Love or Infatuation - How Do You Know?

Question: How would you describe your feelings when you tell someone you love them? I cannot find words that I feel are strong enough to describe the feelings I have. I tell my husband ‘I love you’ and he says ‘Prove it!’. How do you prove it?

Let me begin with my definition of Love. On the most basic level, Love is simply the care, value and appreciation for another. That person becomes precious to us, for whatever reason we feel.

It is difficult to answer any question about romantic love, because people have their own individual reactions to it. However, falling in love appears to be triggered by four major factors: attraction (physical, emotional and intellectual), a feeling of comfort (which encourages security, trust and happiness), a feeling of value (that the person respects and cares for you; that you really matter to them) and a feeling of excitement (that triggers the affection an sexual part of a relationship).

It follows that if any of those aspects are missing, there really isn’t any ‘love’, as such. It would mainly be just a crush or infatuation - a phase that would soon pass.

For example, if you meet someone and there is no feeling of value(perhaps because he/she is mean in appreciating you, or they even abuse you) there is no love there at all. Or if you do not feel completely comfortable and happy in their presence, that’s not love either. If you cannot communicate together, or feel any emotional bond, it is really difficult to love in those situations. Furthermore, if you really don’t feel any excitement when you think of that person or share their company, it’s likely that you would be just platonic friends, not lovers, because the sexual attraction would be missing.

Hence the feeling of love is always difficult to describe, because it depends on which of those emotional factors you are feeling the most. If you are experiencing all of them positively, then that love feeling can be an overwhelming one. You tend to think about the person a lot, you want to be with them as often as possible, you tend to think only pleasant things about them, you feel both passion and fulfilment when you are in their presence, and you feel absolutely joyful most of the time. You just want to smile like a Cheshire cat when you are in their presence, or when you think of them. That’s how Love makes us feel, totally light headed and very happy, and also why we feel very hurt when we have an unwanted breakup. If you don’t feel happy when you think of that person, you are not in love with them. You might love them like a relative etc., without much passion, but being in love is a different happy feeling.

Unconditional Love

As to your husband telling you to ‘prove it’, that’s a different matter. Love is totally unconditional. It does not depend on anything whatever to prove itself. It does not need to be proved in any shape or form, nor does it need to be validated by anything else. True love stands on its own, always. We either feel it or we don’t. We might do little things to express it openly, but they are not necessary. They are just forms of expression.

For example, when we love our children, they do not have to be good to get that love, neither do we have to prove it to them that we love them. That love simply stands on its own. It just is.

Your husband wants proof because he feels very insecure in himself, for whatever reasons. Love is probably something he doesn’t quite understand or appreciate, which perhaps cause him to feel uncomfortable, especially if he feels no control over the situation. Depending on his upbringing, he probably knows how to care for you and value you as his partner, but to ‘love’ you might be another matter. He might not have been loved in that demonstrative way before, and does not know how to deal with it, or he doubts his own love for you, so puts his guilt on to you. Again, he may not think the way you normally treat him shows that love, especially if he believes Love should conform to his idea of how it should be shown.

One way of dealing with that kind of rigid expectation is this: When he asks you to ‘prove it’ next time, ask him if he really loves you. If he says yes, then ask him how he proves it to you? What does love mean for him? You could both be interpreting ‘Love’ differently, and that should give you a measure of how he sees Love, and what he expects from someone who loves him.

Love is always determined by feelings and emotions, and people tend to give different reactions to those emotion. But, in essence, when we truly love, we really value the presence of that person and they become very significant to our lives. Perhaps you have to learn more about each other before you can fully understand and appreciate how you should each demonstrate the love you share.