Arnald Paguio

Block B

It took a lot for me to do all this, if anyone in the audience knows me, they’d tell you I’m

probably the best (and worst) person to give a speech on my topic. It’s also scary to touch on

such a delicate subject-matter: love, a concept so enigmatic yet familiar. To have your say on

what love should be is already risky, to say we’re doing it all wrong would be ludicrous. But

that’s what I want to do today, because I do have a problem with it.

Let me paint a picture: the gleam in his/her eyes, the soft, fervent hum of your heart, the pull

of destiny tugging at your own soul, enticing you to the idea of attainable eternity. We all

want to transcend ourselves, especially in our world that seems devoid of purpose. This

eternity, however, I’ve come to realize, can’t exist. “Ridiculous!” one might say. More often

than not, we can’t say we love someone without looking forward. In fact, the general

consensus is a relationship that doesn’t last isn’t worth it. Now THAT, just can’t be, and let

me explain;

I’ve been in quite a few relationships; it has lent me a reputation…not ideal to say the least.

For a while love felt distant, as if it weren’t for me. Then years passed and I saw a pattern not

only in my life, but those of my peers. Sure, there are definitely outliers, the handful of

couples destined to defy the odds, but that’s the thing. These people are considered

OUTLIERS, and yet we continue to insist that the age-old notion of love lasting should be
the norm. I admit, it’s hard to change old habits or ideas. It seems like a reflex for our parents

to drop the word marriage when we are in any substantial relationship. In our culture, they’ve

ingrained this expectation of forever in our heads in little ways. Commercials, television

shows, movies, and music all prophesize the dream that awaits us all: the one. And you’ve all

felt it, I’ve felt it, the feeling of perfection just within our grasp and it seems obvious to never

let go. What this creates though, is expectation. Expectation, from what I see, a lot of us

can’t handle.

I’m not here to call for the end of lasting relationships, nor am I being bitter towards love. It

is, however, time to fully accept the transient nature of love and not fear it. In our world, we

are lambasted with new ideas, new forms of culture (like k-drama), and stimuli in general

which pull us in all in different directions. What I am tomorrow can be completely different

from what I am now, and that’s the nature of a world in flux. To expect someone to remain

relevant to you for a sustained period of time these days is impractical, bordering

inconsiderate. In mere seconds, I can become a stranger to you, and it’s beyond any of our

control. We can expect change, we can expect to outgrow each other, and most of all, we can

expect the end. Loss will remain painful, don’t get me wrong, especially when the person

you love gives you that look and you know you just stopped making sense to him/her. Your

whole world crumbles because you’ve failed to offer that path to eternity. But, to borrow

from old buddhist mantras, it was expecting eternity which made it all the more painful.

Little did we know, the nightmares that haunt the present stem from dreams we’ve held dear

for so long. So to me, we get rid of the stigma and we switch up our relationship with loss.
We anticipate it, not out of spite, but out of consideration for the world our loved ones live in.

The value of love lies in the fact that we might never see those people again the next day. It’s

painful for me to say, but I’ve promised (and had been promised) forever far too often to not

see the consequences. And that was my mistake, I never learned how to appreciate a person

in the moment, and the moment, if we think about it, is all we have. The laughs we shared,

the hugs we gave, the kisses on the cheeks, should’ve meant the world to us not because they

were signs of things to come, but because in those very moments, you and I both made sense

to each other.

In conclusion, here’s a plea to you all: THE END IS IN SIGHT and always will be, but you

never hear anyone complain about the sun setting or when they hear a storm rolling nearby.

These things, we’ve just come to expect, but it never stopped us from waiting for the sun to

come out eventually. When the sunlight does hit our skin, we bask in its warmth, and in a

way, the same it is with love. So if you love someone, grab his/her hand, for the end is nigh.

All the more a reason to hold tighter.

Sources:

De Botton, A. (2016). On Love. Lecture presented at Ideas at the House: Alain De Botton in

Australia, Sydney.

Fromm, E. (1956). The Art of Loving. New York: Continuum Pub.

Hegel, G. (1798). Love. In Nohl (pp. 378-382).

Jenkins, C. (2015). What Is Love? An Incomplete Map of the Metaphysics. Journal of the

American Philosophical Association, 1(02), 349-364. doi:10.1017/apa.2015.4

Moller, D. (2003). An Argument against Marriage. Philosophy, 78(01). doi:10.1017/

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