Love and Fantasy

Two words that seem to work well with each other don’t you think? Well at least according to a comment I heard this week that joined them both: “Love is a fantasy. The only real thing about it is the pain of when it’s over.”

First thing I thought was “poor guy”, because you really can’t say that unless you’re in some sort of emotional pain. However, it’s still an intriguing statement that was at least real to the person saying it, which made me ask: IS Love a Fantasy?

Indulge me for a little bit.

The word ‘love’ in and of itself carries so many different variations just in its definition. When a person says the word, its as unique to them in its meaning as their own DNA, because different people mean different things when they express the word. Every nuance of context changes its colour with infinite possibilities being presented. The one common thread you could derive is that ‘love’ points to a certain kind of care or preference of a person.

Try it for yourself. Ask 3 people this question: “When you say ‘I love you’ what does it mean to you?”
You’ll probably end up with something similar if you just ask it simply, but if you were to ask those people to elaborate, the differences start to become more clear.

Want to make this conundrum even worse? Fine. Think of what that means when 2 people declare ‘love’ to each other. What one SAYS, and what the other HEARS could be totally different. It could go like this between person A and person B:
A: “I purple you”
B: “Oh my gosh! I orange you too!”
A+B: “We’re in green with each other!”

See?! It can change from person to person. So when you throw in the Fantasy aspect, and you start to see an interesting phenomenon, because a Fantasy is a reality that only exists in one’s mind and isn’t experienced by anyone else, unless it’s shared through written/spoken medium (or some futuristic device that takes what one imagines and places it on a screen for all to see, and such a device could spread around the world so that people could pay to watch other people’s fantasies playing out on a large screen in rooms capable of allowing many to see it at the same time!!! Hmmm….).

So maybe, because this idea of ‘love’ is so unique to each person, and only truly understood by that person… It could therefore be that Love is in fact a Fantasy!

However if the two people understand it to be the same thing, does that make it a reality?

Nope! In that case, it’s a shared Fantasy, because beyond those two, nobody else gets it quite the same.

BUT WAIT! There’s hope for the hopeless romantic. All this talk is just talk. Fact is, Love has impacted this plane of existence for so long it really must be real. Think of all the poems, stories, histories, creations… Heck, even CHILDREN that have been born as a result of Love. Where would you fit all of that? I’m sure it could be real.

Think of all the people YOU Love. Is it possible that all that is just ‘in your head’? I doubt it.

There’s a certain ideology I’m after with this post. One that I’m sure you’ve heard, or at least have been impacted by. One that declares all truth is relative, all of society is just made up of beliefs and thoughts, and not concrete inescapable realities.

I could have easily left my arguement halfway, concluding that Love is indeed a Fantasy. It would’ve been a brilliant discovery for myself and may have even ‘explained’ some things for those reading. Unfortunately, that’s how easy it is for a worldview to be established these days. As simple as an incomplete idea.

The world is full of incomplete ideas jostling for the title of “Complete”, or more aptly “Ultimate”. Love, in its kaleidoscopic forms and features is so great, it just escapes us everytime we try to grasp it. It causes decisions to be made that shape futures into realities. Yes, it may share the qualities of a Fantasy, but it certainly can’t be JUST a Fantasy.

Love MUST be real

Either that or a very well-distributed Fantasy.

Over.