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Is there any truth to the cliche "Better to have loved and lost than never to have loved at all?".

I'm curious as to your thoughts coz I can see both sides.

-AC

never given it any thoughts

Me either but I would say it is better sometimes to be loved then not to be loved at all.JM

I'll let you know when it happens...

for the time being, i'd say that it's true.

That avator btw is very distrubing.JM

I can't say that I'd know from experience...but I'd have to say that I'd rather have the experience of being in love with someone, even had it not lasted, than to have never been in love.

It depends on the type of person one is. I am an individual who falls into pensive moods at times, brooding over the bad things that have happened to me. In the end, I feel that it would be better for my heart to remain a stone than to have it come alive and be broken. If one is the type of person who "gets over" conflicts/disappointment easily, then it would be the opposite.

i know from experience that it is better to have loved and lost than to have never loved before.

TIFF!

I'm going to have to go with "to never have loved at all".

Love is a positive.........lost is an equal if not greater negative. to have never loved at all is neither a positive or a negative. You never gained anything.......but you never lost anything either.

analogy:

Is it better to win 1million dollars and lose it all..........or to never have won it at all. I'm going with the second one. There is nothing lost because you don't know what you're missing...........whereas the first one you've not only lost everything you gained but you also lost more.........disappointment added on top of the loss of the original gain.

Winning money isn't the same as having loved someone.

really......

excitement........planning for the future........enjoying your present with hopes of enjoying your future even more.........all to suddenly be taken away from you.........leaving you without the object that first set you on the coarse and also adding sadness and depression on top of it.

gain and loss........no matter what terms you use to apply them to, same exact thing.

Winning money is not a shared experience. And you can hardly 'be freinds' (ok, biggest myth in the Universe) with the money you have lost.

I repeat what I said in the emotions thread.
Without pain, happiness is nothing. I would rather live a life with pain and happiness, than just happiness. This is the reason why I think there is an Earth, and people don't just go to heavan.

ok........that is your preference.......

but you do realize that from a logical point of view.......nothing gain/nothing lost is better than gain/greater loss?

1+0 = 1

you didn't get anything......but didn't lose anything.

1+ 1 - 2 = 0

you're worse off than when you started.

Worse end result maybe, but a more interesting life inbetween. IMHO '1' is meaningless unless you have a '2' and a '0' to compare it to.

agreed........but we weren't discussing interesing, we were discussing better.



nah.....really........there is no right answer.......emotion is more than just math and could never truly be represented by numbers. The only way my above example would work is purely based on logic...........and emotion isn't based on logic, usually it's the exact opposite...go figure.

people want to feel at least appreciated some time or another in their lives. even memories are better than having nothing to grasp.

how much is Alpha gonna wallow in his grief over his lost girlfriend!!!!

i felt sorry for ya at first but .... YES!!! it is better to have had your girlfriend in your life for the time you did then to have never met her or loved her at all!!!!!!!

I think all the people we have in our lives we learn things from them that we use later in life.... ( **gag** ...i know)

I will say its better to have loved and lost.... while it can hurt, the memories of good times remain, and all of life is about experiance, and learning. It would be sad to have never loved, even more so if one avoided love for fear of some future loss....

it's easier not to love.

but it is more satisfying to find love


(sowwie about spelling, it's not my day )

it hurts to lose it, but i wouldnt trade the positive memories for anything.

so i say yes, it is better to have loved and lost, at least you'll have experienced it.

Depends on how you view it I think.

Personally I always think everyone should go for it when it concerns love. I mean to try and fail is better then to wonder about "what if?" for the rest of your life.

If I hadden't "tried" with Storm I would still be wondering what if

However I also think that when it's right like it is wiv Storm and I. You don't need much conviction you just do things without thinking about them. They just feel right.

Only when I'm with Storm I (can) trully listen to my heart instead of my mind.

I definately think that quote is very true.

No matter how you may feel for a while after you lose a love, in the long run you'll have some wonderful memories of that relationship, and good memories are priceless.

If you want to see a good movie study this concept, watch Eternal Sunshine of the Spotless Mind.

Love is wierd.

