When you love someone, you choose to see yourself and your partner as separate entities. In healthy love, you are individuals having your own dreams, likes, wants, and needs. You each have your whole lives without the other. You choose to honor what your partner wants even if you don’t want that thing.

When you love someone, you don’t cling. You don’t make him be the only tune of your life. There is no such thing as “You are all I need.” in the way you love. You know that wanting to possess what you love is not good. You know this because it makes you suffer. And you know that in the process of chasing something you already know is uncatchable, you will lose yourself. Since you cannot own another person.

Of course, sometimes you kinda want to claw your eyes out, stomp your foot like a kid and shout ‘Mine!’ every time someone devours your love with their eyes. But you have learned your lesson. You were once a hysterical wreck and trying to own your person has made your love run away from you like a man running away from a burning fire. So, you love fiercely but also, lightly.

You love consistently. Your love is the quiet, affection, and attachment you feel when you see your love, hear his voice or talk about him. It is not an obsession that makes you care. It is a normal thing for you. You love him quietly. You dry his hair with a towel, looking cool and efficient. Like there was nothing strange about it. Like it was a perfectly normal thing to do. You care.

When you love someone, you’re still a caveman at heart when it comes to your love. This instinct to fight for your love is more than a biological instinct. You would go to greater lengths to defend the one you love. Like mine did when some of our friends gave an opinion that writing is not really a skill. You should have seen him defend my love for writing fiercely. You love, so you protect that love from anything or anybody that might hurt it.

When you love someone, you don’t love them for their good personality traits and action. You love them because you love them, with all their flaws and insecurities. Like my grandmom did every time her husband (my granddad) spent few nights a week drinking a few beers with his buddies. He knew she did not like that he spent hours chatting with his friends leaving her alone. But she loved him by waiting for him, by not fighting him every night, by not becoming passive-aggressive. By understanding that he needed this time with his close friends. And he loved her by bringing home her favorite beer. He never came home empty-handed.

When you love someone, you create your love every single day. Love is not something you fell into. It is a choice. It is an action. Love is not just in the romance. You don’t feel the attraction you felt when you met your love now, but you choose to not let your eyes and hormones take control. You choose to get to know that person who is changing in front of your eyes. Just like you are going through. Trying to know the new person as you both evolve is your everyday job.

Your love is real when it is there when things go south. You know that you are building your love when it is there on the bad days. When you are fighting. When you want to be alone. When you don’t want to see the face of your love for a couple of days. But still, you are there for your love not because you want to be in love. Not because you like the idea of being in love. But because you choose to love and work at bonding and blending for both the good days as well as the bad days.

You know that you are in a deep and committed relationship when you are making it work come Monday morning. You especially know that your actions show your dedication to what you are building when the weekend was not good for both of you and yet you are putting your effort. You are investing in your love. You are not letting crucial issues pester and grow.

You love by getting out of your own head and asking the one you love for an explanation and listen with an open heart.

Winning has no place in your relationship. No person is powerful than the other in a healthy relationship. “Power” does not have a place in your heart. So, you choose to embrace each other as individual human beings who are pursuing individual passion, goals, and desires.

So, you choose to love by not wanting to win every argument. Winning is really short-sighted. If you get into every argument by trying to win, you win the argument but lose your relationship.

So, you love by realizing that many things are more important than being right.

Chasing to be a winner or the one who comes out to be the upper hand is like creating a fire that can never be stopped. Your relationship is not a chess game where one party always wins. Building your love is not a mathematical problem. You cannot solve it by checking boxes or adding and subtracting.

Love is not shouting ‘I love you’, ‘You are my everything’. Love is not saying the words without backing them up with your actions that show your love. Love is not ignoring your part while the other person is doing his part.

You love by putting in the work. By telling your partner what you like and what you loathe. You love by not withholding your heart’s desires. You love by not wanting to appear nice, polite, and accommodating. Falsehood has no place in your action. You remove your mask. You choose to be frank than making him bleed later.

You love by putting in the work. You are not intentionally hurtful. There are no low blows. You go through life by recognizing that you are both fallible. You are not perfect and you are going to make mistakes. So, you choose to have honest communications. You choose to set your ego aside. You choose to fight less. You choose to get angry less. You don’t always wait for your person to forgive. You forgive first.

You love by putting in the work. You build your love every day. You are present in your conversations. You choose to compromise on things that are important to your love. You make your relationship work. You make efforts. You listen. You talk. You let the other person be.

You love by putting in the work. You step up and take ownership of your emotions. You might feel frustrated, angry, and devastated sometimes. You are entitled to your feelings. Just like he is entitled to his own feelings. But, you choose to take responsibility for your own feelings.

Deep down, you know that your love is not your lifesaver. He is your partner. He is not there to prevent you from drowning or to make you surface above the water. He is there to swim with you in this thing called life.