I believe in the paradox of love: love is weakness which makes us strong.
Get hurt, and then try again.
I say believe, because like the existence of God or UFOs, love can’t really be proven. There’s no experiment we can perform (yet?) to determine whether or not love exists.
Evidence surrounds us though. Look at some phrases so common, we never question them:
Ignorance is bliss, and knowledge is power. What you don’t know won’t hurt you, until you learn a painful lesson, but whatever doesn’t kill you makes you stronger.
To gain any ability — book smarts or street smarts, physical strength or spiritual strength — requires subjecting yourself to discomfort. The discomfort of admitting you don’t know, of admitting your limitations.
When you love something, it hurts you in a way that helps. Exercise only improves fitness through controlled damage. Kids need to risk getting hurt in order to grow healthy. To improve as a software developer, you have to honestly examine your shortcomings, and change your practice. To play guitar, you’ve gotta build callouses.
It’s change, really. Change is risky and uncomfortable, but it’s essential to growth.
You don’t always try the same thing. To love yourself, you gotta risk losing others, if they’re not committed to growing with you.
Love is risk. Love is discomfort.
Get hurt, and try again.
