love is what we have decided that we value in life

Love is all its various forms is ultimately about caring--caring so deeply about another person, group, idea, or place that we would be willing to sacrifice our own health, comfort, and even life for it. One hallmark of great art is the amount of care that we sense has gone into it. When people scoff at modern painting, their typical objection is that it looks as though the painter simply threw paint on the canvas with no care. We find ourselves drawn to art that looks as though the artist struggled with it, put a great deal of thought into it--cared about it.

Love is about feeling that there is something bigger than just ourselves and our own worries and existence. Whether it is love of another person, of country, of God, of an idea, love is fundamentally an intense devotion to this notion that something is bigger than us. Love is ultimately larger than friendship, comfort, ceremony, knowledge, or joy.

- Daniel Levitin