Love - pt. 1

What is love?

This is a question that many philosophers, scientists, psychologists and people in general throughout history have struggled to answer. The answers that have surfaced have only led us to even more questions. The truth is, defining love is an extremely hard thing to do.

Psychologist Robert Sternberg developed a theory, called the Triangular Theory of Love, in which love can be classified into three different types:

• Intimacy - the feeling of closeness, connectedness and bonding
• Passion - romance, physical attraction, and sexual consummation
• Commitment - pretty self-explanatory; the drive to stick together for an extended period of time (most of the time being the rest of your life)

Now, according to Sternberg, any combination (including each one of them by themselves) of these results in different types of 'love'; e.g. a combination of intimacy and commitment makes up the love that best friends have for each other, infatuated love comes from a love that is full of passion and a combination of all three make up a consummate love; the 'perfect' love.

Many theologians and pastors have also come up with a similar theory explaining love. This past weekend, the pastor of Lifepoint Church, Jeff Kapusta, talked about this. Coming from the terms that the ancient Greeks used to describe love, it is also composed of three different types:

• Eros - the passionate and intimate love; the erotic love.
• Phileo (or Philia) - the brotherly, companionate love; the BFF love.
• Agape - the unconditional and selfless love; the Crazy Love.

Eros and Phileo love tend to be the easiest to achieve and show. They are embedded into our human nature and are the most common in our lives, thus explaining why we can show these with such ease. Agape love is a whole 'nother story.

In short, Agape love is a love that lacks any condition or requirement and is completely altruistic; an unconditional and selfless love. The best everyday example of this can be seen in the love that a parent feels for their child; they will always love and be there for their child, no matter what their kid does. Yet, still, this is not true for everyone, since many people view their father or mother as someone who they would just rather forget.

The average person might view this love as nonsensical, irrational and crazy and they have a point; who in their right mind would care enough about someone else without there being the incentive of receiving something back in return. After all, we all have selfish desires and it would make sense to do something for someone expecting something in return (money, attention, recognition, fame, love, etc.). Yet this Love, this Crazy and nonsensical Love, is the very essence of what true Life is.

This Love tells the story of a Father. A Father who unconditionally loved his only Son. A Father who considered his Son the apple of His eye, the Light of His world, His everything. Yet this Father was able to enact the ultimate sacrifice. He selflessly gave up his beloved Son in order to save a people who were suffering due to their own harmful tendencies. He did what no parent in their right mind would ever do: let his Son die so that others would be spared. This irrational Love proved to be the most powerful form of love that humanity has ever seen. This was indeed a Crazy Love.

This Crazy Love comes from a Father that selflessly loves each and every single one of His children. A Love that reaches those who know Him and those who don't know him yet.

A Crazy Love that God pours out onto His people every second of every minute of every hour of every day. A Love that we can barely even begin to fathom. A Love that is Life itself.

So, how in the world, as mere humans, are we to handle this Crazy Love?

Is this what love is?

Coterie Confinement

Cliques are everywhere. They are an inevitable part of human nature. We are wired to be attracted to those who share similar interests, beliefs and thought processes. We want to accepted by a group of peers who will view us as equal.

Yet, many times, this makes us fall victim to many vices like prejudice and judgmental attitudes towards those who are not in our in-group. It can create scenarios for belligerent situations. Prejudice and shunning of other groups or individuals (whatever type it may be) are also bound to happen at times, the degree of it varying depending on the situation.

Sadly, this results in people getting their feelings hurt, avoidable violence, and even missed opportunities to get to know someone who could become one of your best friends. Our behavior is dictated by the ones around us. Whether we shape ourselves to blend in with the crowd or we try our best to the one that goes against the flow, it's all due to what we assume people expect out of us (or what we want people to expect out of us). We confine ourselves between the walls of our coterie, our own little exclusive club of friends. This makes us fall victim to the stereotype threat and, at times, the bystander effect.

