What is Love?

I've been thinking a lot about being in love and how easy it is to fall in love with someone we've made up in our minds. A part of me wonders just how much I truly know about a person before I fall in love with her. How much of it is made up? How much of it really is her? How much of me is blinded by the attraction that I feel and the deep need to be attached?

Attraction and character don't always match and I am very much confused on how to judge the kind of girl who'd be good for me in the long haul. Someone who'd love me for me and would accept me just as I am. Who can see the person that I will be one day and is willing to invest in my life. Seems like such a tall order to make of someone. I was reading 1 Corinthians 13 and it says this.

1 Corinthians 13:4-7
Love is patient, love is kind. It does not envy, it does not boast, it is not proud. It is not rude, it is not self-seeking, it is not easily angered, it keeps no record of wrongs. Love does not delight in evil but rejoices with the truth. It always protects, always trusts, always hopes, always perseveres.

I broke it down and I realise that I've failed to love her in all those ways. I've not been patient. I've not been kind when my heart was broken. I was jealous and at times arrogant when I lashed out at her. I was angered. And the worst part is that I had so much bitterness in me because I was so hurt & could not forgive. I want to love in the way that Paul writes about. Am I able to always protect & always trust? Am I able to always have hope and persevere? Now that's something to work towards and I hope one day my loved ones will be able to truly say that I have loved them.

Right now being able to love like that seems so far away ... I can love like that a little but the past 3 years have shown me just how angry I can be and it saddens me cos' I wanted nothing more than to love & care for her. Oh how easy it is to hate someone and how difficult it is to forgive. I'm glad that I've chosen to forgive cos' life is to short to hate and I do enjoy life a lot more compared to before.

I am recovering and I thank God for restoring a lot of things in my life that I had lost along the way. I smile a lot more easily now and my mind is not far away as much as before. I thank God I can live in the present now and am a lot more contented. That's a good thing isn't it? :)