Valentine's Dilemma

YOU MEET SOMEONE from the opposite sex for the very first time. He stares directly into your eyes. He flashes his most captivating smile, and you are fascinated. Before you know it, your heart starts to beat fast and you tell yourself, "I'm in love.. Oh, it must be love at firs sight!"

Love at first sight? Is it real love.. or not?

Many of our wrong ideas concerning love come from popular love songs often heard over the radio. One song goes: "Love comes from the most unexpected places. When someone's eyes you never met who wants to get to know you. someone's smile you can't forget and if the music plays on in your mind, that's love..."

Often times, song writers write songs about love. But are they talking about real love or are they just talking about infatuation? Romantic feelings can be stirred quickly but such feelings may not be real love, for real love can't be all emotions. 

We may be attracted to a person at first sight, our hearts may ski a few beats, but that may not necessarily be real love. There may not even be such a thing as "Love at first sight."

For one thing, it seems impossible to fall in love with someone at first sight. We don't fall into real love - real love grows. It develops. We have to know a person before we can love him with real love. Real love starts slowly. Usually it starts in friendship and it grows. Until one day, we discover another element in the friendship - the element of romantic love. We will soon realize that our heats have grown and beat together.

Real love grows with them. For this reason, we can say that time can best determine if a romance has grown into real love. Real love will wait for the right time and the right circumstances.

Sure, there is the thrilling element of physical attraction but it is only one of the many things about the person that interests us. In real love, our interest grows. But this interest is in the totality of the one we love. In real love, many or most of the qualities of the other person attracts us. Love at first sight? Is it real? It may not be! It may just be a myth - a make believe story.