These days, I catch a lot of people saying that love isn’t enough. 

Sorry, but I both respectfully and unabashedly disagree. 

As I write this blog while reflecting on the last day of 2011, I think about those that I love most; and it’s no coincidence that those very people can sometimes bring me to my limits and beyond. The biggest arguments I’ve ever had in my life, the most tears I’ve shed during one specific period of time, have been either with them or because of them. I’m not one to do such things over people I have absolutely no heart for. I don’t think most people are. 

Even at one’s greatest, no one is perfect. Who isn’t without fault and their errs? But what one may consider to be ugly or ‘annoying’, those that love us can see the very same things and think, ‘Oh, Lisa. Why do you persist in thinking that you’re not enough when I already love you more than you know?’ It becomes endearing. Things that make you, you. 

With time, I’ve learned that when you tell someone that you love them, that statement shouldn’t just apply to the easy times - the ‘honeymoon period’ during which everything seems so new and exciting. It should embody the periods of sadness, the times when arguments may escalate to unfathomable heights, the disagreements over the most minute details or even the greatest fundamental values upon which we, as individuals, stand upon. Love, in its purest form, is being able to look at someone who slaps you in the face and say, ‘I still love you’. To need nothing for oneself, but to want everything in the world for the other. 

Love requires us to delve deeper into the heart, mind, and life of another; and it also requires us to willingly bare ourselves in a similar light. And as you venture in such a journey, we become more vivid caricatures of ourselves at times. Those closest to me have seen me at my best, but also at my most deviant.

In the same sense, love can sometimes feel like the euphoria which results from wine; but at the most trying of times, it can feel like poison sucking us dry of our ability to see any sort of color in the world (seriously). But times such as these make me realize that if you persist in forgiveness and willingly allow yourself to be broken for the hope of something greater, that such aged wine can taste that much greater. And if you haven’t had a taste of it yet, then at least you can still hope.  And that is exactly what I intend on doing this new year.
In 2012, I will strive to love deeper and with greater trust and hope for those around me, for I know that in the end, love is what life is founded on and is all you need, no matter what.