The Thing I Was Afraid to Write About: Why Love Is the Bravest Thing We Do
- Stefan Jurgens
- Jun 9
- 3 min read
I’ve shared lots of posts, yet I’ve avoided the one subject my grandmum identified as the essential truth of life: love.
Why? Because love feels corny. Naïve. Weak.
We’re taught love is vulnerability, a liability in a self-sufficient world. We hide "I love you" behind irony, fearing the admission diminishes us. Calling it "corny"? It’s a defense against our raw need for connection.
But what if love isn’t a passive fragility, but the bravest, most revolutionary act of being human?
Love Is Action, Not Magic
My grandmum survived economic depression, war, a broken marriage, and loneliness. When she told me, “Love is all,” I thought she was just being … silly.
But my grandmum’s wisdom holds true: love lives in action, not passive feeling. Love isn't Cupid's magic, but the daily work of choosing connection despite our hurts, sorrows, and defensiveness.
Love is engaging when your partner loads the dishwasher ‘wrong’—prioritizing connection over irritation. Love is listening when retreating feels safer. Love is framing conflict as shared turbulence: proof you’re navigating life’s storms together."
Love Isn’t Just a Lightning Bolt
We’ve been told love should feel like a constant euphoric high. But its real power lies in emotional resilience and steady connection, not constant passion.
New love’s intensity is real, but mistaking that spark for the whole of love is like expecting fireworks to last forever. What lasts is quieter, but stronger—not fireworks, but the warmth that remains.
When we chase perpetual infatuation, we risk missing the quiet emotional nourishment that comes from deep, enduring companionship.
How Love Shapes Us—Biologically, Psychologically, and Socially
The absence of love doesn’t break us, but it changes us. We adapt, growing guarded where we once might’ve been open, self-reliant where intimacy could have shared the weight.
But love’s presence transforms us, measurably and deeply:
Biologically: Elderly couples in secure relationships feel less pain when together, and pair-bonded mice resist tumours better than those alone—suggesting that close emotional bonds can boost immunity and reduce stress.
Psychologically: In therapy, psychotherapists offer unconditional positive regard—a professional form of love that says: “You are seen and worthy, even in your brokenness.”
Socially: After unthinkable loss, strangers gather to build memorial playgrounds. They shovel mulch, paint murals, and turn grief into community resilience. Where heartbreak meets shared action, love becomes a verb.
Why We Call It "Chemistry" (But Whisper "Love")
Why do we say, “attachment style” or “neurochemistry” instead of simply admitting: “I want to be loved”?
Because vulnerability scares us.
Many of us learned early that love isn’t safe. Maybe one person craves stability, but fears intensity; another longs for passion, but expects abandonment.
Culture may dismiss love as frivolous, but history proves we’ll risk everything for connection.
We’re built for connection. To shut out love is to shut down something essential in us. Choosing love—messy, imperfect, and real—isn’t weakness. It’s an act of quiet defiance.
An Invitation
My grandmum’s legacy wasn’t naïveté. It was fierce rebellion: planting wartime gardens, tucking love notes into her grandson’s pocket, even as she carried her own quiet loneliness.
Her world was harsh, yet her love was a defiant act of hope.
Her legacy invites us, where our own lives permit, to:
Choose Courage – Lean into the awkward beauty of whispering, “I need you,” and the terrifying exposure of genuine need.
Collect Moments – Notice the sunlight on your lover’s cheek, the spontaneous laughter, the ordinary evidence of shared life.
Build Bridges – Volunteer. Listen. Mend what’s broken. Understand that sometimes love requires firm boundaries—or even the heart-wrenching courage to walk away when a relationship harms more than it heals.
Corn Is a Seed. Plant It Anyway.
Beyond sentiment, love is a survival mechanism. It regulates stress, heals emotional wounds, and builds human connection.
Love shows up as protection, as comfort, as belonging.
Yes, writing about it feels vulnerable. But I do it because love asks for a kind of courage most of us were never taught.
Maybe that sounds corny. But corn is a seed.
Plant it anyway.
Call it life.
At Inner Counsel Therapy, I help individuals to cultivate balanced, compassionate relationships with their goals and self-expectations. Together, we explore ways to embrace growth with kindness and authenticity. Book a free consultation and begin your journey back to yourself.
Comments