As long as we accept we can choose

For as long as I remember, I've been afraid to love—to love in the purest sense.

There are these lines from Lord Tennyson's poem, In Memoriam A.H.H.: 

I hold it true, whate'er befall;

I feel it when I sorrow most;

'Tis better to have loved and lost

Than never to have loved at all.

I’ve been an ardent advocate of the opposition, especially as I’ve grown older. Yet throughout my life, through the good choices and the terrible ones, this is true: it is the very thing I’m drawn to—a moth circling an ever-burning flame.

We cannot know love without loss. The profound pain of loss and the nature of love itself—immense, vast beyond comprehension, infinite—is deceptively terrifying. I say “deceptively” because I’ve glimpsed it and survived.

This video, When I Die: Lessons from the Death Zone, was deeply moving to me. If you’re also on a quest to overcome the fear to love, I hope this inspires you too.