#Relationships101 When Love is Toxic
Can “love” be poisonous? ….. This is a question asked by many and I will do my very best to explain.
Love is a word often tossed around too loosely and not everybody actually understands it. I remember the first time I thought I was “in love” and when people told me I was too young to know what that meant I immediately rebelled against it, as most young people do. The truth is, most people confuse lust, sexual attraction, and emotions as love and that has nothing to do with love actually is. The best definition of love that you’re ever going to find is:
1 Corinthians 13:4-8New King James Version (NKJV)
4 Love suffers long and is kind; love does not envy; love does not parade itself, is not puffed up; 5 does not behave rudely, does not seek its own, is not provoked, thinks no evil; 6 does not rejoice in iniquity, but rejoices in the truth; 7 bears all things, believes all things, hopes all things, endures all things.8 Love never fails.

It doesn’t matter if you’re a bible fan or not. Really read that. It is the description of what love actually is. It does not mean that relationships are perfect, but love is and it never fails. Committed love is NOT a feeling, it is NOT an emotion. It is a decision. Staying in a relationship with a person who cheats or beats on you is not love or “long suffering” as mentioned above, it’s actually a lack of self-love. I am going to speak on this because I not only have enough personal experience to make your head spin and do a few back flips, but for those who that won’t be good enough for, I also have the formal educational background (which of course was obtained AFTER the personal mishaps).
If a pot has a hole in it, can it fully hold water or will it leak out? It will leak of course. Does it mean that the pot can’t be fixed? Nope. But until it is, you’re never going to be able to boil water in it and cook dinner. Too often we have broken people jumping from relationship to relationship and they honestly don’t have a clue what they’re looking for, what they’re doing, or what a healthy relationship is even supposed to look like frankly because most of us didn’t get to see to many as role models growing up. Most people find themselves in “situation-ships”. Just because you are sleeping with someone does not mean its love. How many relationships have we all seen or been in ourselves that were just wrong? Wrong are those relationships FILLED with drama. Who’s hitting who, who’s cheating, who’s lying, make up, break up, tearing each other apart to other people, etc. These relationships not only slowly poison the two people in it, but it spreads like a cancer and starts to negatively impact the people around you. For those in these kind of relationships with children it’s even worse. These innocent babies see your dysfunction and they will grow up doomed to repeat it unless you as a parent give them a better example.

Believe it or not, God is not going to bless your mess. People can’t and do not “change” for other people. If the change is real they will change for themselves and it will have nothing to do with their partner. Change is most effective when an individual gets sick and tired of themselves and or their situation; it’s a very personal matter. Unfortunately, most people hop from one bad situation to another and sadly many people experience that for their whole life because they never take the time to fix the pot before they start cooking. People accept the love they think they deserve, and that is the saddest yet most honest thing I can say to you and if you are honest with yourself (you don’t have to be honest with me because I’m nobody that important) but be honest with YOURSELF.

Anytime you step outside God’s plan for your life, you are putting yourself at-risk to get whatever the world starts dishing out. People often times are actually subconsciously attracted to their equal opposite on a negative scale until they have that pivotal change within themselves when they recognize their worth. If you are a man with low self-esteem nine times out of ten you’re going to subconsciously attract a woman who is going to be a control freak maniac who uses this self-esteem issue of yours to run you and the relationship and vice versa. Self-esteem is a whole other issue because healthy self-esteem has nothing to do with taking nine thousand selfies and posting “cute” pictures of yourself. Women that grew up with parental issues nine times out of ten automatically are drawn to men that will reject them, men that grow up with a mother who is always drunk or on drugs often have severe anger management issues, hit girls, and most of the time have a healthy criminal background. Girls that grow up without Father’s can often times be attracted to older men, or they get so desperate to find love and affection that they will take it from anywhere that even offers a glimpse of it.

It’s not easy. I know… believe me, I KNOW. Here’s the truth, you deserve to be loved. Will everyone experience it? Sadly, the answer is no but you don’t have to let it be you. Sometimes people hold off on ever finding healing because they are waiting for an apology that they may not ever get. It doesn’t matter what your situation is, God is still in the miracle working business and you can really experience love in the fullness that you were meant to but you have got to make a personal decision and commit to that decision. Even if you have never seen a “healthy” relationship, it doesn’t mean that you can’t have one. Love? Love is not poisonous, it’s not toxic. Lust, soul ties, habit, and situationships can be destructive, draining, and toxic, but never love.