Now don't get me wrong, I'm not saying that having friends is bad and I know that being in a "group" is pretty much unavoidable, yet we must look past that. We mustn't enclose ourselves to only hanging out with a certain 'group'. Instead, we must look past the sociocultural expectations of the people around us and break that mold of uncomfortable awkwardness that surrounds being outside one's zone of comfort. We must look past our veil ignorance and start to show respect and love to others that may need it. We can still have our 'group' of friends and take part in activities with others that may share OTHER similar interests that we may have but that aren't as talked about in the other group.

The point in this is that you shouldn't imprison yourself within the boundaries of your own little 'group', 'family', 'denomination' or whatever you may want to call it. We shouldn't shun people who want to join in and partake in the activities we tend to do with our group of friends. Instead, we should by the ones to reach out and lend a hand, even if it's just smiling at someone who's walking past you in the hallway, because in truth, love wins.

Paparazzi

Today was a great day.

For anyone who read my last blog entry, this one won't be as long so don't worry because I'm making it reader-friendly. Anyways, today was actually a bit cooler than other days (and not temperature wise, even though it was actually pleasurable weather for a cloudy day).

I ended up falling asleep at 3:30 am last night due to trying to get a cool-looking template up on here, in which I succeeded. I woke up at 9 and my eyes were killing me. Due to my allergies, my eyes discharge this yellowish snot-like things and when I don't get them off, they crust. I ended up having a very crusty left eye (my right eye was fine). I couldn't even open it so I went and hopped in the shower and stood with my face to the shower-head at full blast. It felt good. It felt so good that I actually fell asleep in the shower. I awoke and realized that I had spent way too much time just standing there so I did the typical shower stuff and quickly hopped out. When I came back to my room, I saw that I had taken a 35 minute shower. Oops. I saw that my phone had the weekly Hump Day text from Jesse but I was too busy to end up responding to the joke he had asked a question to. I ended up shoving a poptart into my mouth and washing it down with some OJ then quickly brushing my teeth and busting out of Cornerstone. Luckily I made it on time to my math class, which was the only class that I had to go to today due to one of my professors canceling class because he was celebrating the end of Passover and I simply didn't go to my social psych class.

The day went by as usual that is until I get a text from Dylan saying that Hilary Duff (aka Lizzie) was on campus shooting a movie. Come to think about it, I did see a ton of cables laying around on the grass in front of the building that my math class was in. I decided to ride my bike to Morton and take a look. I noticed that there was a film crew and a ton of equipment but I did not see any one famous, all I saw was that a ton of people were walking through the columns between Leutze and Morton and that a couple of people were shouting 'KEEP WALKING!!'.

I had to get off my bike and walk it through between the columns because I didn't know what was going on. I stumbled to get through until I walked past a blonde girl with a blue dress with flowers on it. It was Lizzie.

Now, don't get me wrong, I am not some crazed Hilary Duff fan but I thought that was neat. I'm not one to drool over celebrities (after all, they are just people) but this was cool since I remember watching her show (yes I'll admit it, I watched Lizzie McGuire).

As I walked past her, the people that were screaming order told everyone to move away because they were done filming that scene with people walking around. I stuck around because I was curious to see how the filming of a movie was done. It was pretty cool but nothing too big. I saw that Daniel Cuthbertson was there, so I went to say hey to him. He was trying to figure out how to zoom in on his phone so that he could take a picture. I remembered that I still had my camera in my bookbag as he was saying that. I took it out and tried to zoom in but sadly this was all I ended up taking a picture of:

Daniel got the idea of walking through Leutze and stepping out the sidedoor to try to see if we could get closer. We went in and it worked haha. So, now there I was 30 feet away from this famous blonde girl who I really couldn't care much for (all I really wanted to do was shout "LIZZIE!!!"). I ended up whipping my camera out and snapping a couple of shots for the people who kept on texting me to take a picture for them. It was a bit cool because I felt like I was a paparazzi (even though those people are the scum of the earth in the entertainment world). I didn't really feel bad that I was one amongst the 30 other people taking pictures of the actors because I thought, 'hey, they are used to it, right?'. The filming came to an end after the little boy actor wouldn't act the scene right, and when the director said it's over, it was over. The stuff was torn down within five minutes but I did manage to get one more picture of Lizzie:

After the Lizzie event, I went back to my dorm to take a nice long nap. After waking up from my nap (with crusty eyes again) I went to eat dinner and it was pretty standard. It is always fun to go eat with my friends because they really do make my life much more enjoyable. After dinner, I chilled in my room for about an hour and a half. I sat in my desk chair for a bit and realized that today had been a pretty tight day (and it wasn't because Lizzie had come to visit). I realized that the weather today was not the best one in the world, yet God can make a clammy and cloudy day seem as beautiful as a sunny day with a high of 75. I thank Him for such hidden beauty that is indescribable at times.

