulnerable. It’s all too obvious as well that courage and personal strength and the ability to take care of other people are expended resources.

So, in the words of the world’s greatest living romantic nihilistic cynic, Tony Johnson (Ricky Gervais) in the wonderful TV show After Life:

“… (long sigh …) Ah, fuck me!”

Tony Johnson (Ricky Gervais)

And yet, somehow, I’m pretty sure a good many people on this good green earth continue to wake up in love every morning. They can’t help it. I’m thinking of those still romantically connected to their partners; those with unshakable friendships; and whole families in general, no matter how distant and separated by coronavirus.

I’m also thinking about all the young couples out there in Covid Land who have had babies or adopted them in the past year. That new parent smell is something special, isn’t it? Full on ferocious love and beyond.

We’ve also got folks still deeply and madly in love with those who have died in the past year or so–could be Covid-19 or cancer or a freak accident. There is perhaps no greater love on earth than the love of the grief-stricken.

All of these people, these lovers, may well be keeping the trillion or so pieces of Reality that make up this world from flying apart and drifting off towards Alpha Centauri B. These are the people who when they see violence and hostility and pain on TV can’t help feeling deep love for everyone involved – protesters on the streets as well as the police and other officials trying to figure out how to respond to what are obviously extreme public demonstrations of legitimate frustration.

Can real love watch pain turn to anger without feeling that love itself is a better weapon?

-d.c. biddle

The secret to life, of course, is being creative, constructive and positive. That’s how you turn love into a real world superpower. I think of my friends and family members who exercise that superpower most of the time during the waking day. It’s not easy. Waking up in love every morning can be sobering as hell. It forces us to understand we have a responsibility for the rest of the day. No doubt, we have plenty of reasons to feel anger and to want to attack people who have been doing harm to us and our families and our society. No doubt, right now many of us feel deep frustration with those in America (and other parts of the world) who emphasize fear, aggression, lies, and hate as basic modes of communication.

But love teaches us to be careful in our early judgments of others. Judging is the antithesis of love — right up there with ignorance, fear, hate, and aggression. We know this from so many sources: the only legitimate judgment to have for others is love and respect.

I haven’t accomplished anything worthwhile in my life without love as the guiding force in whatever endeavor I’ve attempted. When I look back on my failures or screw ups, more often than not I can’t recall feeling happiness or enjoyment with much of anything at the time. Maybe what seems a demise of love in this world today is connected to people’s inability to feel happiness and enjoyment. They are, after all, connected emotions. Right?

Some people say that things happen for a reason. That’s kind of simple-minded if you ask me. However, I think it’s very true that when things happen how you deal with them is what becomes the life you are living. Yes, it’s a struggle to deal with anger and frustration and feeling vulnerable right now. But we really do have the power to create and be positive and to wake up every morning in love — doesn’t matter what that love is directed at. It could be your neighbor’s cat or a TV show or the guy who runs the cash register at your go-to gas station. The point is to wake up in the morning and feel the good and the mystery of that emotion and to go out into the world and know that if you can be in love with something or someone then something or someone (else?) may well be in love with you too.