The key to living in harmonious similitude and domestic tranquility is found in a single word; love. And before I proceed to unpack that statement, let me clearly make the following caveats.
With all of these caveats having been granted and entered into evidence, my thesis still stands. The problem is not with the thesis, but rather with our understanding of love. And from what our popular culture intones about love, and what we respond back to the culture with, I have come to the conclusion that we are fundamentally ignorant of what love means.
Webster's definition illustrates the problem well.
What I mean by love is defined best by the Apostle Paul in his letter to the Corinthian Church. (I Corinthians 13:1-13 The text below is quoted from http://www.biblegateway.com/passage/?search=I%20Corinthians%2013:1-13&version=NIV )
If I speak in the tongues of men or of angels, but do not have love, I am only a resounding gong or a clanging cymbal. If I have the gift of prophecy and can fathom all mysteries and all knowledge, and if I have a faith that can move mountains, but do not have love, I am nothing. If I give all I possess to the poor and give over my body to hardship that I may boast, but do not have love, I gain nothing.
Love is patient, love is kind. It does not envy, it does not boast, it is not proud. It does not dishonor
others, it is not self-seeking, it is not easily angered, it keeps no record of wrongs. Love does not delight in evil but rejoices with the truth. It always protects, always trusts, always hopes, always
perseveres.
Love never fails. But where there are prophecies, they will cease; where there are tongues, they will be stilled; where there is knowledge, it will pass away. For we know in part and we prophesy in part, but when completeness comes, what is in part disappears. When I was a child, I talked like a child, I thought like a child, I reasoned like a child. When I became a man, I put the ways of childhood behind me. For now we see only a reflection as in a mirror; then we shall see face to face. Now I know in part; then I shall know fully, even as I am fully known.
And now these three remain: faith, hope and love. But the greatest of these is love.
This text stands as the functional definition of love. It stands in stark contrast our construct that golden calf we call love. Our common view of doesn't scratch real love's surface. Our construct for love is bereft of real love's content. So much so, that if real love were intellectual property of someone, that someone should file suit against the construct and insist that the name be changed to something more accurate, like say 'good feeling' or 'fickle in fatuous feeling' or 'momentary sugar high following a good meal'.
By accepting our construct we short change ourselves for what we were intended to have. I understand why we did it. The construct requires little of us. It is a malleable thing that we can fashion as best suits our mood. If our feelings change, we can refashion love to suit our feelings.
From a programming perspective, I am sure of what we've done. Someone for reasons of expediency, unreasonable managerial timelines, or pure mischief, went to the base class of love and gutted it. They left behind only what suited their immediate need, and pushed it into production. The change vastly simplified love and allowed extensibility of the code, so other programmers picked up the change and ran with it and used it ad nauseum.
Leaving us in the state we are in today. It is not unlike the issue that confronted those that managed the BASIC programming language two decades ago when they confronted the GOTO command. The command had been so overused, and so abused that it muddled code and made updating it, managing it, or upgrading it tedious, time consuming, and nearly impossible. They had to start to downplay and deprecate the command so that the language was clearer, and easier to manage. It was a painful transition for them, but they came out in a much better place.
We have to start doing the same thing. We have start unraveling the misused base class, and start removing each instance of the construct from our code. We have to start by restoring the original code and parameters of the base class. We to remove all the fake code we have inserted along the way to make the base class suit our selfish, and dare I say, evil desires. I understand it will render entire application programming interfaces, or APIs, useless and non-functional. I do believe that is a good thing.
Only in doing so will we begin to see love what it was intended to be. Only then will we see that love is not about feeling in and of itself. Only then will we see that love is first and foremost about commitment and sacrifice. Only then will we see that it is not and never will be a zero sum gain equation. Only then will we see that peace and tranquility in our domestic affairs is the direct result of a love that costs us everything that we are, and ever hope to be. Only then will we truly see ourselves as third in any domestic equation behind our creator, and our beloved.
Anything less is worthless tripe, salty that isn't salty, a lamp that doesn't give light, a compass that points to anything but north. Anything less is fake, phony, and fraudulent. Anything less is not worthy to be called by the moniker of LOVE!
- In our culture, the love has been used, abused, tortured, and left with little functional meaning.
- Many people recoil from the word love, because of how its been used to paper over traumatic
barbarity. - Our culture has turned this word into some fickle fancy that more in common with last call and shocking inebriation than anything else.
