To be longing for fulfillment, or to belong? That is the question.
Human relationships are fulfilled when we belong to one another. When we know we have each other, when the relationship itself is the solid ground we can stand on, we find home in one another and are fulfilled in our love.
To be loved is to belong to someone. Sounds simple, but to fully experience being loved, and to really belong, we need to be given. We cannot have each other if we don’t give ourselves to each other. We cannot be had if we remain withheld, undisclosed, unconfessed, unknown in our depths. To love is to give oneself, to offer the other the very things that make us vulnerable, that are most real to us, without self-protection. When we let go of fear and do just that, we can be received, held, seen, known and truly understood.
To give oneself freely is a profound act, because to give oneself is to jump. It is to trust that you are loved, and that the other person will catch you. Will they? It’s a risk, but without taking it, we remain ungiven. And when we remain ungiven, we remain unfulfilled.
Love must be given freely for it to be love. People can get possessive in their desire for the other, but that’s just grasping at straws. Grasping is an expression of insecurity about being loved and in fact undermines the very relationship it’s trying to secure. Being possessive is a selfish attempt at getting what we want, trying to “have” what would fulfill us. It is not having. Really having is when someone gives themselves freely, without coercion, manipulation, or selfish demands. It’s a gift born out of the free will to love.
Only when the other gives their love freely are we truly loved. Just as we are truly loving only if we freely give ourselves. It’s a paradox of love that we can only have it if we give it, with no strings attached, trusting in the other’s commitment to be there. We were made to trust this way, and to fulfill the trust placed in us by the other.
To belong is to make one’s home in the other person. It’s a commitment to be given, to not withhold our inner feelings, our inner thoughts, our inmost movements of the heart. To love is to live within the space of intimate connection with the other. This is home.