There was a time when I thought love was the most powerful emotion one could experience. I still feel this way, that it is truly a force tearing its way through the human race, pulling us apart and pushing us back together at its will. Though, lately, I see love as a delicate and beautiful thing who has a lover herself and his name is passion. Love is steady, a heartbeat of comfort. Passion is what pushes love forward. Passion is what moves people out of their own little worlds. Only when someone is truly passionate about a cause can they become involved. Only when someone is passionate about their work, will they achieve the level of success they wish. Passion is erratic and moves in unexplained patterns, pulling love along for the ride.
I think passion and love are often confused, especially between a man and a woman
. Love is built over time; again, a steady heartbeat you can set the rhythm of your life to. But passion is something entirely different. Now, I’m not talking about lust. Lust is the immediate desire to intimately know someone; a knee-jerk reaction of a chemical shift in our brains when our prehistoric anatomy finds another to reproduce with. Passion builds on itself, growing and shifting over time the more you know a person. The more you recognize their mind and their desires and how they match your own. Passion can make your body tingle and your mind wander to places you never meant for it to go.
Passion between a man and woman may not always lead to love and it doesn’t have to; he can stand alone confident in his nature and he is strong enough to keep two people bonded together. But by God you cannot love someone without passion. Without passion, love is meek and may or may not be able to sustain itself indefinitely. I love you. What does that even mean if there isn’t any passion to back it up? Nothing. It means nothing. It means we have a life here, we own things together, we have a routine. It doesn’t have anything to do with happiness or satisfaction and if you say you don’t want those things either you’re lying to me or you’ve been lying to yourself for a long time. For your sake, I hope you’re just lying to me.
I have been told that my ability to feel passion is greater than most, and I am inclined to agree. When I want something, when I believe in something, when something moves me…and I mean to my core, I will have it. I will move heaven and earth until they crash together; until the raging fire inside of me has been tamed and only the embers remain, though they threaten to ignite at any moment. I’m often scolded for this in my life, by those around me who in fact lack passion for anything and don’t know how to categorize the emotion when they come across it. I used to feel bad, feel like I was the one who had something wrong with her, but you know what? Fuck that and fuck you. As my granny said, “If you can’t take this heat, baby – get your ass out of my kitchen.”
Originally published: 2/1/2013