Love. It’s a concept that I have found to be particularly elusive.
It seems to have such a widely accepted and intuitive definition. Yet I cannot truly pinpoint what this definition is.
Yes, I love my mom; I love my friends.
But I also love butterflies, rolling down big hills, and sushi.
Can such a wide variety of things that constitute objects of my affection really be related back to the same concept of love?
In his book “The Art of Loving,” German social psychologist and psychoanalyst Erich Fromm suggests that “the active character of love becomes evident in the fact that it always implies certain basic elements, common to all forms of love. These are care, responsibility, respect and knowledge.”
In developing my personal philosophical paradigm–as we likely are all doing at this stage in our lives – I have found that to love and to be loved may be the quintessential goal of this life. Everything I do is either a response to or an initiation of Fromm's basic elements of love. The ways in which I relate to the divine, other people, and myself are all rooted in my view of love.
According to the Oxford Dictionary, “art” is defined as a "skill at doing a specified thing, typically one acquired through practice." The art of love, then, could be an ever-evolving skill that we practice throughout our lifetime, learning and adapting in each new experience.
Over this past summer, I took a trip to Cartagena, Colombia with my mom and some members of my home church. The purpose of our trip was to interact with and make an impact on as many people as we could in our time there. This included giving vision screenings and providing people with reading glasses, singing songs and playing games with children, and more. For the record, it should be noted that my personal ideas surrounding missionary work have been complicated because of its proximity to and involvement with colonialism – both historically and in the present day. However, I appreciated that the objective of this mission was less about what knowledge we could impart because of our supposed spiritual or other superiority and more about fostering spaces for genuine human interaction and encounters with the divine.
On our third day in Colombia, our group set out on an hour-long trip through the busy, motorbike-littered streets of Cartagena and into a smaller community outside of the city. The homes were close together, and children ran to and fro–stopping to stare curiously at the strangers that had just shown up in their neighborhood. Throughout the day, we sang songs with the kids, did vision screenings, gave out reading glasses, and ultimately formed authentic relationships with the people of that community–despite the language barrier. We ended our time with a delicious meal that the mothers of the church prepared for us.
Once I returned to my room, I reflected on the events of the day. At the very core of my being, I felt nurtured and loved, and that I had also loved. I thought back to when we walked into a home in the community, and this precious little girl tapped me. When I bent down to look at her, she gave me the brightest smile and most enthusiastic wave. Throughout the day, I had experienced so many moments like this: moments where it became undeniably clear that we were created for love–for genuine human connection. I realized that this is one of the deepest human desires. The famous reggae musician Robert Nesta Marley asked an important question: “Could you be love and be loved?” That little girl who tapped me seemed to know the answer.
The Student Movement is the official student newspaper of Andrews University. Opinions expressed in the Student Movement are those of the authors and do not necessarily reflect the opinions of the editors, Andrews University or the Seventh-day Adventist church.