Is there such a thing as true love anymore?

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Hi Everybody, well is there true love? I've been here just pondering, and thought I'd ask. Gale

― Gale Deslongchamps, Sunday, 25 November 2001 01:00 (twenty-four years ago)

hi gale! no. jess.

― jess, Sunday, 25 November 2001 01:00 (twenty-four years ago)

Yes there is.

― DG, Sunday, 25 November 2001 01:00 (twenty-four years ago)

Everyone has their own truth, and true love exists for me.

I have a feeling other folks here may say otherwise...

― Nicole, Sunday, 25 November 2001 01:00 (twenty-four years ago)

no. or i don't know. and i don't care. too much bother over it. there's temporary close love at least.

― Maria, Sunday, 25 November 2001 01:00 (twenty-four years ago)

define : true love

― Mike Hanle y, Sunday, 25 November 2001 01:00 (twenty-four years ago)

Real and not shallow, where you can take each other as you are, without frills or trappings? I guess just for each other? Another way to look at it is if you look into someones eyes and just to realize that you belong together? Like inside like you have always been together? True love!

― Gale Deslongchamps, Sunday, 25 November 2001 01:00 (twenty-four years ago)

Oh, true love very much exists. Currently I am without, but that doesn't mean it's not there. :-)

― Ned Raggett, Sunday, 25 November 2001 01:00 (twenty-four years ago)

dg - jess - true love FITE

um, true love, i guess if trrue love exists, flase love exists as well, and if that's the case, i'd rather be without bth

― geoff, Sunday, 25 November 2001 01:00 (twenty-four years ago)

Hi Ned, It will happen for you! :) Gale

― Gale Deslongchamps, Sunday, 25 November 2001 01:00 (twenty-four years ago)

It's happened before, Gale. I am a patient person.

― Ned Raggett, Sunday, 25 November 2001 01:00 (twenty-four years ago)

I don't even want to consider the possibility. I've given up trying to decide if there is or isn't. Now I live for the moment maaaannnn.

― Ronan, Sunday, 25 November 2001 01:00 (twenty-four years ago)

Hi Ronin :) You are all young and have years ahead of you. As for me,God only knows but I'm optomistic and I do believe there is the perfect mate for each one of us. :) Gale

― Gale Deslongchamps, Sunday, 25 November 2001 01:00 (twenty-four years ago)

No. Next question?

― kate, Sunday, 25 November 2001 01:00 (twenty-four years ago)

Hi Kate, You sound pretty bitter, what has happened in your life to feel so down? Gale.

― Gale Deslongchamps, Sunday, 25 November 2001 01:00 (twenty-four years ago)

The Poster Who Asked Kate the Saint Why She Was Angry

― H. M. Bateman, Sunday, 25 November 2001 01:00 (twenty-four years ago)

true love = myth create d by Hallmark Inc.

― turner, Sunday, 25 November 2001 01:00 (twenty-four years ago)

Better not to question it. Demystification is cold and harsh. Just let it happen.

― helen fordsdale, Sunday, 25 November 2001 01:00 (twenty-four years ago)

It is properly pronounced "twoo wuv!"

― 1 1 2 3 5, Sunday, 25 November 2001 01:00 (twenty-four years ago)

Yes. No one belives in it til they get stuck with that shit though.

― Ally, Sunday, 25 November 2001 01:00 (twenty-four years ago)

Love exists. Qualifying it with true is rather unneccessary - it's useful for Hollywood, and for insecure people to feel better about their relationships, though.

― Tom, Monday, 26 November 2001 01:00 (twenty-four years ago)

Yes it does. Just b/c you find it though doesn't mean you'll have it forever. doesn't matter how much love you share with someone relationshps require work and a lot of self-examination. That said, lord yes it does exist.

― Samantha, Monday, 26 November 2001 01:00 (twenty-four years ago)

No, next question.

― Pete, Monday, 26 November 2001 01:00 (twenty-four years ago)

rather than FITE let's have CORT CASE. PRE-senting the case for the prosecution/defence of the non-existence of true wuv...

― Alan Trewartha, Monday, 26 November 2001 01:00 (twenty-four years ago)

Not in the parameters discussed. Next question.