After a while, Fletch picked me up and we went to David's apartment to watch Lost. The episode was interesting but I have seen better ones. It was one of those where you can get distracted half-way into it and still come back and know what's going on. This was the highlight of my day because I came to realize that the friend I have made here at UNCW are amazing. At the beginning of the school year, I prayed to find a close group of friends, like I have back at home, and I knew that it was going to take time and effort from my part but also I had to trust that God was going to put people in my path. It has taken a while but tonight I had an epiphany. I realized that the group of people whom I call my friends were truly capable of holding said title. I am specially grateful for the group of guys that I have met down here (this is not to say that I am trying to downplay the girlies, so don't take it that way, you girlies are the best and you know who you are!). I know that bonds of friendship and brotherhood take time and shared experiences but I know I can count on these guys. I praise God for finally opening my eyes to what He had placed in front of me for the longest time but I was just so blind to see it. I'm really going to miss these people over summer break. All in all, today was one of the better days that I have seen in a while.

Okay so maybe I lied about making this blog entry reader-friendly, but hey, I love writing. I really wanted to major in Journalism but Psychology just clicked better with me. I really miss the days of publishing the beloved Rampant Lines but I am truly happy with my psych powers. They allow me to do crazy stuff like telepathy, force powers and VIP access to Narnia.

Just ask this cat:

Today was a great day.

Back to the Future

"Go back... to the... beginning..."

These words randomly pop in and out of my head at least once a year. Yeah, I know it's random but it's been like that since I was in 5th grade. If you are wondering where those words come out of... well... it's not some deep philosophical thinker or a book quote. It's a quote from the Digimon movie. Haha, yes, I started out a blog with a Digimon quote, and no I do not like Digimon (Pokemon FTW!) but that quote has stuck with me ever since. Well, I found it fitting since this will be my re-entry into the blogging world since 4 & 1/2 years ago.

A little background info: I started blogging back in 7th grade, during the times of endless AIM conversations and awkward middle school dances. A time before Facebook, MySpace and Blogger. Being the tech whiz that I was (and still am), I had decided that I wanted to learn

how to play around with HTML and other things. I found out that websites like Xanga, LiveJournal and random online forums would let me do so. After a while, I decided to start blogging as a way to keep the happenings in my life in some sort of concrete format. Long story short, I used Xanga (and sometimes LiveJournal) up until my 10th grade year to blog but my computer got hacked and all my journal entries were deleted. I meddled a little bit with the blog-like Facebook feature 'Notes' but it quickly ended up dying off.

Now, onto the real blog.

In the theme of looking at blogging stuff in retrospect, I thought it would be fitting to write about the past week or so.

Hmm, let's see: during the beginning of last week I ended up giving into buying the new version of the Nintendo DS, the Nintendo DSi. If you know me, you know that I'm a compulsive shopper when it comes to electronics, even though I wasn't waiting for it to come out like I have to past things (iPhone 3G, Wii). Let me tell you, this thing is pretty cool; apart from being a portable gaming device, it has two built-in cameras and a mic, an online store, a web browser and a cool little sound editing application. Sounds cool except my iPhone can already do all that stuff and more. Anyways, I've been playing around with it for quite a whi

le and I really like it. One little bummer is that Nintendo got rid of the GBA cartridge slot on it (but I'm guessing it's because they will end up selling old GameBoy games in the DSi store).

The rest of that week went by pretty quickly. I spent Monday and Tuesday doing the usual Monday and Tuesday things, took a math test on Wednesday that I feel complacent about, and ended up going home for Easter.