We are the sum total of our experiences, so if we have not known love, then we have not truly lived!

Yeah. I like that.

My signature pretty much says it all: "Love is a crafty lie, an evil being, to subdue your soul".

Nothing more, nothing less. Why do we all believe we need love? Because we do I guess. Love is often the crafty lie manufactured by one party to achieve something else (whatver that may be), usually not involving the other party.

That's when your subdued soul flares up and you have to go through the whole thing again to ahcieve your subdued, or "happy" phase.


What a load of crap.

We should probably just accept that the only person you really need to love you is you. Other people are bonuses, but in the end, if you don't love yourself, that's tickets for you then.

This depends on one's opinion of that true love. If a one person called X is lusting after another person called Y, and X thinks they are "in love" with Y, the cliche doesn't really apply to this case...

Whereas if you've been in love once, real love I mean, they'll realise that it is better to have loved and lost rather than to not have loved ever.

...Hey...but that's just my opinion...

If you go from having 1 apple, to having 2 apples, you will be more grateful for the second apple. If you go from 2 apples to 1 apple you will miss that second one, but you will have had it in the first place.

frodo.......I'm not going to comment on content.......but bad analogy.

you + 2 apples........= 3 subjects. normally in cases of love there are only two.

For the analogy to fit you would have to be one of the apples.......who came together with the other......only to have it leave.

I take it back, for it is better to feel something than nothing.

Who was it who said (along these lines): "Should such joy follow great sorrow that our sadness would never end!"

(Or something like that, I have probably completely butchered it, though .)

let me ask anyone who doesnt agree
IS IT BETTER TO HAVE LIVED AND DIED, THEN NOT HAVE LIVED AT ALL?

another thing, love {that is true love} should not be compared to apples or numbers.

and i know from expirience that it is better to have loved and lost then to not have loved at all.

i'd say it isnt better to have loved and lost, just because if you've loved and lost then the pain is greater than never to have loved at all. i mean, its not that the memories arent good to have, because they are, but in my experience, the pain is much greater...

I agree with the saying.. good memories boost our spirits when we're depressed about something at certain times in our lives.

but at the same time, I can agree with the people who think the statement is false and would rather never have loved, because it depends on how deep or painful that loss was.

A good way to look at it I guess is like, as sad as it is to be in loss of one you love, the only reason you feel that sad is because you felt so good before. So it's sorta like a reminder of what was great.

-AC

I wouldn't call a Keats quote a 'cliche', but anyway...

I think the answer to this question is simple. A life spent in the shadow of defence and regret is a life spent in darkness. Step into the light and you may not like what you see, but at least you have the kind of judgement that comes from experience, rather than fear.


"Beauty is truth, truth beauty,"--that is all
Ye know on earth, and all ye need to know.

- Keats, again...

you can only hurt real bad if you cherish your things more than average people....

example--> see how kids cherish thier toys... and how adults keep thier photos together...

Be resolute, fear no sacrifice, and surmount every difficulty to win victory - Mao Tse-tung

MAO TSE-TUNG!?! MAO TSE-TUNG!?!?!?! Mao Tse-tung was a philandering dictator whose actions were irreconcilable with his words! If you know ANYTHING about Mao Tse-tung then the last place you would be quoting him would be in a discussion about LOVE!!!!!!!!!!!!!

well you aint me, I quote whoever I choose, I dont care what deeds they have done, sometime the worst person say somthing wise which can have multiple uses

If someone has loved and lost, that person is in extreme emoional pain. So, I would think it's better never to have loved at all as one is not aware of what one doesn't have. Allthough I am married and have a 2 yr old daughter, I don't regret knowing love, but I profoundly fear the loss of it.

wow this thread has been risen from the dead...

That's coz it's mah thread bebeh.

-AC

Personally, I think it's better to ride a roller-coaster than drive in Holland.

ok try this one. is it better to know something that to know nothing and live in pure ignorance? same question really.

to love and be loved is a gift in itself. its the begining of the end. each cycle ends to begin again.

it depends, will you stop by in Amsterdam?

ok whats your view yerss?

