This Is The Reason Why Love Isn't Enough

I have heard this ‘love isn’t enough” soooooo many times in my life and I honestly never really understood why people said it. Like, aren’t we supposed to marry for love. And umm, isn’t it true that love conquers all? I mean, did anyone read 1st Corinthians 13:1 -13 with famous “love” scripture? For most of my adult life, I have been utterly confused about why love isn’t enough. That is, until I got married (insert girl with her hand on her forehead emoji) LOL. Yup, once I got married and started to realize all that it takes for a commitment to… well… actually BE a commitment, I finally got why love just isn’t enough to keep people together. And since it took me until I was in my late 30’s, I figured I would share with you the reasons why love isn’t enough. So, here it goes.

First of all, love is a choice. It is something that you decide to do. Because love is a thing that you actually DO, that means it’s a verb. An action.

Many people believe that love is a feeling or an emotion. And, in my opinion, that’s why so many people believe they are “in'' love when they have a very strong emotional connection or euphoric sexual chemistry with someone, because they FEEL a very strong pull to the person. Truth be told, a lot of times, those emotional connections and sexual chemistry are not a result of love. Most of you are probably thinking I am going to say they are because of lust, but I’m not. Those strong connections are more than likely areas of both people’s lives that they are attempting to fill voids in and areas of their lives that need to be healed. Remember, relationships are mirrors, so you attract and are attracted to people whose energy matches the energy that you are radiating. That energy match can create some VERY powerful emotions and sometimes create bonds of co-dependency. So, it will feel like love. It may feel like a soul mate. You may feel a powerful connection. And oftentimes, it’s hard to break. When people experience this, they think it’s love that they feel, so they choose to keep trying (or forcing) the relationship to work. (btw, if you feel you are stuck in this type of relationship and you need help, contact me here).

I explained all of that in the previous paragraph because I wanted to clear up a misconception about love so that when I explain why love isn’t enough, you aren’t thinking that I’m talking about the above “love”. Because that is not the kind of love that I am saying is “not enough”.

Here’s what I’ve learned about love. As mentioned previously, love is a choice. It is something that you decide to do everyday. Deciding to love is the action of making the decision to nourish, care for, prioritize, communicate, demonstrate, provide for, cater to, consider, honor, serve, satisfy, uplift, support, inspire, encourage, and (I mean, I could keep going but I think you get the point) EVERY SINGLE DAY. Literally, every day, every hour, every minute, and every second you make the decision to love. If you don’t understand that, it's ok, I’ll give you a quick example of what I mean. - Every second of every day you can choose to do something that does not honor loving the person you are with. If I am at the supermarket, and a handsome man walks up to me and asks for my number, I can choose to love my husband and honor my marriage or I can choose to give that man my number and open the door to cheating. At that moment, I am deciding to walk away from temptation, thus choosing to love my husband. This is why I say love is a decision that you make every second of every day. You are faced with decisions every second, and love is deciding to honor your partner and do what is best for the union in every decision, no matter how big, small, or insignificant you think it may be.

Now, let’s get to why love isn’t enough.

Choosing love everyday is done by taking actions and making decisions that are in alignment with loving, honoring, cherishing, and respecting your wife or husband (or girlfriend or boyfriend), and it requires certain qualities and characteristics within a person to achieve this. If a person does not have these qualities or characteristics, all is not lost. People can learn these qualities and characteristics if they truly want to be with their partner and they are determined to have a successful relationship. Anyone who doesn’t want to or makes excuses why they can’t learn the qualities and characteristics for the success of a relationship is not someone who is choosing to love you. Period. Truth of the matter is, most of us do not come to the table equipped with all of the qualities and characteristics that it takes to choose love everyday. Most people have to learn them. I know I did!!! LOL. So, what IS the quality or characteristic that you need in order to be equipped to choose love everyday? Well, there’s quite a few and they may differ a little from one relationship to the next because every relationship is different. But, these are the ones I find that work best for my marriage and the marriages of people closest to me.

Patience.

The ability to communicate effectively or the openness to learning how to do so.

Vulnerability.

Honesty.

Enough humility to accept that you are not perfect and you have to change and grow too.

Communication (did I say that already?)

Compassion.

The ability to prioritize your partner above all.

Teamwork.

Compromise.

Willingness to work on yourself and deal with some of your toxic behaviors or beliefs.

Communication. (Yup, it’s theeeeeeee most important so I’m saying it again, lol)

Commitment.

Willingness to put forth effort.

Like I said, people are going to want other things to be on this list because, you know, different strokes for different folks. To me, these are great starter foundational qualities. So, as you can see, you need more than just love because you need the above to be able to make the decision TO love.

I hope that made sense.

This wasn’t an easy blog to write. LOL

The bottom line is - love has 9,678,765,335,000 different meanings because every person in the world gives and receives love in a different way. And that makes love a completely individual experience for every couple. So, you have to communicate with your partner so that the two of you can learn each other's love languages, needs, boundaries and create the qualities, characteristics, experiences, and life that make you both happy and fulfilled. You don’t get into relationships, you attract a person who is equipped to work with you as your teammate to develop the characteristics that you both need to choose to love each other everyday. In other words, love and relationships are built. One brick at a time. And love isn’t enough for this journey. You need more than that. So, toughen up buttercup, and work with your partner so both of you have the emotional maturity and emotional strength to build a relationship in which you both have what it takes to choose to love one another everyday. Trust me, you’ll need it.

Love ya Queen!

Breezy Phoenix