Stephen Stills

"And if you can't be with the one you love, honey, love the one you're with..."
"Love The One You're With," Stephen Stills

Are you kidding me?  This is the way that we're supposed to go through life?  Settling?  I was getting pretty incensed the other day when I saw someone's Facebook status update read "Love is about learning to love the person you're with, not trying to change them into something they're not" or something like that...I'm paraphrasing.  We're reading "Romeo and Juliet" in my class and Romeo falls so hard for Juliet that he is killing himself for her in a matter of days.  If all runs together, doesn't it?  Loving who you're with instead of moving on and finding someone better and more appropriate for your needs and desires, or learning to love the one you're with, or falling head over heels for whatever dame shows up on your doorstep.  This is absolutely insane!

Love is about being with someone that you completely and utterly can't stand being without.  You love them for their positive traits and negative traits and idiosyncracies and exasperations.  You love them uncontrollably and unabashedly.  You love them because you want to, not because you feel you need to.  You give them everything you have, and they return the favor and then some.  You put their needs in front of yours because you know that they're doing the same thing for you.  It's not about settling with some Joe (or Joanna) Schmo just because it's convenient.  It's about patience and waiting for that one to come into your life and completely rock your world - indefinitely.

My uncle once told me that even if you think that a person is one in a million, there are at least 7,000 people in the world that fit that exact criteria.  The world is huge.  There is so much out there to learn and explore and we'd be remiss if we merely stuck around our comfort zone and accepted the status quo.  Love is not always going to fall into your lap, and when it does, it doesn't always last.  It needs to be sought deliberately and nurtured.  But we need to discover our own selves fully first...

I'm reminded of Benvolio's words from "Romeo and Juliet" when Romeo is hung up on Rosaline the nun:
"Examine other beauties."  There are others out there.  Settling should be the last thing on our agenda.