# Difference Between Loving Someone and Being "In Love"



## AmbiguousHusband (Apr 17, 2015)

I'm struggling in my marriage. You can find my more details explanations in the "Considering Divorce" section, although to be fair, I am really not "considering" divorce so much as the through drifts into my head and causes anxiety.

I am seeing a new counselor tomorrow, and I have begun journaling and documenting all my thoughts. My plan is to write about them, and, pending my wife's permission (since much of this involves her) post it online for others. I have found a great deal of solace and comfort in knowing that others have experienced similar situations and made it through.

Last night though, in speaking with my mom, she asked me a question that got me thinking. She asked, "are you still in love with her".

It made me pause, because everything I have read on the all-being, all-knowing internet seems to indicate that being "in love" is more the infatuation stage of a relationship. The butterflies. The anxious moments waiting to see them. Missing them every time they're gone. So on.

However, I have yet to come across a succinct, spot-on definition of "love vs. being in love", and I'd be curious to know what people here think.

One of my favorites is that love is an action. It's a choice. It's a commitment each day to be with someone despite any faults they have, either real or perceived, and continue down that path.

What are others' thoughts?

And, while this may be a bit of a tangent, how did you move past phases when you may not have felt "in love" or questioned if you were capable of love at all?


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## Marduk (Jul 16, 2010)

To my simplistic way of thinking, loving someone is deeply caring about them.

Being in love with someone is the same thing, only wanting to screw their brains out, too. Or a sense of passion, maybe.


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## jorgegene (May 26, 2012)

i think that 'being in love' is a mostly western concept that has been over romanticized.
and by the way, i say that as a romantic myself.

it is as you describe, an infatuation, a feeling primarily. it can be combined with other attributes, like commitment and 
friendship, but it primarily emotional.

the problem with 'being in love', is that it is often transitory, and like most feelings and evolves as we grow together.
it ebbs and flows. whereas commitment, dedication, friendship should not waver. 

as the saying goes; "feelings come and go".

so what's the answer? the basic attraction should be there in a marital relationship i believe, and after that it's work, constant vigilance and effort to
feed the relationship and make it go, and foster it like anything else worthwhile.........even more so.

what about if the attraction isn't there? well, to me, that's a problem, but it can work as testified by millions of 
non-western marriages around the world currently
and through history.


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## SimplyAmorous (Nov 25, 2009)

I find this an awesome quote on the matter....


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## Celes (Apr 28, 2015)

One of them involves wanting to bang, the other does not.


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## richardsharpe (Jul 8, 2014)

Good evening
I think people make too much of labels and words. What matters is how you feel, even if that feeling can't easily be described in a few words. "Love" includes a wide range of things - trust, comfort, sexual desire, desire to protect, enjoyment of their company, desire to please, appreciation of being pleased, duty, cooperation etc. 

I suspect that these are combined in different amounts for different people.


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## Lynn508 (Feb 16, 2016)

I know a few elderly couples who have been together for decades who describe themselves as in love. So I don't agree that it pertains only to the beginning stages of romance. For me, in love means you deeply care about that person and are focused on that person as a partner or potential partner to the exclusion of others.

Love is both a feeling and action, it doesn't have to be one or the other.
_Posted via Mobile Device_


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## Prodigal (Feb 5, 2011)

I can only speak from my own experience and perspective, since I was married to an alcoholic who drank himself to death. Literally.

I had to love him enough to step back from his addiction and quit trying to make him get sober, see the light, or have a moment of clarity that would make him seek recovery.

I loved him enough to respect his right to live his life as he wished without my interference. I also loved myself enough to walk away and cut off contact with him the last year of his life. Most difficult thing I have ever done in my entire life. I loved him. I love him. In love? I don't think that was part of the equation. It was just love; "in" had nothing to do with it.

Basically, I had to be at peace and relatively satisfied with MY life without interfering in HIS life. It boiled down to what he did had nothing to do with my happiness or contentment. 

Heck, I might sound like I'm full of chit, but I think loving an addict was the hardest thing I ever did in my life. 

I will always love my husband, the good/bad, sober/drunk, kind/nasty. He was what he was.


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## *Deidre* (Feb 7, 2016)

I'm engaged, and so perhaps it is still all new? But, I'm both 'in love' with and have love for...my fiance. And I hope it always stays this way.


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## Redactus (Nov 22, 2015)

Loving someone means you still care about that person, being "in love" means that you are still willing to forsake all others for that person.


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## sheishei (Jul 25, 2015)

there are so many ways of loving someone or something , we love so many things throughout our lives , but i see being in love with someone as knowing their flaws and good things as part of a self, this person i love, i love because it is what it is with flaws and all. It doesn´t mean that sometimes it might get on my nerve, but i breath and remember that that person i love will not always be , say or think the things i like , that´s why " I " exist, i´m me and am comfortable and know exactly what i would like to hear or have done , but still sometimes i find myself profoundly annoying , but it doesn´t mean i don´t like myself and that helps me remember that there are ups and downs , the person you love will not always be what you expect them to be, specially because they not only love you they must love themselves, and loving themselves means that they can´t always please you. 
I agree with the commitment part you mentioned, choosing to love someone is different as when you love a family member, you grow up with your siblings , see them everyday and sometimes they annoy the hell out of you but that doesn´t mean you stop loving them because of it, we don´t even choose to love them , we simply do , but choosing a partner and committing to that love is accepting imperfections , but as humans we idealize a reflection, a perfection that doesn´t exist if your love doesn´t commit to the imperfections as well. I guess it is a matter of how much you can/want to take when things don´t go the way we expected.


