One of my favorite quotes by one of my favorite authors about one of my favorite topics (stick with me here) is as follows.

"To love at all is to be vulnerable. Love anything, and your heart will certainly be wrung and possibly be broken. If you want to make sure of keeping it intact, you must give your heart to no one, not even to an animal. Wrap it carefully round with hobbies and little luxuries; avoid all entanglements; lock it up safe in the casket—safe, dark, motionless, airless—it will change. It will not be broken; it will become unbreakable, impenetrable, irredeemable." (C.S. Lewis, The Four Loves)

Love. What is it, even? What does it look like? Why does everyone write about it (including me LOL, hypocrisy at its finest), sing about it, make movies about it, praise it and complain about it? What has us so hung up on love?

I don't have any exact answers those questions, but I have some ideas.

For most of my life, I've assumed love to be a feeling, something that just kind of happens to you regarding the people that you feel fondly toward. Like, "Yo, Mom, I love you because, well, you're my mom." It's only recently, in the past few years, I have been faced with the undeniable truth of the matter: Love is a verb.

I think it's fair to say that most of us "love" the thought of love. We are eager and excited to receive love, especially from people who love us. But what about the people who are hard to love? The people who have hurt us, people who we adamantly disagree with, people who are offensive to us and even people who are simply different from us? They don't deserve our love, right?

This is when we must actively choose to love because it's not something that's just going to naturally flow from us. We all have people we want to withhold love from, but everything goes back to the importance of valuing each person simply as a human being, not placing their worth in the things they have done, the beliefs they adhere to or the categories society places them in.

OK, but how? How can we choose to love, especially if we don't feel it?

You have to show it. Listen to the thoughts of the people you disagree with; hear them out. Make the effort to actually get to know someone you aren't well acquainted with but have already made assumptions about.

Refrain from speaking badly of the people who have hurt you; don't feed your heart the poison of bitterness. Pray for your enemies. (It's a classic, and for good reason. Prayer can work wonders, and not just for the people you are praying for. It changes you, as well.)

When you choose to love, you will sometimes be hurt. You will sometimes be rejected, but you also will discover grace and strength you didn't know you had. You will find healing you didn't know was possible, and your heart will remain open for those who will extend their love to you in return.