― Ally C, Monday, 26 November 2001 01:00 (twenty-four years ago)

Hi Ally C, :) Please elaborate on your response. Gale

― Gale Deslongchamps, Monday, 26 November 2001 01:00 (twenty-four years ago)

One odd thing re. this thread - why do all the nay-sayers feel the need so briskly to add "Next question"?

― the pinefox, Tuesday, 27 November 2001 01:00 (twenty-four years ago)

I do most emphatically believe in love, before you all discount me as some sort of Scrooge. But love is something which takes time to grow, it takes time to develop, and in a serious long-term relationship, you have to work hard to maintain it. It's not something magical that just HAPPENS without any work and without any effort.

This idea that there is only ONE TRUE LOVE for everyone is ridiculous, half-understood Pop Platonic Philosophy. (Almost as dangerous as Pop Psychology.) There's not just One True Love, there's compatibility, there's affection, there's committment, there's a whole host of things involved. You don't just find your One True Platonic Soulmate and have a magical perfect ride for the rest of your life. You find someone with whom you are compatible, with whom you have the desire to spend your life, and then you make it work. Usually through compromise and mutual self sacrifice.

To believe otherwise strikes me as naive and silly. Maybe I'd feel differently if I'd ever HAD an example of True Love in my life growing up, but every single one of them has fallen apart. The only couples I know who have stayed together long-term were not those who were full of this notion of "true love" but the ones who worked hardest at staying together.

Sorry if that makes me the grinch that stole Valentine's Day.

I am actually very happy at the moment, so I don't why people keep telling me that I'm not. Very strange.

― kate, Tuesday, 27 November 2001 01:00 (twenty-four years ago)

It's horrible when you meet a person, objectively and honestly believe they are your Designated Soulmate, and then it all breaks down. And it's awful when you see the person treating subsequent partners like chattel, and the partners just let them. Sigh.

― suzy, Tuesday, 27 November 2001 01:00 (twenty-four years ago)

It's horrible when you meet a person, objectively and honestly believe they are your Designated Soulmate, and then it all breaks down.

It's even more horrible when It's horrible when you meet a person, objectively and honestly believe they are your Designated Soulmate, and they just disagree.

― Nick, Tuesday, 27 November 2001 01:00 (twenty-four years ago)

[xXx] = mark s's designated soulmate. annoyingly [xXx] missed the memo...

― mark s, Tuesday, 27 November 2001 01:00 (twenty-four years ago)

Disagreement would be an improvement! Getting them to even notice that the idea has been raised is the issue...

― kate, Tuesday, 27 November 2001 01:00 (twenty-four years ago)

Nope, change that answer. I'm with Nick D now. Unrequited Love = dud or dud?

Ah well, at least it's not Schrodinger's Crush any more and the cat has crystallised into being dead.

― kate, Tuesday, 27 November 2001 01:00 (twenty-four years ago)

'True love' is the delusion of the last couple of centuries when people stopped getting married off by their parents to improve their social status, it'll go the way of all other silly crazes.

― dave q, Tuesday, 27 November 2001 01:00 (twenty-four years ago)

A big part of me wants to agree with dave. But empirical evidence suggests he may be wrong. Doesn't it all go back a bit further than two centuries though (look at Donne for a start). I blame courtly love. Bring back marriages of status and convenience! Actually, thinking about it, what about Catullus? Or was that just lust?

― Nick, Tuesday, 27 November 2001 01:00 (twenty-four years ago)

Love is glorious but can a real bitch when life gets in the way. and past marriages. *holds head in hand*

― Samantha, Tuesday, 27 November 2001 01:00 (twenty-four years ago)

What are you talking about, Nick? Courtly Love is *MUCH* better than the real thing. I wouldn't be in this mess if I'd just left it in the abstract and not gone trying to make something real happen with someone so totally and completely Out Of My League. I'll shut up now, because I'm doing what I said I'd never do again and dragging out my bedraggled personal life all over the board. :-(

― kate, Tuesday, 27 November 2001 01:00 (twenty-four years ago)

Arranged marriages actually can work out very well. I was always surprised by my otherwise westernized, feminist Indian friends who weren't opposed to arranged marriage.

― Samantha, Tuesday, 27 November 2001 01:00 (twenty-four years ago)

High concept pitch time! A feisty riot grrrl is flung back to 11th century France! Yes it's courtly love vs Courtney Love FITE.

