I.37 — Loosening Love

There is a form of love that is mostly a grip on someone's staying, on them remaining exactly as they are, needed exactly as much, available on the same terms as yesterday. It feels, from inside, like devotion. It behaves, in practice, like a hand closed around a wrist.

The tell is what happens when the person changes, because they will. A new opinion, a new friend, an evening spent away, a door that used to open toward you and now, once, does not. If what rises is fear dressed as concern, or anger dressed as hurt, the grip is showing. What is gripped is not the person. It is an image of the person, held still, defended against the plain fact that people move.

Love with an open hand is smaller in one sense and larger in every other. It gives up owning the staying and is left with the actual person, the one who is aging, changing their mind, capable of leaving the room and, sometimes, of leaving for good. That person is harder to love than the still image was. It is also the only one who is real.

Try this once, in one relationship. Notice the exact moment love turns into a demand, a sentence that starts with you should, or a silence that means you had better. See it clearly. Do not rush to fix it or explain it away. Just see it.