Last time(year) I said that "to experience is a good thing"...
It's just one of my psycology experiements....

You got me, yerssot. Please let me amend my observation:

I think it's better to ride a roller-coaster than drive in Holland without being stoned or all shroomed-up.

Agreed?

thats great! I seem to ba a convo killer! ppl seem my name as the last person to post and no one comes near! why's that? I dont bite for moon's sake!

"ok try this one. is it better to know something that to know nothing and live in pure ignorance? same question really."

That's for another thread. This is Loved and Lost .

-AC

Well none of us can really say can we?...because you could not have experienced both situations so who's to say which one is better or worse?..it depends on the feeling and u couldn't have had both feelings so how do you know which feeling hurt the most?

"it depends on the feeling and u couldn't have had both feelings so how do you know which feeling hurt the most?"

I think the theory is that while you can't experience the sheer hurt of losing someone you love, if you've never loved. So is it better to experience love even if you lose it, than it is to never experience it.

-AC

i'd say its better to have loved and lost because although you will feel hurt, u will also remember all the good times you've had and all the memories which will keep u goin throughout the day

but then one could argue that its better to have never loved at all because you wont feel the hurt, after all you cant miss something u never had....

Yeah but in hindsight there is always gonna be a time where you get past the pain of a break up although it's not necessarily getting over the love. So then you have the memories, the feeling of what it was like and no pain. Maybe a a bit of sadness.

Depends on the loss. If I was in a long term relationship and my girlfriend died or whatever, would be much worse.

-AC

love will always make you grow...
no pain no gain... <--- that is a common proverb used by my friends..

This question is same like letting a child experience what fire can do to them...

There are different parents with different philosophies.. some let the child experience the pain, some just forbid them.. according to what you said, I believe you will just forbid them, right?

A) I'm not having kids.

B) Would I forbid them from falling in love? **** no. If my son or daughter came home looking sad and said "I have a crush and I dunno what to do." The first thing I'd do is make them realise how important it is to cease the chance. Happiness is a luxury we're not often afforded and alot of the time, with regards to relationships or attractions, you have to just grab at it.

You can't discover love if you don't take the first step.

-AC

Love is something that, IMO, you cannot truly understand until you've experienced it.

even when experienced it aint all that comprehensible

Very true.

better to have loved and lost than have spent the rest of my life with that psycho.

Love is more than words and actions.... it's all about the mind..

I think you can think in cliches

It is neither better nor worse. Both hurt and both are, in their own separate ways, unbearable.

Storm: "If you're not reaching forward to any growth or future, you might as well be dead."

Reaching forward to growth and a future also means moving closer to one's eventual death. Every moment forward in life is a moment closer to the end of life.

i think the cliche is true, i mean wouldn't you rather be able to say "yeah, i ahve had a girlfriend/boyfriend" than "uhh..... no i have never had a relationship". but then again, i guess you have to experience it it too. i myself am in the midst of my first real relationship and to me there is no better feeling in the world, so i guess it is all up to the person.

nothing is greater than the love of a patriot....

remember that!!!

Hummm...Is it better to of loved and lost than to of never loved at all.

Though to love and lose that love would sometimes feel like death.

To never to of loved would be death

What is life without love, i haven't experianced it but i don't wanna be alone anymore! any ladies intrested in an honest guy, brown hair, and English?

^ lol

Love for others eliminates selfishness... If there is selfishness, then there is no love for others, other than oneself...

"nothing is greater than the love of a patriot....remember that!!"

No mind more dead either.

-AC

WTF??

I think it is better to have loved and lost because at least then yopu would have had the joy of love, I have never been in love but I would hate to spend the rest of my life like this. It would be terrible to have never loved

If you've never loved than how would the age-old axiom apply to someone who has never experienced love?

That's the whole deal.

Is it better to go without the happiness/hurt combo of love and just live never knowing?

I don't think so.

-AC

Love is a disease, all it does is either forces you in to living a particular lifestyle where you have to do everything to make the other happy or suffer the consequences - and trust me...consequences hurt more than physical pain.

I'd rather not get AIDS, so if i had a choice...i'd never fall in love.

