Courage to Love

What makes it so hard to love?

I have been thinking a lot lately about the idea of love and how far we let our hearts wander into the wilderness of the unknown. There is so much promise there, but there is also an unknowing that can bring fear and hesitation. So what is the right response?

I seem to have this strange expectation that controls different aspects of my worldview. I expect things to just "click" into place, so when they do I tend to put a lot of stock into it immediately and when they don't, when it requires a little more work, I tend to doubt and wonder. This is a difficult thing to reconcile with what I know about love. I expect love to be both exciting and challenging. I don't think love is always roses and sunshine, but the thorns and the rain, too, even hurricanes. (and all the better because of it)

So when it is love that isn't clicking into place, I begin to war and wrestle with that. I am already fearing I am being too vulnerable for an online blog, but since I know of about 5 people who read this, I would venture to say I would have this conversation with any one of you, so I will keep going.

I want to have the courage to step out in love no matter what the outcome appears to be. Whether I am loved back or rejected, I want to be free. I saw a quote yesterday that said, "God didn't save us to tame us." I don't want to be tame in the way I love people. I want it to be extravagant and world changing.

On the other side of this coin, I don't want to be hurt and bleeding by the end of my life because I have been slashed through too many times by my indiscriminate feelings.

So when it comes down to it, all I know right now is that love isn't always safe. It isn't safe with our friends or family. It isn't safe with our significant others. It just isn't always safe and comfortable. Loving IS stepping out of the comfort zone. Loving IS being vulnerable and willing. Loving IS opening up when your not sure what that will bring. Loving IS seasoned by the responses you get and how you deal with it. I am just barely starting to let my heart out of its cage. Who knows where it will go.

Maybe I will have more answers when I am done reading The Four Loves by C.S. Lewis.