Get our priorities adjusted |30 August 2014

It’s a subject that occupies our mind a lot throughout our life time. There are those of us that may go through life without truly finding it or completely understanding it. Not understanding what it truly means and feels like, and therefore convince ourselves that it is something else.

I am not an expert on the subject, far from it, but I feel that there are people out there that confuse it with other emotions that stem from material things, and physical desires, that in some way may feel like we have found it. The ‘it’ that I am referring to is none other than the feeling we call love.

“4 Love is patient, love is kind. It does not envy, it does not boast, it is not proud. 5 It does not dishonour others, it is not self-seeking, it is not easily angered, it keeps no record of wrongs. 6 Love does not delight in evil but rejoices with the truth. 7 It always protects, always trusts, always hopes, always perseveres.

8 Love never fails.” (The Bible - 1 Corinthians 13:4-8 New International Version)

Sure enough such a love must be one of those found only in fairy tales, or found only in those epic Disney movies, whereby true love can conquer all, can surmount every and any barrier, and that is everlasting and perfect. True enough such love would indeed be wondrous, and magical. It is not that I do not believe in the possibility of such a love, in terms of two people that are seeking a romantic connection, but I believe that we are sometime blinded by our other desires, which in most cases lead us to settle for less, thinking that it is actually more.

That is why one of my favourite all time Disney animations is ‘Beauty and The Beast’. That is because in this movie there is a strong message that I believe is being communicated, and I am not sure that we all got it. What the movie is portraying is that love is not obtained through mere physical appeal or desires, but rather through the connection that is felt within one another, or through the beauty we see inside the other person. It would have been easy to see Bell, the protagonist, fall in love with a prince charming or Gaston the villain of the movie, but in Beauty and the Beast the handsome Gaston, who every girl in town wants to be with, is depicted as the villain, self-absorbed, arrogant, and caring nothing for others, but himself. I think that this is a nice switch for ones.

As we live in a world where physical appearance means everything to us, it should therefore not come as a surprise to us that a lot of us mistake physical attraction for love. Yes it is a form of love, but I doubt it is the kind of love any of us are truly after. I am not saying that all attractive women or men are the same as Gaston, what I want is for you to see the difference, and at least attempt to get to know the person before you surrender yourself completely over to them.

As a child growing up, I along with my peers especially the girls of my age, were overwhelmed by a romanticise kind of love, whereby the girls were told that love was when you are swept off your feet by a tall, dark, handsome man, intense, mysterious, and who seems to know exactly what they want, when they want. Those where the stories told in the fantasy books like Mills and Boons, which of course the girls loved to read all the time. Although this I would say was the way that most girls of my generation would wish to experience love, I feel that nowadays the younger generation, be it girls or boys, have a somewhat contorted view of love. Again I am not saying all of them, but an alarming number of them I feel have lost sight of what love truly is.

The physical appearance is still there for some, but for a lot more, they are now more concerned about monetary security. They live in a world that is so governed by money and the desire to obtain it, that they seem willing to sacrifice emotional and spiritual happiness, for the temporary happiness of money, or rather what it can buy for them. Can we truly blame them? Listen to the songs they listen too, which promote having money and affording expensive things, and practically saying that women are attracted to a man because of how much money he has to spend on her. Is it true or false? That’s what they are saying in those songs a least.

I have personally heard preachers that tell you that you have to keep coming to their church so that you can be blessed, and how would you know you have been blessed, because God will make you have access to more money, and you’ll be able to buy a car, have a better house. It’s a topsy-turvy world, when even churches start to attract new followers with the promise of wealth.

Therefore yes, that is one of the reasons why I believe we are dealing with so many troubled youth. They’ve got their priorities all wrong, because the whole world around them is telling them that happiness comes from riches. You can find love when you have money, and my favourite quote of all is “Get rich or die trying”. Doesn’t it just say it all? It is high time we teach the up and coming generation the true meaning of happiness, and love. I believe that someone that has found love, although being poor, can be far happier than a person without love, but is swimming in money. Of course that’s only my own view of things, and I can always be wrong.

K.B.