The moment we choose to love we begin to move towards freedom.
Interpretation
Choosing to love leads us to a state of freedom and liberation.
In this quote, Bell Hooks emphasizes that the act of choosing love is not only a personal decision but also a transformative one. When we consciously decide to love, we open ourselves to possibilities beyond our fears and limitations, moving towards a state of emotional and spiritual freedom that enriches our lives and those around us.
In practice
In a speech about personal growth, one could quote this to emphasize the importance of love in overcoming challenges.
Privilege is not in and of itself bad; what matters is what we do with privilege. I want to live in a world where all women have access to education, and all women can earn PhDβs, if they so desire. Privilege does not have to be negative, but we have to share our resources and take direction about how to use our privilege in ways that empower those who lack it.
Self-love is the foundation of our loving practice. Without it our other efforts to love fail. Giving ourselves love we provide our inner being with the opportunity to have the unconditional love we may have always longed to receive from someone else.
While privacy strengthens all our bonds, secrecy weakens and damages connection. Lerner points out that we do not usually "know the emotional costs of keeping a secret" until the truth is disclosed. Usually, secrecy involves lying. And lying is always the setting for potential betrayal and violation of trust.
When we only name the problem, when we state complaint without a constructive focus or resolution, we take hope away. In this way critique can become merely an expression of profound cynicism, which then works to sustain dominator culture.
Once you do away with the idea of people as fixed, static entities, then you see that people can change, and there is hope.
I still think it's important for people to have a sharp, ongoing critique of marriage in patriarchal society β because once you marry within a society that remains patriarchal, no matter how alternative you want to be within your unit, there is still a culture outside you that will impose many, many values on you whether you want them to or not.
Had I been in love, I could not have been more wretchedly blind. But vanity, not love, has been my folly.
Love cannot be held prisoner because it is a river and will overflow its banks.
God is calling you to a passionate love relationship with Himself. The answer to religious complacency isn't working harder at a list of do's and don'ts-it's falling in love with God.
I live in Harlem, New York City. I am unmarried. I like 'Tristan,' goat's milk, short novels, lyric poems, heat, simple folk, boats and bullfights; I dislike 'Aida,' parsnips, long novels, narrative poems, cold, pretentious folk, buses and bridges.
Her heart - like every heart, if only its fallen sides were cleared away - was an inexhaustible fountain of love: she loved everything she saw.
We outgrow love like other things and put it in a drawer, till it an antique fashion shows like costumes grandsires wore.
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