― Tom, Tuesday, 27 November 2001 01:00 (twenty-four years ago)

Courtly Love = West Indian fast bowler.

― Trevor, Tuesday, 27 November 2001 01:00 (twenty-four years ago)

I realised I knew fuck all about courtly love, so I learned lots here. Fascinating.

..the "courtly love" relationship typically was not between husband and wife, not because the poets and the audience were inherently immoral, but because it was an idealized sort of relationship that could not exist within the context of "real life" medieval marriages. In the middle ages, marriages amongst the nobility were typically based on practical and dynastic concerns rather than on love. The idea that a marriage could be based on love (as in the "Franklin's Tale") was a radical notion. But the audience for romance was perfectly aware that these romances were fictions, not models for actual behavior

― Nick, Tuesday, 27 November 2001 01:00 (twenty-four years ago)

Exactly why Courtly Love was so great! It was a fiction, it was an ideal. Hence why I probably should have left Shroedinger's Crush as Courtly Love, to have romances and songs and things written about him.

― kate, Tuesday, 27 November 2001 01:00 (twenty-four years ago)

loads of mediaeval literature depended on courtly love for its very structure, hence when you had real LUUURVE or adultery happening in them, that also signalled the entrance of ANARCHY into plot and structure. just like real life, eh kids? i want to go and read Malory NOW!!

― katie, Tuesday, 27 November 2001 01:00 (twenty-four years ago)

er, depended on the CONVENTIONS of courtly love, that should have been. i am distracted - thinking of PUB...

― katie, Tuesday, 27 November 2001 01:00 (twenty-four years ago)

No going to the pub without me. You have to transport me back over there. Thanks!

― Ned Raggett, Tuesday, 27 November 2001 01:00 (twenty-four years ago)

Tom E's acest wee post for yonx.

― the pinefox, Tuesday, 27 November 2001 01:00 (twenty-four years ago)

Pah! The courtly/courtney gag is an old one in my manor.

― Nick, Tuesday, 27 November 2001 01:00 (twenty-four years ago)

Gale. My answer is pretty much the same as Kate's. The idea of a 'soul-mate' is risible. I am constantly in love with different people in different ways.

― Ally C, Tuesday, 27 November 2001 01:00 (twenty-four years ago)

Tart

― Nick, Tuesday, 27 November 2001 01:00 (twenty-four years ago)

I have never considered Courtly Love as an alternative to Pathetic Unspoken Crushes. I think I'm happier now. Off to find someone to idealize.

― Maria, Tuesday, 27 November 2001 01:00 (twenty-four years ago)

Skipping 57 messages at this point... Click here if you want to load them all.

I want my penny back

― Mr Mime (Andrew Thames), Monday, 22 March 2004 10:28 (twenty-two years ago)

one month passes...

real love does exist, mostly in many hearts
most people are in love with the idea of being in LOVE.

― sdcin, Sunday, 2 May 2004 02:23 (twenty-two years ago)

"mostly in many hearts"?

― latebloomer (latebloomer), Sunday, 2 May 2004 06:09 (twenty-two years ago)

i am mostly in love with the ide of being in LOVE in about 74% of my hearts.

― Ian Johnson (orion), Sunday, 2 May 2004 06:10 (twenty-two years ago)

Girls don't like love, girls like jars of monkeys.

― Sick Nouthall (Nick Southall), Sunday, 2 May 2004 06:54 (twenty-two years ago)

true love travels on a gravel path.

― jel -- (jel), Sunday, 2 May 2004 09:01 (twenty-two years ago)

Ah well, at least it's not Schrodinger's Crush any more and the cat has crystallised into being dead.

That's genius kate.

I think, for some people, romantic love is not an option.

― holojames (holojames), Sunday, 2 May 2004 10:59 (twenty-two years ago)

This is quite a thread, really.

― Ned Raggett (Ned), Sunday, 2 May 2004 12:14 (twenty-two years ago)

Ally made my meanspirited Vin Diesel joke for me, I note again

― Mr Mime (Andrew Thames), Sunday, 2 May 2004 12:27 (twenty-two years ago)

No.

