Liking and Loving

The other day I was talking to a friend, and I told her “I like you.” She responded that she loved me, and then I said that I loved her too, all of which was true, but the reason that I started off with liking her is that for me that is the bigger compliment.

I try to love everyone. I don’t always succeed, but my end goal is to have Christ-like love for everyone. I love many people that I don’t like. If I like you, I do love you too, but the point is that I also enjoy spending time with you.

It’s not completely unrelated. If I like you, it is easier to love you, because there isn’t anything getting in the way. It’s amazing how difficult it is to feel love when you are constantly irritated. At the same time, as I love you, it becomes easier to like you. Having a vested interest in you makes it easier to spot your good qualities, and excuse your flaws, and find you enjoyable.

I won’t deny that my loving you gets you farther. If you need help, it is love that makes me do it, but I will help the annoying ones too, if I can—it’s just not as gratifying. I guess my point is that I love you because of whom I am (or am trying to be), but if I like you it is because of you.

I do have a long way to go. First of all, there is the question of boundaries. If I love you, I want what is best for you, but that may not mean giving you money, or not calling the police on you, depending on the circumstances. It may even mean that if spending time with you would be bad for me, even if it might be good for you. I get that, but somehow maintaining love for people who do bad things can be difficult.

That is still not my biggest problem. The worst is loving those who annoy. My personal kryptonite is stupidity, especially combined with neediness. Since a persistent focus on getting others to pay attention to you interferes with your ability to accurately perceive the feelings of those around you, or pretty much anything anchored in reality, stupidity accompanies neediness more often than not.

At times I have justified my preference for other types of people in that those who are constantly seeking attention will probably get it, but it won’t be enough, and also, people who are not like that still need occasional support and encouragement, and you can make more of a difference there. The logic is sound, but my real motivation is probably just a desire to not be anywhere near the stupid.

Naturally, this is bad of me. At the same time, I believe that as I keep going, I will improve, and that it will get easier—I will find another level of love.

In some ways I have already seen growth. One interesting thing about Facebook is how greatly it exceeds the number of people you can be aware of, and care about. I have often found myself praying for multiple people in my personal prayers based on their statuses. It’s not that I wouldn’t want to know what was going on, and help, but before Facebook it was impossible to know what was happening with whom on that scale.

On a smaller level, I see it in our family prayers. Some time ago my sisters and I decided to start praying for a few people. We started with three guys in the ward whom we felt were fairly marriageable—no big issues stopping them—but maybe just needed a little push to move forward. (I know it sounds weird. We want to get out of the singles ward, but we know we are still needed there, so we are trying to pray other people out to the point where we are not needed anymore.)

Some months later, we are usually praying for about thirteen people, plus this family, plus other individuals who may have specific temporary things going on. No one has complained about the prayers getting too long, or the slowness of the process. In addition, sure, praying does not feel like much, but sometimes it is all you can do, and then sometimes we get ideas about other things we can do, and opportunities come up. As we open our hearts, they expand. (And two of the original three guys have serious girlfriends now too, so we feel good about that.)

I may have some hope in the stupid area too. One person I have a lot of difficulty with is my older sister, who is so focused on getting attention that there is nothing else to her. I used to be able to talk to her about this, and she would agree with me, but nothing would change. Now we can’t even have the conversations. I prayed for her to get better, but nothing was happening there. I tried feeling differently, and nothing happened there. Finally I decided all I could do was try and act nicer to her, so my behavior was at least more correct, even if nothing else was.

I made a point of exchanging a few responses with her each night, acknowledging what she was saying. She enjoyed it, and both Mom and Julie mentioned how I seemed to be getting along better with her. They thought I was feeling better about her, which I was not, so it was not everything I had been hoping for, but it was a small improvement, and maybe that was enough.

I say “was” because there was a big setback. She got mad at Mom about something, so didn’t come around for a while, and we got used to the peace. Then she came back and started trying to make up for lost time, talking twice as much and twice as pointlessly. I have had a hard time trying again, but I will have to, because she is family and I do love her, even if I do not enjoy her.

I know, we haven’t even touched on romantic love yet, and it is the right time of year for it, but I think it will kind of be the same. I suppose that will be more similar to liking, but more exciting. In terms of being kind and faithful and honest with someone, again, I will do that because of who I am—loving him will just make it more of a joy.

So that’s where I’m at—still perpetually single, but there is a lot of love in my life, and I am still working on improving the love that I give. I feel like I love pretty well now, but I intend to love brilliantly.