“Love, as I see it today, is very conditional. It’s this idea that as long as our partners fit within a specific set of conditions, constructs and expectations, we will continue to love them. That’s a bit fucked up in my opinion. I think we need to give our partners room to explore, to make mistakes, to grow and to experience this life to the fullest. I think we need to remember that we are loves, not keepers.”
Cole Schafer (January Black), One Minute, Please? (Page 124)
“I was jealous of other men where it concerned the women I was dating because I was scared of losing her to him. I was at war. Love should be many things but it should never be war. Jealousy was my body and mind’s way of doing everything I could to not be abandoned, to not feel that pain of someone leaving. As a result, I led an exhausting life. I couldn’t enjoy love or intimacy because I was so fucking terrified of losing it. Numerous people, both men and women alike, struggle with jealousy. We attempt to mask it in our relationships as being healthy or flattering, branding it as some sort of fucked up proof our partners care about us. But jealousy is not love. It’s selfishness. If we’re not careful, it’s an emotion that can quickly transform into possession. Let her keep her wings.”
Cole Schafer (January Black), One Minute, Please? (Page 112)
“Falling for people through screens is dangerous. It’s fiction. It’s stranger than fiction. We’re not falling for people, but rather the idea of them we’ve fabricated in our own heads. It’s like falling in love with Lady Brett Ashley in Hemingway’s The Sun Also Rises. After I read Hemingway, I fell in love with that women. But, I can’t take her to dinner because she doesn’t exist. And, that is our generation’s curse, falling for the pretty fiction behind glowing screens that we create in our own heads. At times, I wonder if our imaginations will be the death of any chance we have at love.”
Cole Schafer (January Black), One Minute, Please? (Page 108)
“We often confuse love with possession.
Cole Schafer (January Black), One Minute, Please? (Page 106)
Unlike our pets, humans weren’t meant to be kept on leashes.
They weren’t meant to be neutered and spayed.
Their wings weren’t meant to be clipped for the sake of your possession.
When you love someone, you love them unconditionally.
You love them not under the condition they’ll be here forever.
But, rather, that they chose to be here, for a moment or a lifetime.
Even though they could have flown anywhere.”
“There’s little room for rationality in love. There’s room for compassion, honesty and forgiveness. But, if you’re approaching love with a sense of rationality, like it’s some black and white problem to be solved, you’re not truly loving. You might think you’re loving. But you’re not truly loving.”
Cole Schafer (January Black), One Minute, Please? (Page 86)
“I couldn’t tell you what I fear
more. Spending the rest of my life
with just one person. Or, never
finding one person I want to spend
the rest of my life with.”
Cole Schafer (January Black), One Minute, Please? (Page 43)
“I have learned that Grief is a force of energy that cannot be controlled or predicted. It comes and goes on its own schedule. Grief does not obey your plans, or your wishes. Grief will do whatever it wants to you, whenever it wants to. In that regard, Grief has a lot in common with Love. The only way that I can “handle” Grief, then, is the same way that I “handle” Love — by not “handling” it. By bowing down before its power, in complete humility.”
Elizabeth Gilbert
“Trying to get those near you to behave more like you is the opposite of love and it reflects your lack of inner peace. If you truly love someone, you have to accept them as they are, you can certainly give them suggestions from time to time but in no way can you control them. You can also create boundaries when necessary but you can never force them to change. Control is a manifestation of your own insecurity”
Yung Pueblo
“I believe that when you remove malice from your heart, not only do you feel better, you look better. I think you lose your frown lines and your wrinkles lessen and your age spots disappear. I believe it’s better than Botox, extending grace. I do.”
Bevy Smith, TED Talk
