What is Love?

There are scientists who argue that love is simply a hormone-induced state meant to perpetuate the species. Erich Fromm declared that love is a skill which should be learned, practiced, and mastered. The German philosopher Arthur Schopenhauer compared the drive toward intimacy and its dilemmas with porcupines that huddle together in order to keep warm, but end up poking each other with their quills. So, what is love?

Below you’ll find several definitions of love to pick and choose from.

The Anatomy of Love

Anthropologist Helen Fisher has studied love for over thirty years and has written several books on the subject, including “Why We Love: The Nature and Chemistry of Romantic Love”.  Citing evidence from studies of humans and primates, Dr. Fisher demonstrates marked parallels between the behaviors, feelings, and chemicals that underlie “romantic love” and those associated with substance addiction.

Fisher explains that the purpose of this dizzying dopamine-fueled process is for a man and a woman to come together long enough to conceive.

In addition, she argues that because infants are helpless, there is an imperative for mother and father to cooperate in child-rearing.  A different stage of love, which is “attachment”, involves a different chemical basis, and is meant to keep a couple together long enough to support a child until weaning. Love, then, has a chemical basis; and its main purpose is the perpetuation of the species.

Is Love an Art?

“The Art of Loving”, by psychoanalyst, Erich Fromm was published in 1956. In it, love is presented as a skill that can be taught and developed, and which requires knowledge and effort, as opposed to being simply a pleasant sensation that arises by chance. Dr. Fromm argues that we use almost all of our energy in learning how to achieve success, prestige, money, and power, and almost none to learn the art of loving.

He argues that most people see the problem of love as that of “being lovable”, as opposed to the problem being one’s capacity to love. People therefore go to great lengths to be worthy of love, taking care of their physical appearance, chasing after visible signs of success, developing pleasant manners and interesting conversation, and so on, in order to be deemed love worthy. In addition, people tend to think that loving is simple and what is difficult is finding the right the person to love.

Fromm goes on to argue that love is an art; and in order to learn how to love we must proceed in the same way we would to learn any other art, such as drawing, medicine, carpentry, engineering, and so on. That is, we must master both the theory of love—like a student of medicine studies the human body and various diseases–, as well as the practice of loving. In fact, he argues that we must practice the art of love until we have mastered it.

(Love is courtesy of Denise Mayumi).

The Symposium – Love is the Desire and the Pursuit of the Whole

“The Symposium” is a philosophical account written by Plato which describes a discussion a group of men were having on the nature of love.  One of the men present—Aristophanes—argued that formerly the natural state of man was quite different. Man was round and had four arms and four legs, two faces on a round neck, four ears, and so on. This race of man was very strong, and they attempted to climb to the heavens and attack the gods. In order to weaken them, the god Zeus split them in half.

Each half then wanted the other, and they threw their arms around each other desiring to grow together in the embrace. Aristophanes concludes his speech as follows: “So you see how ancient is the mutual love implanted in mankind, bringing together the parts of the original body, and trying to make one out of two, and to heal the natural structure of man”.

(Love is in the Subway is courtesy of benurs).

Love Through the Eyes of Children

A group of children ranging in age from 4 to 8 year-olds were asked the following question: “What does love mean?” Here are the answers they gave:

• “When my grandmother got arthritis, she couldn’t bend over and paint her toenails anymore. So my grandfather does it for her all the time, even when his hands got arthritis too. That’s love.” Rebecca – age 8

• “When someone loves you, the way they say your name is different. You just know that your name is safe in their mouth.” Billy – age 4

• “Love is when my mommy makes coffee for my daddy and she takes a sip before giving it to him, to make sure the taste is OK.” Danny – age 7

• “Love is when you kiss all the time. Then when you get tired of kissing, you still want to be together and you talk more. My Mommy and Daddy are like that. They look gross when they kiss.” Emily – age 8

• “Love is what’s in the room with you at Christmas if you stop opening presents and listen.” Bobby – age 7

• “Love is when you tell a guy you like his shirt, then he wears it every day.” Noelle – age 7

• “Love is like a little old woman and a little old man who are still friends even after they know each other so well.” Tommy – age 6

• “Love is when Mommy sees Daddy smelly and sweaty and still says he is handsomer than Robert Redford.” Chris – age 7

• “When you love somebody, your eyelashes go up and down and little stars come out of you.” Karen – age 7

• “You really shouldn’t say ‘I love you’ unless you mean it. But if you mean it, you should say it a lot. People forget.” Jessica – age 8

The Poet Rumi in Love

The great Sufi Mystic Rumi, his heart filled with love and his body shaking with passion, knocked on the door of his beloved.

“Who is there?” she asked.

“It is your lover, Rumi”, he answered.

“Go away, for there is no room for the two of us here,” the voice responded.

Confused and distraught, Rumi went off to his meditations and prayers. Later he returned to the house of his beloved and knocked again.

“Who is there?” she asked.

“It is you,” Rumi resplied.

The door was thrown open and the lovers passionately embraced.

Love is Blind

Shakespeare wrote that “love is blind” in several of his plays. Today it’s a phrase that gets frequently cited when someone seems to be turning a blind eye to their partner’s faults.  But, is love blind?  The quote below suggests that it’s quite the opposite: love is the ability to see the good in another, even if it’s not in plain sight.

“So Babbie loved the little minister for the best that she had ever seen in man. I shall be told that she thought far more of him than he deserved, forgetting the mean in the worthy: but who that has had a glimpse of heaven will care to let his mind dwell henceforth on earth? Love, it is said, is blind, but love is not blind. It is an extra eye, which shows us what is most worthy of regard. To see the best is to see most clearly, and it is the lover’s privilege.”

– J.M. Barrie “The Little Minister”

The Fable of the Porcupines

The German philosopher Arthur Schopenhauer once told the following fable about porcupines:

“A troop of porcupines is milling about on a cold winter’s day.
In order to keep from freezing, the animals move closer together.
Just as they are close enough to huddle, however, they start to
poke each other with their quills. In order to stop the pain,
they spread out, lose the advantage of commingling, and again
begin to shiver. This sends them back in search of each other,
and the cycle repeats as they struggle to find a comfortable
distance between entanglement and freezing.” (Source)

This is a dance that is often played out in romantic relationships. In an attempt at intimacy, two people can become so entangled that they unwittingly hurt each other; so they move apart. Then they miss each other, so they try coming close once again, only to wound each for a second time. The solution is to find the right balance between togetherness and individuality; to be neither too separate from one another, nor overly involved with one another.

Conclusion

I would agree that there is both science and art in love, but, above anything else, love is spiritual. As Zora Neale Hurston proclaimed: “Love makes your soul crawl out from its hiding place.”

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