The Power of Love (by Summer)

Hi, it's me, Summer. I thought about doing a story for this. Shysage listened to what I had in mind, then hugged me a few minutes, trying not to cry. At any rate, he said a blog post would be better, whatever that is. He smiled, and said once I had it written down, and was happy with it, he would take care of getting it posted. And we are even buried in the Past right now; I don't know how that works.

The title is the power of love, and I guess I need to start by explaining this right away. Love is NOT just sexual interaction! This seems obvious to me; you can pursue some level of pleasure with somepony you hate the rest of the time... or even somepony you don't even know. I don't, well I wouldn't... Even though the word love is used like that a lot, that's just not love.

What is love then? Hmm... For me, love is not getting yelled at, ever. Or somepony being angry with me, even if I deserve it. And never being put down, or made fun of. And I guess as a Fluttershy, I can feel it when I am just being tolerated or... well, ulterior motives, love would never do that. Just complete honesty... In fact, I would feel complete acceptance, gentle peace. I would always see a calm, sincere smile, and could feel that firm, caring hug, no matter what. And maybe this is me, but soft gentle caresses all over my body, not just the sexual areas. I mean love would include that, but would encompass far more, and not focus just on feeling amazing, I don't know. And this physical stuff would be the capstone, not the initial pursuit. And, oh my goodness, love is always there to help! I could count on love to always be there, with exactly what I need, including a shoulder to cry on... no matter what. So, I guess, to boil it all down, love is making me feel so cherished, every moment, every hour of every day... and this... regardless of how hard it is, or whatever else is going on around us... I know this seems centered on me, but I am just trying to explain love by painting a picture of how real love makes me feel... cherished... like I am the most important pony in Equestria. I think deep down inside, most everypony already knows what this is, and how it feels.

And, I am pretty sure about this. Ponies pursue a lot of different things to feel better. We could start at the hard cider trough, and go from there; there are so many paths ponies gallop along to try to fill the hurt and loneliness inside. But these pursuits, I feel pretty strongly that they are all nothing more than temporary fixes, dim reflections of the real love we all desparately want, and even more desparately need.

Well, ok then. How can a pony get this real love?

If you have enough gold bits, here in Equestria, you may be able to buy a part of this -- for an hour, for a day maybe, or longer if you have a lot of bits. But, like I said, this only gives you a (small) part of what love really is, and only for a short time. Real love is so amazing, such a short term deal would never do, and could never really show love in all it's glory. But I think this, something like love can be bought and sold, but inside, we know it is contrived, forced, artificial; we clearly realize the charade. Maybe for some, this is enough I guess. And if that's they way they want...

And I gotta admit that ponies with that Fluttershy sensitivity often just live this way; we are just naturally very giving ponies. But most of us end up with ponies that just take... That is just... Well, such... We crash and burn; the amazing gift of giving just can't be trampled and abused like that. The giver eventually burns out...

I can only share what I have learned: we need to learn to give this kind of love first. We should not expect to receive this kind of love until long after we have committed to giving it to others ourselves. But, oh my goodness, the more we give, far more will we receive. I think I'm jumping ahead... Putting other ponies ahead of ourselves, making them more important; treating them as more important; I think that is the key. And yes, that is just so hard, and certainly goes against how we feel a lot of the time. But I have found that to be the root of true love. Everything I mentioned about how love makes me feel, somepony needs to be willing to give that to me -- and no matter what, wow! That ususally doesn't just happen. We need to learn to give that amazing gem we hope to one day receive back (we will!). I think this might be the hard part. Putting others first is not very popular or comfortable. And many ponies that try often get so abused and trampled...

Maybe, in some ways I got lucky. Shysage is so amazing... But we have learned a lot about this together, seeking to simply serve and care for each other, taking care of each other regardless of how hard it was or is for us personally. This seems the perfect soil for just such an amazing flower to flourish. Honestly, like most ponies, I used to pursue the thrill of the moment. But now, I have real love, every moment of every day of the year. There is just no comparison. And our true friend in the sky really helps us here, I don't know...

The slow rise of anger, hatred, yelling, strife, and worse, even here in Equestria, is a real concern to me. Such things only work to stamp out the possibility of the real love that we all so desparately need. This is just really scary to me. The growth of such unloving emotions and actions short-circuits any possibility for real love, and can only have a harmful impact on Equestria as a whole. And listen, this isn't rocket science, even though I have never seen a rocket! More and more, we are surrounded... Ponies next to each of us are really hurting inside. And it seems like daily life for some ponies, well every day is crushing for them. And, you know what? This growing crescendo of yelling, anger, rage, hurting, killing... It's not helping! It is only making things worse! We need to realize...

But this is amazing -- love has power too! As more and more ponies grow in their comttment to put each other first... Equestria could be such an awesome, amazing place! This absolutely can be a very real outcome if we, more and more of us are willing to invest, learning to love like this, and give ourselves...

...

I feel like I am trying to explain something so amazingly beautiful, and I am getting so completely lost adoring what I am trying to talk about. I apologize if this discussion isn't real organized as a result. I also know that my heart is speaking as well as my head. I can only hope each of our readers find such a love that effortlessly and gently fills our every yearning. Everypony needs that...

-- Summer