Never knowing? we dont know how it feels to have a horrible disease but we can read about the effects and what can happen to us. would you prefer experiencing it? logically, No.

Then it is no love imo.

Love is being honest with yourself at all times, being honest with the other person at all times, telling, listening, respecting the truth and never pretending. Love is an understanding so complete that you feel as if you are a part of the other person.

Love is the freedom to pursue your own desires while sharing your experiences with the other person, the growth of one individual alongside of and together with the growth of another individual.

Love is giving and taking in a daily situation and being patient with each other' s needs and desires.

It's wrong to say that it is not love at all... I think he's just fustrated at love, to say those words...

Do you think this is love peterKSL?

Love is freewilling... It is a passion, that you want to do, not force... nope it's not love...

But after some time, when relationship has formed, some, will get tired of it, because you have a responsibility to fufill, which is to make the other happy... or suffer the consequences... you don't have your own freedom, you can't be yourself...

I wouldn't call it not being yourself I would call it be an alternate form of yourself. Ones true self is almost always slightly adapted depending on the company one is around.

"which is to make the other happy... or suffer the consequences... you don't have your own freedom, you can't be yourself..."

The one thing you can be for sure, when you're in love, is yourself.

Why are the consequences something to be suffered? If I had arguements with my ex girlfriend, we'd sort them out. There was no suffering.

The whole point of being in a relationship is to sacrifice petty freedoms to be with someone you love.

-AC

Why do we always assume to love is to love someone else? Why is it so difficult to love yourself? Has society poisoned us that much that we must seek companionship in order to establish a safety harbour for our own love?

I'm all for self appreciation but waking up and saying "Self, I love you" is never the same as waking up in the arms of someone you love, with them saying it to you.

-AC

It is human nature to be adapted, I have the same oppinions, but sometimes you just want to be alone...



Sometimes its the continues arguements, or the same arguements that drive either one of the mad...

"The whole point of being in a relationship is to sacrifice petty freedoms to be with someone you love."

this is the only thing I agree with you...

if u truly love sum1 then giving up previous freedoms and habits is no big deal, infact u wont really even be thinking about those petty losses. If ur in love that is, a lot of people think they are in love but are actually far from it.

Neither is 'better'.

If you have never loved, then you cannot miss it. You cannot miss something you never had.

To lose someone - well I dont even wanna go into that, since Im in such position at the moment. So speaking from the ''at the moment'' point of view, its better to have never loved.

For the record, hope you're get through things ok. I'm dealing with it too, have been since November.

It does tend to make me feel better when I think like, I'm only ultra sad because I was ultra happy. Sure by not loving I'd have avoided the sadness but also avoided being ultra happy. So it is kinda worth it. The pain, depending on the extent of the feelings, the break up itself etc, may never go away. It doesn't get better though. You get to points where there isn't much pain but you can always look back and smile at how good things were.

If you do need anyone to talk to, can always PM.

-AC

If you never have loved and you see other people in love, then you'll always wonder what youre missing..

I was always semi-curious, never longed for it or anything.

Being in love is f*cking awesome.

-AC

Thanks, and I have.

this is a difficult subject right now, I just loved and lost, someone to retire with in a couple years, his kids said it's either them, age 18, and 25, or me age 52. He made the decision, of course. Loving is an important plus that develops our character. I wish I had never been with him and he wants to remain friends. I don't want to think about the positive with him, it only hurts more. Now the love of my son is with me. Different kind of love, and that helps me to understand his choice. But it still hurts and makes me want to never build a relationship with a man again. As they say "give it some time" There are different kinds of love and I have the two at battle here. Time isn't passing fast enough for me but I'm hanging in there only because of the very topic we are discussing, Love. Yes we need it. How sad for those who have never experienced it. I know a man who lost 4 of his 5 children and a wife in a fire. He is still with us only by the love of his only surviving child. The power of love is so strong. Yes we need it, it is a gift from God. So take it when it is there.

I feel for you workinggirl......That's when love cuts like a knife....sometines it would be nice to have an erase button...My father remarried and my 2 half brothers wouldn't accept his new wife...It really hurt my dad and his wife.....they eventually did break up, but for other reasons also...

