Loving Ever After

Cliche title, yes. But this is yet another blog post that contributes towards the stretching and pulling at my heart strings.

Which reminds me! Tumblr has been passing along something peculiar that I found mind-boggling and quite intriguing:

Interesting...but we should be aware that Tumblr is yet another social media website that claims particular facts that we most likely cannot find trustworthy or reliable; let us also keep in mind how much the main stream media continues to embellish subjects in order for us to have mutual perspectives on false ideas.

Let us conceptualize the differences between the science and psychology of heartbreak into one large and tasty sandwich! Well, to be quite frank, the two are not as far as they may seem! Therefore, for future reference, I will be referencing the two in relatively similar matters.

Onward to the unraveling of this little Tumblr meme, shall we? (:

We don't want to be those internet users who read this and think "Oh how sad! How deep! How applicable this is to my young teenage life! It must be true!"

By the way.. I am not by any means trying to shoot down this little meme and stomp on how wrong it is. I actually don't think it's entirely wrong! However, getting the facts together is far more important than using a social media website as a source for learning crucial facts on love and heart ache.

First off! Web MD claims that emotional trauma and heart ache exist as contributions to long-term health issues such as heart disease and high blood pressure. Okay okay, but what if your someone like me who gets sad far more easier than other people, as well as having the tendency to put far more punishment on yourself than you really should. (Which is profoundly connected with sociological matters...something that I am very excited to be minoring in! :D Maybe I'll blog about that another time! ^_^)

These punishments and pressures that we hold strongly against ourselves are a few of the symptoms of being a perfectionist; or simply, a people-pleaser.

People who cannot help the way they feel and who have a history of psychological differences and issues are also more prone to being at risk of heart-related issues like heart disease and high blood pressure.

If this sounds somewhat interesting. The Web MD article thingie is here:
http://www.webmd.com/heart-disease/news/20070920/stress-breaks-hearts

Ugh, Reyna. Web MD? We coulda just googled that!

Alright, fine! Lets dig deeper then! :D

Judith Horstman is an award-winning journalist who specializes and writes in topics relative to health and medicine. According to her book, The Scientific American: Book of Love, Sex, and The Brain: The Neuroscience of How, When, Why and Who We Love, she starts off exactly how any other author would start their book; by looking at what the fundamental concepts of the theme that she is attempting to convey really is.

"Love is so vital to the human condition that it is beyond mere emotion. Indeed, many researchers have described love as a drive, an urge, and even a hunger. A multistudy analysis confirms that the powerful rush we feel when we are madly, deeply, passionately in love is not really an emotion. It's a reward produced by ancient brain pathways that similarly motivate our most basic needs such as those for food or sleep."

Love is far more than an emotion....but a necessity? It's no wonder our world is crushed when the love we held for an individual is no longer present! This does not by any means need to be romantic.

Lets look at the death of a parent, relative, friend or sibling.

The love that was being fed to our hearts by a particular person in this world is no longer here to feed

it! So what happens when our hearts are now missing the food? What happens when the absence becomes so profound, that we feel our heart groaning and cringing in pain from the hunger? We as humans in this world are so hungry for love. (Well, I mean. As Christians, we know that such a hunger is solved when we come towards our salvation.)

But not one of us lives a perfect life. Why? Because we are human! Just because you long for the love of a friend, or the love of your father and mother doesn't make it wrong. It doesn't make you not love God any more. However, choosing to love these people MORE than our God is what makes these desires wrong, and it is what leads to idolization.

So what is love? Well, from a Christian viewpoint...hehe. We like to define love from 1 Corinthians 13:4-7

Love is patient and kind; love does not envy or boast; it is not arrogant or rude. It does not insist on its own way; it is not irritable or resentful; it does not rejoice at wrongdoing, but rejoices with the truth. Love bears all things, believes all things, hopes all things, endures all things.

Sophocles also writes, "One word frees us of all the weight and pain of life: That word is love."

It's profound to even begin to try and comprehend the solidity of what love really is, as well as how much it is a necessity to our lives.

So if love is so essential, and possibly most incomprehensible, then heart ache may just be one of the most hardest experiences that we humans would ever go through. Why? Because it's about loss.

We are losing the one that has given us these feelings of being satisfied with who we are. These feelings of amounting up to something for someone. Maybe we're all people pleasers. Maybe its a hidden drive for us to amount to something, and when we do amount to something, we hold on to it as much as possible.

So as for heart ache? Our brain sends out pain signals to our body when we experience this loss. Those same signals that are being distributed are the same signals that we would feel if one was to be kicked on the shin. Perhaps this is some sort of wacky way that our body tries to protect itself... So yes, we are feeling physical pain from the loss of meaning to someone.

Then there are those who over love. I was talking to one of my best friends the other night, and I realized that the two of us had something in common: We over love.

We over love so much to the point where, if we feel denied, rejected, or pushed away- we blame ourselves. We blame ourselves so much for not loving these people enough to mean something to them. We tear ourselves down because we feel like we're not good enough for that person; and that is why they left, or do not love us in the same way we love them. I am not blogging about a past love. Nooo way jose. This reflection on my personal behalf is not about a boy. Rather, past experiences that I've dealt with friends.

I hope this blog was somewhat fun to read. It was a whole ton of fun to write! Perhaps one day, I would elaborate on this even more.

Until next time~

-Rey