I love you. Here's why
I love you.
I mean it. I have reasons. Many. And I will explain them. Because it would be weird for you to believe that I love you without enough reasons.
About me
Let’s start with me (because everything in my universe starts with me, just as everything in yours starts with you.)
I love writing.
I am writing right now and I love doing it. As my fingers move over the keys and these words appear on the screen in front of me, I am filled with joy, wonder, and love.
I predict I will later edit what I am writing, and almost-right words will become ever-more-right. I predict I will be filled with more joy and wonder and love.
[Editor’s note: I did edit it, and I was.]
About you
Now let’s move to you, the center of your world.
I may know who you are, but I probably don’t. I hope this piece of writing will last for a long time, and most of the people who read this will be unknown to me and most will be unknowable because this writing will outlast whatever of me does the knowing.
Whether I know you or not doesn’t matter. I love you.
Now for the reasons
Reason 1: I love you because I have loved writing this and you have read it—at least this far. That’s a good enough reason for me to love you. You may need more reasons. I don’t. But here are some more, for you.
Reason 2: I love you because you are still reading this. (You are, aren’t you?) I don’t love you more for continuing to read it. I wouldn’t love you less if you had stopped at the first sentence. Or the title. I’m looking for excuses here (some call them reasons.). Not for me. I had me at Reason 1. But for you.
Reason 3: I love you because we share so much. Perhaps we share a network of loving friends. Certainly we share the internet. Most of your DNA is the same as my DNA so we have our shared genome. We share common ancestors—the first human, the first vertibrate, the first cell. Whatever. We share enough for me to say I love you That’s a good excuse. I mean a good reason.
Reason 4: I love you because I want to be the kind of person who can love anyone, even you. I say I love you because I want to be the kind of person who can say I love you. I’m not quite that person yet, but I’m practicing and I am getting better.
Reason 5: I love you because you’ve inspired me to write this. Yes! You.
What I imagine
I can write without any reason and any inspiration. But right now, I imagine that I’m inspred by imagining you still reading this (You are, aren’t you? How did I know that?)
I imagine that because you have read this, you write or talk to a friend and say something like, “I thought of you,, and I love you.”
I imagine that because you have read this, you decide you can love someone else and you love them. Or you decide you can tell someone else, and you tell them. Or both.
I imagine so many things that you could do and say as a result of reading this. I’m full of joy and love just thinking about what you might do. Or not.
And I imagine you doing something wonderful that I haven’t imagined.
You could!
The end of reasons
I can invent reasons and imagine things longer than you are willing to read them. Maybe you’ve already given up. I hope not. In any case, I’m going to quit with the reasons and imagining.
I hope that this inspires you to tell some people that you already know that you love that you love them. (That’s a confusing sentence, but I love it.)
I hope this gives you some reasons you can use to help you love some new people and that you can use to help you tell them.
I hope you find your own reasons to tell more people that you love them.
Think of the world
Think about how the world would change if you loved everyone you could love--and told them.
Think of how the world would change if you encouraged people to love more, not less--and tell more people more often.
That’s what I’m thinking.
This is my small contribution.
Please make your own.
If for no other reason than someone loves you.