Love Is A Choice - NOT An Emotion

Like most people, I have often heard the all-too-common refrains, "you can't help who you love", "it just happened", or "one thing led to another". Most often, I hear this from women who are attempting to justify their ill-advised involvement in some situation that has come back to bite them in the behind.nnLadies, I'm about to set you free!! None of these assessments is accurate. The truth is - you absolutely, unequivocally "help" who you love; it did not just happen; and one thing did not lead to another. You either made it happen or you allowed it to happen. Now, you're free because either way, the situation is in your control. For purposes of this entry, however, I will focus on the 'who you love' issue as it concerns unhealthy romantic love.nnContrary to popular opinion, love is not accidental, incidental, or happenstance. It isn't random, arbitrary, or evolutionary. It happens by the sheer force of two independent wills focused in the same direction. It happens because the two people involved wanted it to happen, and have usually expended considerable effort to make sure that it did happen. Love is not a hole in the sidewalk waiting for you to blindly fall into it. Love is the by product of mental and physical time and effort deliberately put forth to create and continue feelings of infatuation and romance.nnWe've all seen the situations where people have gotten involved in emotional and/or physical intimacies with someone they were "just friends" with. The usual protests go something like "I don't know how it happened", "I never intended for it to happen", or "I couldn't help myself". The facts are that these relationships never just happen. They occur after days, weeks, and months of finding big and small ways to perpetuate the ectasy of illicit attraction.nnThat fact alone begs the question, is it really love you've created? You might think it is. Your partner may even agree. The truth is you've created a fantasy that can only survive in the bubble of the manipulated realities you've invented. That's why the magic dies under the stresses and strains of real life. No longer able to shield your "love" from the side effects and consequences of real life, you usually soon find that your "love" fades.nnIn short, true love is a series of choices that you get emotional about. It is not merely an emotion or a feeling that you just helplessly fall into like a hole in the sidewalk. True love is deliberate. It lasts, not because of how you feel about eachother - but because of your dedication to your commitment to eachother.nnSpeaking the truth in love,nnDeidre