- This word as we have chosen to define it, is typically used as a shield to cover the foulest expressions of the darkened heart. Even in the church. Any conversation that begins with, 'I am telling you this in love...', makes me want to duck and draw a weapon, because incoming
gunfire is on the way. - Love in practical everyday use, is little more than a feeling that accompanies a good meal, a chick flick, or a sappy smarmy trashy harlequin romance novel.
With all of these caveats having been granted and entered into evidence, my thesis still stands. The problem is not with the thesis, but rather with our understanding of love. And from what our popular culture intones about love, and what we respond back to the culture with, I have come to the conclusion that we are fundamentally ignorant of what love means.
Webster's definition illustrates the problem well.
- Love- Noun: Strong affection for another person; attraction based on sexual desire; affection or tenderness felt by lovers.
What I mean by love is defined best by the Apostle Paul in his letter to the Corinthian Church. (I Corinthians 13:1-13 The text below is quoted from http://www.biblegateway.com/passage/?search=I%20Corinthians%2013:1-13&version=NIV )
If I speak in the tongues of men or of angels, but do not have love, I am only a resounding gong or a clanging cymbal. If I have the gift of prophecy and can fathom all mysteries and all knowledge, and if I have a faith that can move mountains, but do not have love, I am nothing. If I give all I possess to the poor and give over my body to hardship that I may boast, but do not have love, I gain nothing.
Love is patient, love is kind. It does not envy, it does not boast, it is not proud. It does not dishonor
others, it is not self-seeking, it is not easily angered, it keeps no record of wrongs. Love does not delight in evil but rejoices with the truth. It always protects, always trusts, always hopes, always
perseveres.
Love never fails. But where there are prophecies, they will cease; where there are tongues, they will be stilled; where there is knowledge, it will pass away. For we know in part and we prophesy in part, but when completeness comes, what is in part disappears. When I was a child, I talked like a child, I thought like a child, I reasoned like a child. When I became a man, I put the ways of childhood behind me. For now we see only a reflection as in a mirror; then we shall see face to face. Now I know in part; then I shall know fully, even as I am fully known.
And now these three remain: faith, hope and love. But the greatest of these is love.
This text stands as the functional definition of love. It stands in stark contrast our construct that golden calf we call love. Our common view of doesn't scratch real love's surface. Our construct for love is bereft of real love's content. So much so, that if real love were intellectual property of someone, that someone should file suit against the construct and insist that the name be changed to something more accurate, like say 'good feeling' or 'fickle in fatuous feeling' or 'momentary sugar high following a good meal'.
By accepting our construct we short change ourselves for what we were intended to have. I understand why we did it. The construct requires little of us. It is a malleable thing that we can fashion as best suits our mood. If our feelings change, we can refashion love to suit our feelings.
From a programming perspective, I am sure of what we've done. Someone for reasons of expediency, unreasonable managerial timelines, or pure mischief, went to the base class of love and gutted it. They left behind only what suited their immediate need, and pushed it into production. The change vastly simplified love and allowed extensibility of the code, so other programmers picked up the change and ran with it and used it ad nauseum.
Leaving us in the state we are in today. It is not unlike the issue that confronted those that managed the BASIC programming language two decades ago when they confronted the GOTO command. The command had been so overused, and so abused that it muddled code and made updating it, managing it, or upgrading it tedious, time consuming, and nearly impossible. They had to start to downplay and deprecate the command so that the language was clearer, and easier to manage. It was a painful transition for them, but they came out in a much better place.
We have to start doing the same thing. We have start unraveling the misused base class, and start removing each instance of the construct from our code. We have to start by restoring the original code and parameters of the base class. We to remove all the fake code we have inserted along the way to make the base class suit our selfish, and dare I say, evil desires. I understand it will render entire application programming interfaces, or APIs, useless and non-functional. I do believe that is a good thing.
Only in doing so will we begin to see love what it was intended to be. Only then will we see that love is not about feeling in and of itself. Only then will we see that love is first and foremost about commitment and sacrifice. Only then will we see that it is not and never will be a zero sum gain equation. Only then will we see that peace and tranquility in our domestic affairs is the direct result of a love that costs us everything that we are, and ever hope to be. Only then will we truly see ourselves as third in any domestic equation behind our creator, and our beloved.
Anything less is worthless tripe, salty that isn't salty, a lamp that doesn't give light, a compass that points to anything but north. Anything less is fake, phony, and fraudulent. Anything less is not worthy to be called by the moniker of LOVE!
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