La Douleur Exquise - The Exquisite Pain

Love is a funny old emotion. 

People kill for it, and people die for it. People will quite literally hurt themselves and others just for a taste of the rapturous intoxication that's embodied by that little four-letter word. 

So why do we do it? Because it's not as if it's easy. It takes time, and hard work. Simply put, love's a bitch. 

Thing is; we don't enter into these things thinking about the end result and the pain it might bring. Love's an addiction; it's the same as any drug. You're drawn to it because of how it makes you feel initially. That crazy high. Then you spend the rest of your life chasing the dragon. 

I recently stumbled upon a French term I found quite elegant - "La Douleur Exquise". I'm told that it refers to the deep pain of loving somebody that you cannot have. Knowing that, and longing for them anyway. Emotional "cold turkey". This is something we have all experienced at least once in our lives; myself included.

I once thought that my first love would be the grandest of my life. I then thought exactly the same about my second love, and my third. I'm certain I will feel this way about every girl I ever fall in love with. 

Maybe that's the nature of love. The pursuit of happiness, contentment and companionship. Because is there anything quite as sweet as rolling over in the morning, and feeling that warmth next to you? Holding it in your arms and pulling it closer, and knowing that that's yours. That they have given themselves to you and you to them, wholly. 

I think we chase it because there's nothing else on the planet that can make you feel like that. There isn't a single thing in this world that people are so willing to suffer for. That's the beauty of it. Like addiction, it doesn't matter how destructive it is; you will always convince yourself that you are worse off without it.

If you're reading this you may think I sound cynical, but I urge you to look closer. Love is a wonderful thing, and I don't lament the loss of it without a certain perspective. I view life in the same way that I would view a song; change is important. Without change, the song would consist of one note, played over and over again. If you embrace the changes, you free yourself up to ride the crescendos and live in the music. 

Note for note. Beat for beat.

The Moral of Icarus

Beginning a new journey is as difficult as beginning anything with meaning; it's hard to know where to start. Much like a story for which you've written only the middle and the end, oftentimes you wish you could just jump straight in at the 6th chapter, at a point where everything has begun to make sense and take shape.

I've always believed that this is because first steps are invariably the hardest ones to take. It can be easy to forget sometimes that you have to learn to crawl before you learn to walk, even if it occasionally feels like it'd be easier to simply lie there; an immobile, immovable object with no desire to drift and no need to change trajectory. 

Over the last few weeks, I've had my love of film reignited by the good advice of a friend. The films that have begun to re-stoke this passion in me have each dealt with the invasive discontentment that can descend upon us as we grow and change. More importantly, these films have focused on the desire to escape that downward spiral and emerge as someone better. Someone great.

So why is it so difficult? Why do we fear journeying into the unknown? Probably for the same reason we fear the dark as children; we have no idea what's out there and it seems far more logical to remain in the safety of our beds. This is a mindset I've fallen into time and again. I'm 24 years old and it often feels as if all I have to show for it is plans and hypotheticals. Plans are important, but it's finding the distinction between a solid idea and a pipe dream that matters. Once you've figured that out? Hell, maybe it's better to shoot high. 

It's all how you look at the glass. Is the moral of Icarus that he flew too close to the sun? No. It's that he fucking flew.

So I suppose, in the end, it boils down to a choice:

Would you rather fall on your face from 10ft or 1000ft? Either way it's going to sting like hell; you might as well enjoy a good view on the way down. You might see something beautiful.