Once I got home, Daniel and I went to see if the asian could come out to play. Sadly, he had to write two essays before the end of the night. I dropped Dan off at his casa and went home to spend some time with my mom and Abue. I decided that I was going to stay in for the rest of the day/night since I was a bit tired from staying up late the night before studying. Thursday, I went to Josh's (the asian) house and picked him up and brought him back to mi casa so that we could spent some quality gaming hours together. Once nighttime hit, I called around a couple of friends but no one seemed to be in town yet so Josh and I kept our gaming marathon running until 4 am.

We woke up Friday at 1:30 pm and Abue (my grandmother) greeted us with a delicious brunch. The rest of Friday is history for it consisted of visiting old friends and the sort. Saturday, I spent most of the day in my house until Josh came over and we watched a movie. As the movie ended, I got a call from Keith and it wasn't one that I wanted to hear.

He called to tell me that Carlyn's dad had just died of a heart attack. That familiar somber and gloomy mood overcame my mind. I decided to find out a little bit more of what had happened by calling Keith's mom and asking her the specs. She said that earlier on Saturday, Mr. Wynne had fainted and shortly after was taken to the hospital where he passed away about 30 minutes before Keith called me. I hate the feeling of bereavement, especially when others around me feel it worse than I do. I cannot believe how Carlyn, Mrs. Wynne and their family felt like when they heard that Mr. Wynne was gone. Thoughts that hadn't surfaced in a while came back up... this reminded me a lot of when Matt died. The irony of it was that it was the 3 & 1/2 year anniversary of Matt's death, which was a bit eerie. I felt that the only thing I could do at the time that would be helpful was to keep the Wynne's in constant prayer. Mr. Wynne was an awesome man, I really enjoyed it when he greeted me randomly, whether it was at church, someone's house, or Target (somehow I would see him there a lot). It's tough to realize that our lives are just like specs of dust in the wind, one minute here and the next one gone. I know that what I'm about to say is cheesy and clichè but please keep the Wynne family in your thoughts and pray for strength, especially for Mrs. Wynne and her children Carlyn, her sister and her brother.

With a lack of a better transition,the rest of the break was enjoyable. Easter sunday was amazing and I was ready to head back to Wilmy because I truly did miss my Wilmy peeps. I lazily spent Sunday afternoon unpacking my junk, wagging it and then going to "study" with some peeps. Let's just say that studying was not one of the things in my agenda. Monday came and it was bearable since I still did not touch any studying materials. I ended up getting

a modchip for my DSi in the mail that I had ordered last week. It is amazing, it lets me write programs for it and also let's me put homebrew applications and games that other developers have made. Monday night means Heroes and it was actually very decent and intriguing. That series has come a long way from being addicting to absolutely preposterous back to "I know it's not as good as it used to be but, hey, it's actually getting good again."

Today, I went to bio, did not pay attention at all (like always). After bio, I noticed that it was really cloudy but it wasn't raining. I was a bit bummed since I was hoping for rain because my PE class gets cancelled when it rains (since it's an outdoor class) yet it was just clouds. As I'm making my way from Dobo to the track field, I get hit by random little droplets of water yet it wasn't enough for the class to get cancelled. As I chained my bike up to the bike rails at the track field, the random droplets let out for about a minute. Then it was as if a gallon of water had been poured on my head. Raindrops fell onto the pavement like spilled cereal. It

was rough. In the end, I ended up having to bike all the way across campus in the pouring rain. The rest of my Tuesday was fine and dandy until I was leaving Cornerstone to go to dinner. As I'm walking out, a huge cloud of pollen hits me in the face. My allergies are still partying in my nose and eyes as I'm writing this. Pollen is not my friend and I detest it. Maybe one day I will develop an immunity to it if I hang around it for long enough.

Well, this blog entry was a pretty big and hefty one but, hey, I gotta get used to doing these things again. I know I left out a lot of stuff but I did it on purpose since it was already getting overwhelmingly large and it's also almost 2 am. My insomnia has resurged and I'm pretty sure I won't be able to help it go back to normal until the end of the school. Of course, by then it really won't matter that much.

I leave you with a picture for your thoughts: