To love not just deeply, but well
Do you know how to do that?
Hey, friends. I’m so sorry not to have sent out a newsletter last week. Suffice to say, a spring cold and the stress of working at a prominent research university under attack by the current administration overwhelmed my usual ability to push through.
But, I’m back at it now, feeling healthier (if no less stressed) and hoping that you are well.
Onward!
It might seem an indulgent or frivolous thing to be fixating on given the state of the world, but I find myself thinking continually these days about how to love my people and the world around me, not just deeply, but well.
The English language is such an insufficient tool for talking about love, but I’m going to give it a go anyway. Obviously, love is a feeling. As in, an internal emotional experience we carry viscerally— in the body— and embellish, interpret, and define intellectually and psychologically. We can feel love for friends, family, romantic partners, pets, experiences, jobs, institutions, countries, and on and on.
What I mean when I say that English is an insufficient tool is that we use the same word for all these different types of love. This can be confusing, causing us to qualify love based on its object. Platonic love versus romantic love, for instance. Still, that same, single word— love— is just sitting there, being amorphous and slippery and transcendent, resisting our desire to contain her within categories, because stipulating the object of our love doesn’t necessarily change the depth of our feeling.
But love is also a language between two subjects, a communication between us and someone (or something) else. The extent to which the object of our love feels loved by us necessarily says something about whether or not we’re able to communicate our love well. Whether we have developed adequate fluency so that our love vocabulary keeps pace with the depth and complexity of what we want to say to bridge the inherent chasm between our internal experience and another’s.
I’ve experienced, both as the subject and the object, loving or being loved deeply but not well, if we define well as feeling loved by someone. What about you?
It’s said in this age of self-actualizing, therapized, pop culture that because we can’t control other people’s experience of us, only our own behavior, that other people’s response to us isn’t our responsibility or, in some cases, even our business. And if we’re talking solely about what we can and can’t control, sure, that’s true. But if we’re talking about love— as in, about loving someone— doesn’t it ring some alarm bells if the feeling you have for someone and their experience of you don’t line up? If they don’t feel loved by you?
Love doesn’t erase trauma, mental health issues, addiction, or any number of other factors that can make it hard to receive love that’s offered. Even when we love someone well, we can’t guarantee they’ll always feel loved by us. Still, we should care when that is the case, and be willing to interrogate whether we’ve played a part in that disconnect.
The reality is that everyone we love is a separate person from us. This might seem obvious, but love and magic are intertwined in our cultural ideas about love, making it easy to assume the people we love will simply “get us.” If they really loved us, they would anticipate our needs, understand implicitly how deeply we love them, and intuit our intentions regardless of our impact.
This kind of magical thinking may work in those early, sparky moments when we first meet a friend or lover, or when our kids are very small, but it’s the antidote to loving anyone well over the long haul.
What do I mean when I say, “love our people well”? I mean, do the people we love feel seen in the fullness of themselves? Do they feel assured that we can lovingly, honestly witness all that they are, even the mucky, messy, destructive, unhealed, and uncivilized bits? This doesn’t mean liking every bit of someone, protecting them from discomfort or accountability, or making excuses for them when they do something harmful or problematic. It means not looking away while still loving them as well as we can.
When my kids were toddlers, they were known to throw terrible tantrums in public, say mean things to me and each other, and be physically aggressive (Toddlers can be squishy, incredibly beautiful monsters). Sometimes all I could do to keep myself from responding horribly was calmly, firmly saying, “I love you, but I don’t like you right now. So, I’m going to take some space.” Sometimes that space would be turning up the music in the car and refusing to talk for a few minutes until it felt like the mood had shifted. Sometimes, they had to sit on the other end of the couch or in another chair, out of reach, until we’d all taken a beat. Sometimes, I’d have to step out of the room.
Author Prentis Hemphill puts it this way: “Boundaries are the distance at which I can love you and me simultaneously.” We can offer loving witness to the fullness of someone and also have boundaries. We can say no. Is it harder when you’re talking about love between two adults who are capable of much more significant and lasting harm than any toddler can inflict? Yes. Is it uncomfortable, maybe even enraging, to have someone we love enforce boundaries between us? Also, yes. But who said love between two complex, imperfect humans trying to love each other well and practice their integrity at the same time would always be easy sunshine?
