Hey i want to throw this out there. Does everyone think that love makes the world go round? I`m not really sure if it is. In a way i understand it, and in another way i don`t. I guess I`ll know when i actually find my "love". What about true love can that even exist? Or happiness in for one person? It can mean a lot for to put off for one person. But thats just me. See thats the thing when ever we wish for a person happiness, it won`t do any good. And what about living without hurting yourself or anyone?... Someone`s bound to fall and hurt someone else. So i don`t think anyone can have a clean relationship with anyone. Enemies, girl friends, boyfriends, friends, family, colleges,ecetra... Just respect your self and no one alone. This way you won`t have to burden ones pay on you, including haunting past stalking right behind you. I`m pretty sure you can change your own past. In your own ways.

I've heard people say that the three things that humans need are faith, hope and love. And that love is the most important. I'm not sure if it's biblical or something but either way I think it sounds about right (I'm an atheist btw). Just think how miserable and lonely you would be without these. I don't know about faith but with things like suicide and loneliness, love and friendship give people hope.
With true love it probably could exist but is just uncommon because love now days is all about social physical attraction or social status. Or they are just desperate and will settle for just about anyone. I think that true love is only possible for certain kinds of people.
With the hurting people side of it I think that in a real, loving relationship you will both be open and honest enough with each other to not hurt each other or get hurt by each other. In other words you will understand each other which will make things between you easier to sort out.
This also connects to my thread of not having real friends too I guess.
People can change in life and if you both know that then the past won't matter. If you can trust that they had there reasons for doing whatever they did and that you would probably do the same in there position then understanding each other could be easier.
I think that you have the right idea though. I think it's better to be really picky about who to love or be true friends with because otherwise you will usually just settle with who's available. Sometimes we might just be in an environment where the people around us aren't compatible and can't give us the feeling of true love or a true friend.
I hope this helped.

If you just take a brief look at history from the beginning of civilization to now.
The world defiantly doesn't revolve around love.

I think what foreversigh is very true, and very wise. I also believe that true love is only possible for certain kinds of people. I also would die by the truth that mutual understanding is what leads to love. The world today is too physical...looks, clothing, social status. It's all too important to the every day person. A shame really, those things will decay so quickly.

It's hard for me not to be a shallow person. I'm sure it's hard for everyone. Recently I've been really trying to break out of that. It's so restricting to the soul.

In my head "love" has an easy explanation. I believe love is just "Shared Selfishness" we're all inherently selfish. But when that selfishness lines up and syncs with others. The effects pretty beautiful.

I've been questioning this a lot later...we all have a desire for love to be real, but we're just so weak that efforts fall through a lot. It's a thing to ponder. But I guess I'll end it by just saying...be open about your imperfections and faults. I feel like that's a severe pitfall in love.

Thanks Liber. By the way, I love your idea of love being "shared selfishness". It really makes sense and I've never really connected the two. I'm not sure if this is relevant but I did think about something interesting about selfishness a while ago that I think is connected.

The way I see it is that if everyone was selfless or put others first then the world will be a lot better for everyone (so i guess we could still be selfish as well). The reason that people are selfish instead I think is because we've concluded that we can't rely on others to be selfless for us so if we are selfless then it will put us at a disadvantage. There's probably a good metaphor to explain this that I can't think of but I guess it's something that has to be perfect to work so even if it is only 1% making it not work then it prevents the whole thing and snowballs into the world of today (By the way if someone could think of a good metaphor to explain this it would be much appreciated).

We are naturally selfish either way. But you don't need the whole world to be selfless for it to benefit you buy just those around you. So if everyone around you (like a village or community for example) looked out for others first then it would become an awesome, safe place (not perfect though but close). But even that isn't perfect and you might have your doubts about peoples reliability. So what we really need is something really reliable and the best way to do that is to decrease the numbers so that you can be more honest and open with them about it. The most reliable way of mutually beneficial situations is by just having the two of you. You can be a lot more open and trustworthy and understand each other a lot more. This means that you have the best feeling of safety and reliability that you can get. You both benefit from it so it's like you said, "shared selfishness". I don't know if it applies to love but it makes sense for what I would think of as the perfect two people relationship (to an extent).

I wonder if at one point the world was like that and everyone put others first. I hope that made sense and that you found it interesting or helpful and relevant.