Originally posted by Jackie Malfoy
That avator btw is very distrubing.JM

That avatar is fire.

things happen to were u often need someone it's better to love and lose it cause at least u know u can find it again and a least u know that u have it in u u can't always have what u want and sometimes that person isn't meant to be with u or anyone

Everything, even if its bad, is a experience, and we can learn something from that. We must think of things as if they were challenges.

Best of all to love and not lose. I personally prefer to have experienced some semblance of love, rather than to have no point of reference in conversation.
To have loved is to have gained knowledge, with which one can combat ignorance.

Bull, that's what it is. SpellJammer has been very slow TO love because of the idea of loss..

Spelljammer...stop talking in the 2nd person...... We know it's you....

Love is a 2 edged sword....

Some described it as hurt so good...........Oh me...........

Originally posted by Alpha Centauri
Is there any truth to the cliche "Better to have loved and lost than never to have loved at all?".

I'm curious as to your thoughts coz I can see both sides.

-AC
Yeah, I'm a believer of that saying.

I like sex. That's all I need.

Originally posted by EsteemedLeader
I like sex. That's all I need.

Don' t bypass the censor Acherontia.

You cannot know love truly and deeply until you have experienced loss....When you do.....then it is even more precious then life.

I thought I was incapable of feeling love, I had never loved anyone. Until a few weeks ago I meet a girl and fell in "love" with her, she was the only thing that kept me going. The short time we spent together felt great, I was happy for once and saw the difference between love and lust. Things did not go as planed I f**ked up some how, I don't know how but she dumped me and now I just want to die, I once again see that there is no such thing as love, It's just an illusion a weakness, I would of done anything for her. I lesson to the not so wise never fall in love because love never lasts long enough like drugs....

I'm all for experiences, so I think it is better to have experienced love and then lose it then to have never had it at all and be left wondering what it is like.

Everything is temporary, everything we experience we will lose one day. I think the better we have to do is to have those experiences, and learn what we can, and then when it ends, we will still have something remaining with us. Its not just about love, but all life is like this, did you prefer to never be born, as to have to live, and suffer, but learn something that you can carry with you forever.

Originally posted by Acherontia
Heck, I don't even know everything.

Or anything, apparantly.

I'm surprised my thread is still alive.

-AC

we dont have to lose everything u know,

if you know u can live a lifetime with sum1 without ever thinkin about sex if she says, then ur in love or welll atleast ur on the way

I feel life is so exciting when you experience new events...If a person never feels love and then loss, would he/she truly of lived all they could...NO, I don't think so. You can look back on it and say "Hey! that was a great experience."....Wow! now on to the next adventure. You have to go out and experience everything to the fullest. It only makes life more exciting....If you went on a trip to Egypt lets say, but just stayed in your room, what good it that. That's what life is. Are you gonna stay in your room (play it save), or are you gonna see all the sites (taking chances, and experiencing all there is)....I feel a person should fill in every nook and cranny while we're here.....You can look back on all your experiences just like looking through a photo album...Saying, I sure did experience some cool things....Sometimes you just need to look at it in retrospect to get a good picture, for sure...From the outside looking in...beyond it all.

Better to have loved...

Agree, to have Loved is for me, better.
People have to be strong to admit when love is over and then, let go.

For me, as a Buddhist, the most difficult thing not to be attached to would be my loved ones - I can't imagine losing my daughter or wife to death. I know that death is just a portal into more life, and that one should not be attached to anything, but it will take some serious meditation for me to not be totally crushed by the death of my wife or daughter.

i hate sayings like that

all except the idea that i should regret nothing, because i learn from everything

Originally posted by Alpha Centauri
Is there any truth to the cliche "Better to have loved and lost than never to have loved at all?".

I'm curious as to your thoughts coz I can see both sides.

-AC

No, because if you love and lose, it hardens you to reality. You are either adapting to the pain, or crumpling under the preasure. Where if you never loved at all, your state is preserved.

However what the little "cliche" is trying to express is "It's better to try and fail, than not try at all." That in which I find better said than the above quote.