― CRW (CRW), Sunday, 2 May 2004 12:51 (twenty-two years ago)

"true love" (as I would mean it) is the optimal intersection of sexual attraction and compatibility in the same person. For most people this probably is going to entail a good deal of luck or fate (if you believe in that stuff) so it happens rarely and does earn itself some kind of semi-mythical status.

― Kim (Kim), Sunday, 2 May 2004 19:07 (twenty-two years ago)

I agree, if you don't fancy someone but they are really, really nice the chances are you still won't be interested (I've been there), but if someone is an asshole and yet good looking there is a chance you might give that a shot too (I've been there too). Trying to find a combination of both is so hard as to be nearly impossible. I thought I had it once but I didn't and it was such as disappointment that I really can't arse myself to be excited about the prospect of going through the search again, which is why I'm beginning to think cold, empty promiscuity might have something after all.

Actually. Nah. Scrap that.

― CRW (CRW), Sunday, 2 May 2004 19:25 (twenty-two years ago)

one year passes...

do you believe in love?

― c7n (Cozen), Thursday, 27 October 2005 13:06 (twenty years ago)

yes

― mookieproof (mookieproof), Thursday, 27 October 2005 13:15 (twenty years ago)

No.

― Paranoid Spice (kate), Thursday, 27 October 2005 13:21 (twenty years ago)

maybe

― jel -- (jel), Thursday, 27 October 2005 13:22 (twenty years ago)

I don't know

― jel -- (jel), Thursday, 27 October 2005 13:22 (twenty years ago)

can you repeat the question?

― jel -- (jel), Thursday, 27 October 2005 13:23 (twenty years ago)

Ha ha!

Wow, this thread is really interesting to me, in retrospect, with hindsight, and everything.

That said, I still earnestly believe everything I posted on this thread.

And I say that as someone who is "In Love" and very happy in a quite probably long-term relationship. I call it being a realist.

And in hindsight, the cynical self at the beginning of the thread was right, and the "happy in love" Kate was a momentary aberration.

Why the hell was this thread revived? I'm going to get a coffee and think about mortgages instead.

― Paranoid Spice (kate), Thursday, 27 October 2005 13:25 (twenty years ago)

I believe in a thing called love

― miccio (miccio), Thursday, 27 October 2005 13:26 (twenty years ago)

yes.

― g-kit (g-kit), Thursday, 27 October 2005 13:27 (twenty years ago)

since u been gone, i can breathe for the first time

― The Lex (The Lex), Thursday, 27 October 2005 13:27 (twenty years ago)

Sometimes I miss Gale.

― Mädchen (Madchen), Thursday, 27 October 2005 13:30 (twenty years ago)

Fuh-uh-uhck.
That's pretty much my answer to this freakin' question.
However, I'm still (deliriously) optimistic. Will check back when hit with thunderbolts that don't eventually end in "You're amazing but I've got mother issues and can't deal with a relationship, etc." bah. There is no answer; I am going to be a physicist.

― rrrobyn (rrrobyn), Friday, 28 October 2005 04:39 (twenty years ago)

You find someone with whom you are compatible, with whom you have the desire to spend your life, and then you make it work. Usually through compromise and mutual self sacrifice.

Anything you have to achieve in this way isn't worth having, imho.

― Bob Six (bobbysix), Friday, 28 October 2005 06:28 (twenty years ago)

Indeed. Compatibility might usefully presuppose that you don't have to "make it work" - it's just there.

I too miss Gale D, especially since I may be heading in her general direction at some point next year...

― Marcello Carlin (nostudium), Friday, 28 October 2005 06:48 (twenty years ago)

ILX is pretty representitive when it comes to matters of the heart.

― Come Back Johnny B (Johnney B), Friday, 28 October 2005 06:50 (twenty years ago)

i don't know about true love, but there's sure as fuck a lot of false love about. i believe in love per se, though, definitely, and my current relative bliss gives me faith and hope for the future of love and all its loveliness.

― CharlieNo4 (Charlie), Friday, 28 October 2005 07:16 (twenty years ago)

Shut up and go away with your blissedness.

― Paranoid Spice (kate), Friday, 28 October 2005 07:16 (twenty years ago)

(There should be a smiley face on the end of that, not for Chuck per se, but for those who don't know that Chuck and I are mates IRL.)

