I have so many questions for you!
Love
Do you need love to survive? I know there is a love hormone, but is it vital? And what kind of love are we talking about here?
I know it’s really important to show children love so they thrive in development, but is that love or caring?
Is it in our genes to fall in love? If you’ve never been in love do you actually know what you’re missing? Can you crave something you don’t understand?
What happens when we’re adults? Some people are afraid to be alone and I am probably one of them. There’s always been a man around throughout my adult life. Would I have benefitted from more periods of alone time? Is love as important as independence?
Some people are so afraid to be alone that they will stay with their partner no matter what leaving the people around them baffled. How much will people tolerate in their quest for love? I’m not really talking about abusive situations here because I know a person can become trapped and not have many options. I don’t know what that feels like in a relationship but I have felt trapped in another sense and I know it’s horrible. I can’t imagine what that must feel like with a partner.
But what happens when you put your own needs aside to please someone else?
When does love for yourself come into play? Is it more important to love yourself or others? Can you love others without loving yourself?
Socialization and Depending on Others
As someone with a mental illness, I greatly depend on my family. I drive. I work part-time. I take care of my daughter to the best of my ability, but there’s still a lot I need help with. I look to my husband for validation. Are my feelings valid? Was my reaction appropriate? I look to him for reality checks and he lets me vent about my frustrations with stigma and many other things. There are very few places I go alone. I feel my experience is not typical, so how much does an average adult need to depend on others?
Are we really social creatures? Do we have to be? I personally find being around others to be overwhelming and exhausting. I talk to my friends via Facebook and texting sometimes, but I hardly ever hang out with anyone. I like being alone with my sketchbooks and journals. I would rather be home than out.
Is there ever too much alone time? Can alone time be detrimental?
Then there was the pandemic. I finally returned to work last summer. That really fucked me up as I’m sure it fucked up a lot of people. Obviously, I spent a lot of time at home and it was devastating to my mental health. It makes me wonder what exactly the problem was. Did I need to be around other people or did I just need more to do? Boredom has never been good in my life so I try to stay busy under normal circumstances. But for once, did I crave to be around others?
I want to read what you think. How important is love? Do we need to be social to thrive? How often do you crave to be around others? Do you find it as exhausting as I do?
Update
I haven’t been posting to my blog as much because I have been writing articles for a content marketing agency as well as focusing on my artwork. I am sharing a few pictures of my paintings and I am also including a couple of drawings I did this week. I have spent so much time painting but my husband told me yesterday that he actually likes my drawings better. My husband is incredibly supportive but also very honest. He tells me when my artwork doesn’t look right and my poems don’t make sense. He’s probably the best kind of partner you can have as an artist or a writer.
I forgot to mention that the paintings are finger paintings, acrylic on canvas and the drawings are Sharpies and colored pencils.
Do you need love to survive? I know there is a love hormone, but is it vital? And what kind of love are we talking about here?
I don’t know. I have been amazingly lucky.
I met Wife in college. Both of us came from odd homes. My parents were both survivors of severely toxic homes and were learning to live and love. Her parents were, well, cold — no hugging, no verbalization of parental love. And we completed each other. We fell in love quickly and waited until I graduated to marry. She followed me into the army and then the park service. We are now 57 and 54, both with disability retirements, and are still in puppy love stage. I have never actually been without love — parental or in marriage — so I cannot actually answer the question. I feel complete with Wife.
I know it’s really important to show children love so they thrive in development, but is that love or caring?
I would say both. Caring for children means providing for their physical and educational needs. Loving children means providing for their emotional and social needs. Unfortunately, not all children get both. Or either. For many reasons.
What happens when we’re adults? Some people are afraid to be alone and I am probably one of them. There’s always been a man around throughout my adult life. Would I have benefitted from more periods of alone time? Is love as important as independence?
Again, I don’t know. But I do think of independence as being a part of love. Wife and I play off of each other. Part of that was allowing each other independence — the space to change. Which, I think, is the key to how long our marriage has lasted — we are not the same people who married back in 1989.
I think we did benefit by short apart times. My Park Service duties at forest fires (and hurricanes, and terrorist attacks), limited to 16 days total, were not only good financially, but the coming back was so great for both of us.
I have so many issues, some of which my wife does not know of, but I manage to come across as normal. And I have had a really great life so far, and it continues to be great with the granddaughters. So I guess I really am not a great one to be commenting on things like love.
Sorry I can’t be of more help.
I love your colorful flowers, particularly the set of four and the set of three. You have such a great color sense, and the color & composition is very retro and fun.
As for your questions…hmm. I think everyone is born with personality traits, including how far on the introvert–>extrovert scale they are. That can be modified by the people around you–the most outgoing extrovert can get burned out if they’re surrounded by malignant idiots, and the most extreme introvert can be content in small groups of very compatible and loving friends. What any particular person needs to thrive probably depends on where on the scale they fall and who they’re surrounded by.
It’s hard to answer whether I think you’d have been happier on your own for a while or continuously in a relationship. I’m guessing that you crave the security your husband gives you that you always have someone “in your corner”, someone who can fill in the gaps you might miss.
Me, I’m kind of middle-of-the-road, so the best answer I have to give is, “it depends”. I find some situations exhausting and others invigorating, and it depends on the people around me. Before the pandemic, I really enjoyed going out for karaoke with a group of friends, and I really enjoyed sitting on the back deck reading a book. When I was dealing with a parents’ last days and the death itself, I craved time when I didn’t have to look to other people’s needs and be ready to go into battle for them. It’s all situational.
What do you do when you’re at the end of your limit?
I have to get by without that hormone, whether I like it or not. I had an advantage during lockdown in that being confined to my home and barred from social contact quite literally made no alteration to my life in any way, as did the ending of lock down. If there is harm in that, then it has shaped my life the way water does for fish.
The lockdown didn’t bother me until the last few months then I got depressed. That was more because I work in the health field than because I was sorta isolated when I came home. I’m a bit of an introvert so being around people is exhausting even if they’re fun. So I was glad to get away from the not much fun job .
As far as love, I felt unloved by both of my parents who were both very immature, overcontrolling and cruel but I had other adults constantly around who acted normal and were also caring and dependable . I’ve left relationships where I was cruelly treated and had my parents dump on me for saving my own sanity and possibly my life . Which explains why I ended up in a bad relationship in the first place. I guess to me, love means stability, affection, and , freedom to create and grow
Love the paintings btw
Funny thing, I am alone (fifty five years and counting) by virtue of one, life-defining love. And I would rather remain alone (happily so) than surrender up that heaven I chanced upon.
Ain’t that a kick in the head?
Or maybe, quote: I’ve got a hole in my boat!
😉
“love” has so many meanings!
Pretty sure I mentioned some in an earlier comment.
I do wish to state that I think nobody ever needs https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Tough_love
(I think if anything is evil, that is. A perversion of actual love)