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I have tentatively started reading into my research topic ‘Love Pedagogy in Youth Work’ for my Ph.D.
I have commenced this journey with the book ‘See No Stranger’ A Memoir and Manifesto of Revolutionary Love by Valarie Kaur
Kaur believes that;
Loving only ourselves is escapism
Loving only our opponents is self-loathing
Loving only others is ineffective
Love is not singular or dichotomous and its shades of black and white often merge into grey. However, love is much more than these achromatic colours and its hues surpass our primary understanding, as Love is on a spectrum which is a veritable cornucopia of clashing and complementary colours with a touch of the impossible.
The two truths of love are that we must love ourselves to love others and that we must love others to love ourselves, even the people whom we consider to be our adversaries. In the game, two truths and a lie, the lie of love is that it is our choice, one that we can curtail and control. Just like the ‘impossible colours’ that cannot be perceived by the human eye, love also has an impossible nature that transcends our cognitive and emotional control. Love is therefore free, bondless, eternal and is both tangible and intangible.
To understand the dimensions of love we need to simultaneously consider its width, breadth and height in addition to its depth. We then need to accept that conceptualising love dimensions only aids our current comprehension of its construct, but does not define love as love is impossible. Love is all of the visible possible colours, but is also the impossible colours that our current perception cannot perceive.
"The greatest thing you'll ever learn is just to love, and be loved in return." - Moulin Rouge!, 2001.
I am not sure if this is a good, bad or ugly start to my Ph. D., but it does feel a little impossible………… until it starts to feel possible…………