― Paranoid Spice (kate), Friday, 28 October 2005 07:17 (twenty years ago)

Love definitely exists. I've seen it with my very eyes.

― Come Back Johnny B (Johnney B), Friday, 28 October 2005 07:22 (twenty years ago)

"I've seen it happen, in other people's lives..." etc. etc. blah blah boring Smiths references.

― Paranoid Spice (kate), Friday, 28 October 2005 07:23 (twenty years ago)

Actually, come to think of it... I'm starting to feel like the Atheist of Love. That is... I see people all around me who believe in it, and seem to function as if it were true, the same way I see people attending churches and synagogues and getting something out of religion. But it means nothing to me and has no relation to my life.

Either I'm an old cynic, or those people who believe in love are deluded fools, and there's no way that those two viewpoints are mutually recconcilable.

― The Atheist of Love (kate), Friday, 28 October 2005 07:26 (twenty years ago)

what's true love anyway? if you love somebody it's true.

― ken c (ken c), Friday, 28 October 2005 07:34 (twenty years ago)

of course there's such a thing, i usually have true love with several women at a time.

― Ste (Fuzzy), Friday, 28 October 2005 07:35 (twenty years ago)

diagrams plz

― Marcello Carlin (nostudium), Friday, 28 October 2005 07:36 (twenty years ago)

Is it better to be a deluded fool or to be 'working at a relationship/marriage'?

Blissed out people in love set my teeth on edge, but then I also really hate hearing how marriages don't just happen, that they're hard work etc.

― Bob Six (bobbysix), Friday, 28 October 2005 07:38 (twenty years ago)

I would say that it's better to be in love. Of course relationships have to be worked at, same as you have to work at a job or a career in order to do it well and get anything out of it, financial and/or otherwise.

Also the definition of love here needs to be expanded - not just romantic love but love for family and friends, simple love of life, etc. - there are lots of different manifestations of "true love."

― Marcello Carlin (nostudium), Friday, 28 October 2005 07:57 (twenty years ago)

dolphin love

― ken c (ken c), Friday, 28 October 2005 08:00 (twenty years ago)

TS: Courtly Love vs Courtney Love

― Marcello Carlin (nostudium), Friday, 28 October 2005 08:02 (twenty years ago)

its a weird concept. i mean i know something i've felt certain things. but like kissing ( a strange thing) - why does it work?

― mullygrubbr (bulbs), Friday, 28 October 2005 08:04 (twenty years ago)

With me at the moment it manifests itself as a tummy tingle whenever I see one of her emails in my inbox or when I look at her blog and there's a new post. Or when I'm writing the blog I'm writing for her. Can't pin it down to anything but it undeniably exists.

― Marcello Carlin (nostudium), Friday, 28 October 2005 08:21 (twenty years ago)

yeah i know. its one of the GREAT feelings you cling to in a world of drab.

― mullygrubbr (bulbs), Friday, 28 October 2005 08:22 (twenty years ago)

weird inexplicableness

― mullygrubbr (bulbs), Friday, 28 October 2005 08:23 (twenty years ago)

Some people seem to understand "true love" as a single thing, a once in a lifetime event.

I say, RUBBISH!

You can have many many great loves in a life. Thats the POINT of life! Great loves, great losses, joy and pain. Feeling. So yes, true love exists as long as yer up for it! ;)

― Trayce (trayce), Friday, 28 October 2005 08:23 (twenty years ago)

bah. i haven't had that feeling for years. i'm jealous marcello!

― gem (trisk), Friday, 28 October 2005 08:23 (twenty years ago)

sorry to be mr bees knees but *it* surrounds me. has done for - o - 15 yrs. lovely with difficulties yes but - o - !

― mullygrubbr (bulbs), Friday, 28 October 2005 08:26 (twenty years ago)

you are lucky gaz! i can tell it's true from when you post about your family. i hope that finds me one day.

― gem (trisk), Friday, 28 October 2005 08:28 (twenty years ago)

No.
-- CRW (...), May 2nd, 2004 1:51 PM. (CRW) (link)

aww :(

― ken c (ken c), Friday, 28 October 2005 11:18 (twenty years ago)

six months pass...

HiGh On FeEd N' sEeD

― k-unit, Sunday, 30 April 2006 19:46 (twenty years ago)

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