In a world where hook-up culture is the new norm, and leaving your crush on read receipt is a way to say “I’m interested, but not too eager,” it’s hard to separate fitting in and staying true to yourself when it comes to dating.
I’ll just go ahead and say that hook-up culture is not for me.
There are a lot of reasons why this lifestyle is off-putting to me personally. Half are from experience, and half because I’m learning more about myself every moment I’m alive (and I am not judging anyone that participates in this lifestyle), but the main reasons are because I am a follower of Jesus Christ and I am an all around sensitive person. I grow what I feed to my heart and if it isn’t quality substance, it won’t sustain quality life.
When I think of love, I think of one of my favorite quotes by Eleanor Roosevelt: “It takes courage to love, but pain through love is the purifying fire which those who love generously know. We all know people who are so much afraid of pain that they shut themselves up like clams in a shell and, giving out nothing, receive nothing and therefore shrink until life is a mere living death.”
Love is a painful, beautiful, heartbreaking, heart wrenching, stunning phenomena of a feeling. Biblically, love must be sincere, deep, and is the greatest of all hopes. King Solomon loved his bride in potentially one of the greatest love stories the world has ever read (Song of Songs or Song of Solomon). Because of the love that I have felt, received, read about, written about, and given in my past, I want nothing short of amazing.
Not only is it what I want, it’s what I, and frankly anyone with a pulse, deserves. We were created to live out a purpose greater than ourselves. We were created to give and receive a love so deep that even the hearts that are most in love can’t fully comprehend it.
To hook-up, to give a small portion of yourself to one or many people, to continue to weigh the difference between what you know and you deserve, to how much you’re worth versus what you’re getting, is exhausting.
Much like ripping off duct tape from a surface and experiencing the adhesive component become weaker, we abuse the power of love in that same way. I certainly know that I have, but I made the choice to hold myself accountable for the way I not only treat others, but the way I treat myself.
We have heard time and time again that we accept the love we think we deserve, but we should know that we deserve more.
Image Sources:
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