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## frusdil (Sep 5, 2013)

I think there's a big difference between "falling" in love and "being" in love - falling in love is all the excitement, the butterflies (though I still get those when I see my hubby) the breathless can't get enough of them, that undefineable thing. Being in love is what's still there once the initial rush wears off...it's when love changes into something lasting...you're still in love but it's different, lol. Instead of all the consuming, breathless and unsustainable rush it becomes comforting, secure and beautiful, in a lasting way. It's loving someone when they're not very loveable - and we're all unlovable sometimes.

It's...oh I don't blo0dy know...how do you define it? Lol.


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## TRy (Sep 14, 2011)

AmbiguousHusband said:


> However, I have yet to come across a succinct, spot-on definition of "love vs. being in love", and I'd be curious to know what people here think.


"Love" is caring for a person. "In love" is desiring a person. I love my children, but I am both in love and love my wife.


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## SimplyAmorous (Nov 25, 2009)

Lynn508 said:


> *I know a few elderly couples who have been together for decades who describe themselves as in love*. So I don't agree that it pertains only to the beginning stages of romance. For me, in love means you deeply care about that person and are focused on that person as a partner or potential partner to the exclusion of others.


Science has attempted to explain how this works...personally I think it's when 2 Romantic types get together & they just really enjoy GIVING & loving.. basically "feeding" their relationship... here are 2 articles about this (pieces of them)...








Still Madly in Love? Brain Scans Can Explain - Brain Scans Reveal Similarities Between Those Who Just Fell in Love and Long-Married Couples 



> The study also found that:
> 
> *** Greater closeness with a partner was associated with activity reflecting reward and motivation, as well as of awareness.
> 
> ...










 Brain Study Reveals Secrets of Staying Madly in Love -What brain scans teach us about intense long-term passionate love




> *The Characteristics of Intense Romantic Love*
> 
> Intense romantic love typifies symptoms (common to being newly in love) including:
> 
> ...


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## arbitrator (Feb 13, 2012)

Celes said:


> One of them involves wanting to bang, the other does not.


*"Banging," like kissing and touching, is just a natural biproduct of the genuine, unrequited love that you develop and retain for someone!

True love means that you just don't want to willingly vacate their presence!*
_Posted via Mobile Device_


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## 2ntnuf (Jul 14, 2012)

This would be a great question for those who consider themselves in a successful long-term marriage. I'm thinking more than twenty-five years of marriage. 

Pretty much any others have not gone through the toughest stages yet. 

I think everyone has a variation of each of these. I think the most successful and most content couples are those who truly do believe similarly and naturally do things that the other finds loving. Of course, there will be work involved. Since we are all different, we have to learn what our partner finds loving and do those things often enough that they feel loved, but not so often that we feel controlled or exhausted.

I think loving is a slight misnomer. I think it can be equated to the definition of charity. We are charitable to those we love, yet have not recently been loving. We do this out of our belief system concerning our respect for ourselves. It makes us feel good to treat others in a loving manner, even when they might not seem to deserve it. We stop loving them when the cost outweighs the rewards. It's chemical and intangible with elements of tangible in relation to what we believe we need, after basic necessities. 

I think being in love is an emotional response to being with someone who we really enjoy spending our time with, doing things together, sharing thoughts, and growing with. 

I think those feelings of love increase our natural attraction for them and as time goes by and our physical appearance deteriorates from it's peak, our mind's eye only sees how much we love them and want to be so close to them, that we physically need to be with them. That mind's eye only increases our partner's physical attraction in our brains. 

This doesn't mean that the one unknowingly using their mind's eye, is themselves still physically attractive by general popular opinion. It means we generally think of ourselves as attractive when we love ourselves. We must love ourselves, or we cannot love another very well. 

Others we do not truly feel in love with, or who we do not feel love for, would suffice for sexual release when they are physically attractive to us, but could not bring about the deeply loving emotions and actions in response to any manner of intimacy with that one person we love to share our life with the most. 

And yes, I think there could be others out there who would give us similar feelings, but never the same. Better or worse can only be determined over a long period of time. There is only one of each of us.


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## Romango (Feb 20, 2016)

I think you could ask a thousand people and every single one would have a different definition. For me, the operative difference in being in love and loving someone is the word "in." I love my XW, was married to her for seven years and have two children with her, whom I will forever be "in" love with. I still care deeply about my XW, but I am no longer actively involved in her life outside of what concerns my children. I am "in" love - as in part of, together, bonded, actively involved and concerned with - my fiance and my children. 

That's just my definition.


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