Why do people love? Love is simultaneously one of the greatest joys in the world and the source of the greatest pain. Indeed, an enormous amount of emotional pain would disappear without the burden of love. Yet, nearly all individuals spend their entire life in pursuit of some love whether that be a relationship, the perfect job, one’s own self, etc. People are not ignorant of the very real pain associated with love, so why is there so much effort spent in pursuing it?

For many people, the story seems to be that a pursuit of love results in pain that leads to a hatred for love. A desire to never experience that pain again is created, and to protect one’s self, hatred is born. At least, this is how love and hate have traditionally appeared to me. The musings of my mind, however, have recently caused me to tinker with this idea and come up with a new hypothesis: we love because we hate.

Even as I type this, I cannot help but chuckle at the absurdity of the thought. Love and hate are normally thought to be eternally at odds and are often depicted as being irreconcilable. We must choose between one or the other, with apparently no room for both.

But what else can draw out the deepest and strongest feelings of love other than the hatred of whatever may endanger or relate to that love? I loathe the thought of being alone in the world, which causes me to put an incredible amount of care and nurture into my relationships with other people. I despise the disrespect that so many men give to women, which causes me to experience the greatest joy in being able to give women the respect and proper treatment owed to them. I hate experiencing pain, which causes me to love to alleviate the pain of others. Even in the example of love resulting in pain that leads to hatred, that hatred only fuels the love of protecting one’s own self from pain. If anything, rather than hatred being at odds with love, hatred only amplifies the feeling of love.

Is hate good then? Was it the hatred of the consequences of sin that resulted in Christ displaying the ultimate act of love by dying on the cross? Is it the hate of evil in the world that causes us to furiously love those around us, knowing that at any moment we could lose them?

I don’t know if I can really give an answer. In a world that is so broken, hatred supporting love could very well be just a skewed understanding of love. In this very moment, my mind is filled with questions of ideas and concepts of life that used to seem so simple when I was younger. If I know anything about love and hate in this world, it is this: there is nothing simple or easy about love, both in understanding and in possessing it.