When folks assume love means constant ease, with never a hint of conflict or discomfort, they’re driven by simplistic, infantile fantasies that have more to do with returning to the oceanic lack of boundaries in the womb rather than being interested in love between real people. Psychedelics and religious ecstasy can offer what they seek. Temporarily, at least. A real person? Not so much.
What else falls within the definition of loving well for me? I am loving well when I make time and show up, am curious about others’ experience and feelings, meet people where they are, and hold onto the strongest, brightest, most loved and loving version of someone for them when they can’t.
We are loving each other well when we hold each other’s stories and celebrate each other’s achievements. When we help each other grow. When we are hype squad and grief group and shield (There are things we should not be protected from, but there are also times when we need our people to stand, undaunted, between us and harm.)
I feel loved well when my people listen to me deeply, see me clearly, acknowledge my strengths, and challenge me on my weaknesses. When we work through disagreement without enacting harm, returning to each other again and again, and again.
I also feel loved well by my co-workers, who openly appreciate my contributions, make me laugh, and express curiosity about my life outside the office.
And I feel loved well by my neighbors, who shovel my walk unexpectedly, bring me excess flowers from work events, and help me with unexpected problems with my house.
And I feel loved well by my cat, even though she hogs the bed. And by the woods near my house, even though I have to wade through thick mud to get to the best ramps in spring. And by you, who take the time to read and leave thoughtful, vulnerable comments in response.
What does loving well mean for you? When do you feel loved well?
And why does any of this matter when the world is on fire?
Honestly, I’m not sure anything matters more.
Jamelle Bouie wrote an op-ed in the New York Times a couple of weeks ago (gift link), arguing that the important thing about the behavior of the current presidential administration isn’t that it’s unconstitutional, but that it’s anti-constitutional. Meaning, it undermines the common beliefs and understandings upon which our republic is built.
“In an absolute monarchy or dictatorship, sovereignty belongs to the man or woman in charge, who commands the state in its entirety. In a constitutional system such as ours, sovereignty belongs to the people, who invest their authority in a set of rules and norms, a constitution, which binds and subordinates the government to their ultimate will,” Bouie writes. “An anti-constitutional act is one that rejects the basic premises of constitutionalism. It rejects the premise that sovereignty lies with the people, that ours is a government of limited and enumerated powers and that the officers of that government are bound by law.”
Extending this premise to our current conversation, I would argue there is being unloving— behaving in a way that contradicts the connection between people who love each other— and then there is being anti-loving— behaving in a way that undermines the entire notion of connection and interdependence upon which love is built.
Abuse is anti-loving. Violence is anti-loving. Greed is anti-loving. War is anti-loving. Hierarchies of human value are anti-loving.
The current administration, I would agree with Bouie, is anti-constitutional. They’re also anti-loving. In the face of that, how could loving our people, neighbors, country, and planet well— bearing honest witness, holding faith in the best of what we are capable of, showing up consistently, choosing kindness and joy, while also insisting on integrity and accountability— not need to be at the heart of how we resist?
There is so much concrete, collective, and systemic work to be done. But if that work isn’t fueled by a fierce and unwavering determination to love our people and world well, what is it fueled by? And if it’s not loving well that motivates and guides us, will we feel loved well by what we create or are left with in the end?
Like I said at the outset, this is a very complicated time to be working in higher education, particularly in the office focused on international students, faculty, and scholars, and study abroad. In order to ground myself throughout the day, I’ve been keeping the live Feederwatch cam from Cornell’s Lab of Ornithology up in the corner of my screen.
When I feel myself spinning out, getting angry or anxious about the state of the world, I turn the full force of my attention on the cam for a few moments, reminding myself that right now there is also this. Right outside the door, the natural world just goes on being itself with no particular regard for me, my fear or worries or goals or opinions. As I look at the water, watch and listen to the many different types of birds that appear (and one very persistent, naughty squirrel), my nervous system regulates. Love reasserts herself.
Have a good week, friends. Much love to you.
XO, Asha
Holding on to love can be challenging these days as anger and sometimes hate can take over. And so important to touch base with love, that it's still there.
Thank you, Asha, beautiful reminders <3