In a world full of binaries, love has often become one of them. In our culture and society, we construct binaries to categorise and hierarchise people, concepts, experiences, and identities. Rather than see connections and relations between things, we tend to separate and compare them. This can be seen in an abundance of areas such as gender, sexual orientation, thinking/feeling, political affiliation, arts/science, and even in our relationships with one another and the world around us.
Our world has become increasingly disconnected in many ways, starkly seen during the pandemic and the rise of loneliness globally. We have not only become disconnected from other human relations but the greater world around us. In an increasingly individualist and artificial society, we focus on the self and the benefits and freedoms of oneself rather than the relationships and interdependence we are all a part of. We have become disconnected from our relationships with the land, waters, animals, plants, minerals, and other members of the ecosystems and planet we all share.
When we begin to see ourselves as increasingly separate from the things around us, we disconnect ourselves from those relationships. If we see love as something that is taken and given rather than shared, we see the individuals in a relationship as single units more than a team. Giving and receiving love for ourselves, or self-love, doesn’t have to be in opposition to giving love to other people. If we value the collective goal, then doing good for the collective includes us.
We can imagine things in terms of we and us more than me and them.
When we depict love, especially in February, we often see representation in the form of certain kinds of romantic love, which we more generally call a relationship. One of the hallmarks of a good relationship is pro-relationship behaviour, where the goals and value of the relationship are deemed as more important, at times, than the needs of the individual. There is, like most things, a healthy balance of this at any given time depending on the situation.
Love can be seen as interdependence and taking care of the community, a population that comes in all sizes. We are always in a community, depending on where we construct and draw relative boundaries. Allowing our needs to be met by a community or team requires interdependence and humility.
This drive to care for each other is so natural and human, yet we often get caught up in cynical cycles of human nature. We start believing that deep down many of us are motivated by self-interest, whereas in reality so many of us want to help the team but simply have barriers that prevent such action.
Systems and worldviews can disable or enable the appreciation for all the things that connect and bind us together, rather than differentiate us. Our struggles, our pain, our love, and our lives are all connected to one another. To care for our communities, and for one another, is to care for ourselves and others.
When we look for that love, that connection, that relation, we can find it. When we forget about our common humanity, we feel isolated and alone. To remember all the people, bugs, soils, waters, friends, ancestors, flowers, berries, birds, and members of our communities who got us to this point allows us to see how connected we are, and how loved we are. Seeing self-love and love for others, human and more-than-human, as all the same collective love allows us to remove the emphasis on the individual and remember the greater community.
We are stronger and go farther together.
When we set up the binary of who loves, me or you, we lose sight that WE are being loved and loving. We share love in the community, which is everywhere around us. The planet supports life, plants photosynthesise to create the oxygen we breathe, water flows through the air and our bodies to sustain us, and we support each other.
This Valentine’s Day, I encourage and support everyone to reflect on and embrace the interconnectedness of love, the collectiveness of love, and the community that love builds and is built by.
This article would not be possible without the wonderful, lovely community here at Vic. I am so grateful to the friends and loved ones who went on walks, Facetimed and chatted with me about their knowledge of love and community and connectedness. Together we wrote this, with so much love.
