I Think I Love You 5r5e4

I THINK I LOVE YOU…

…but I’m not sure

JESSICA DEKOEKKOEK

Copyright © 2014 Jessica Dekoekkoek.

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ISBN: 978-1-4808-0811-9 (sc) ISBN: 978-1-4808-0812-6 (e)

Archway Publishing rev. date: 6/2/2014

Contents

Foreword

Part One: Never Stop Moving Quiet. Calm. Soul Reflection. Vibrant Bold Connection

Part Two: Candid Candor Freedom to Breathe A complementing energy Noise cancelling No disguise Lonely Challenge Matched Baggage

Strength Its own timing Compromise

FOREWORD

DO YOU KNOW WHAT LOVE IS?

What is love? To answer that question, Haddaway would say “Baby, don’t hurt me”. And I am tempted to agree with him. Some people wear their heart on their sleeve. I like to think I wear mine underneath my sleeve. The sleeve of a very thick sweater, which is buried underneath a jacket. Imagine: parka. The stuffy kind where you can’t really move your arms. It’s just easier that way. When something happens unexpectedly, I think that the feeling associated with the unexpected, whether it’s good or bad, is much stronger than any other feeling. There is an instant tie that is imprinted in your mind. And no matter what happens, you go back to that original blueprint. Of how you felt when you were hit with the unexpected. If you bundle up, in said parka, you don’t have to worry about that blueprint… because one is unable to reach it. So if you ask me if I know what love is, my answer to your question, naturally, would be:

A four letter word.

Because of three things:

1. I have no clue 2. I know of zero universal definitions 3. Do I really want to know?

Part One: Never Stop Moving

I’m the kind of person who tends to keep my thoughts to myself. But in my mind, my thoughts roam free and wild. To think too much or too long about something is dangerous. For me. The thoughts tend to take on a life of their own. There is always noise. Writing this to you is making it quiet…but there is always noise.

Everything in sequence. Thoughts flash by like a moving train. Always noise. Always moving. It never stops.

So what does it mean when you meet someone who makes the noise disappear?

Love is…

Quiet.

Calm.

Soul Reflection.

When you ask me if I know what love is, I have to be honest and tell you that I don’t know.

Do you?

A lot of the time I think that love is nothing. It is fabricated.

We have put a tremendous value on a word and have imposed meaning without thought. Love is anger. Love is hurt. We fight for love and in the name of love. We stick with those we love, unconditionally.

I once read that ‘love means never having to say you’re sorry.’

Negative.

Love means having to say you’re sorry all the time. We’re human. And it is much easier to take out our frustrations on those who are closest to us. We use love to ask for forgiveness. We use love as a justification to forgive the very acts that we ourselves would find unforgivable in another’s world.

We put a price on love. Objects have become a symbol of love. Love has become synonymous with the heart. That is where we are taught to feel love.

I say you feel love in your brain, your stomach, your eyes and your feet. You

know love when your heart and brain are always fighting. You know love because your eyes make you feel it in your stomach; Nervous butterflies dancing to a rhythm that your body can’t keep up with. Your feet tell you about love when your steps don’t feel heavy.

Love is…

Vibrant

Bold

Connection

Part Two: Candid Candor

The meaning of love, as it has been written for us, gives the illusion that it is everything. Once found, it will be the answer to your emptiness; or will keep you from your loneliness. It will complete you.

Some people spend their lives searching for love. Others spend their lives holding on to what they think is love for fear of being without.

We spend time trying to find it.

To be in it.

To be a part of it.

So much so that for some, it becomes you. The hunger for a love of your own starts to consume the very core of who you are.

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My biggest fear is to lose myself in love. With another person. That seems dangerous. This is something I consider a threat.

One day something happened that took off the parka. That rolled up the sleeve. That exposed the heart that had been buried underneath.

Without warning. Without seeing ‘a light’.

Unexpected.

There were no fireworks. No roses. No applause.

Just one moment.

Where all the cells in my body. Neurotransmitters in my brain. Fired. Together. Kind of like a jumping jack. For that moment I felt peace.

No inhibitions. No judgment. I could be me for a while, with another person.

Love is…

Freedom to Breathe

A complementing energy

Noise cancelling

No disguise

Being in love can be beautiful. And if that love is reciprocated by the other, you are lucky in love. If it’s not, then love can mean the very thing it promises to cure: feeling alone.

Love is…

Lonely

Challenge

And that is the very problem I find with your question. There are not enough words to describe all that accompanies feeling love. We all feel love. Differently.

We all see love.

Ask for love.

Act love.

Act on love…differently.

Every individual creates their own blueprint, of what they know love to be. And every so often, two individuals create a blueprint match.

Love is…

Matched Baggage

Strength

Its own timing

Compromise

In all of my naiveté, I say love is Taco Tuesday. Or sharing your favorite candy. Or sitting in silence together.

Love is the little things. Love is kid stuff. Because as soon as we get older, we make it complicated. We make it what we think it should be, instead of what it is. So when you ask me, ‘Do you know what love is?’ My answer still is, and always will be:

A four letter word.

That you can sculpt, mold and assign meaning to. Because I have no answer for you. I only have an answer for what I think it has been, should be, and more importantly, what I would like it to be.