We know what it feels like when we like something. It could be ice cream, your favorite dish, an IPOD, a new smartphone, an idea. We want it because we don't have it yet. We want it because possessing would satisfy us.
Sometimes, we want more of it. We can't seem to get enough. At other times, we've had too much of it, and we just lose interest until such time we come to miss it, and we go through the same prociess of liking, wanting and possessing; and, dropping it.
We like something because of what it does to us. It is an object. It is a utility. It was given a value that has no value of its own. Or, maybe it has a value of its own; but no one has any interest in it if it is not of value to him or her. The external value takes over the internal value. And, it is liked, not for its sake, but for what it can be use to the individual. Money is liked because we use it to buy something that we sought for. Stop liking it, and the thing loses its value. It not only ceases to be of value, it also ceases to be of use. The value is in its use. This is what liking does to an object, be it a thing or a person.
The negative thing about liking then, is the belief that you can't live without it. This is what markets want you to believe with all your guts. There was a time we didn't have an IPOD. We weren't craving for it. But, market created a need that we could live without. But, with marketing, people were conditioned. As one girl said: I could not live without my blackberry.
The positive thing about liking, however, is that we need objects to possess or consume in order to live. We need food. We need clothing. We need people to learn how things work, how to behave, we need to know what to value.
Without them, we would be nothing. We would not be able to function properly.
Liking then serves one purpose: to satisfy the individual. It is natural and necessary.
But, things can go wrong when we start confusing liking with some other experiences. Especially, when we confuse love with liking by infusing the features of liking into love. When that happens, the situation becomes a moral issue.
It becomes a moral issue when we 'love' someone for that person fills a void, a lack in us. This is what liking does, but when love is confused with it, then we tend to use people. Liking becomes confused with loving because of the intensity that is felt or developed over time. No one likes to call it liking, this intense feeling that we have for the other because then we becomes aware that we are using him or her. We would want to give it another name. We call it love.
But that does not change anything; except giving liking another fancy, romantic name. It does not change anything because the other is treated as has having an external value and therefore of use when we need to satisfy our biological or psychological need.
At time, we gradually transcend liking and enter the realm of love. Many want to believe that it was indeed the case with their mate. Nonetheless, unless we take the time to differentiate loving from liking, we can never be sure. Or, we may have mistakenly believe that what we experience is love, when it was never the case.
So, what is love if it is not a liking? Is it a feeling? Or, is it borne out of a rational decision?
