I could spend my life trying to analyze the emotions and words of others.  I have found that it simply distracts me from focusing on my own actions.

As a sexaholic, I am, more than anything, a love cripple, and before recovery, had absolutely no idea what love was.  For me, it was simply a word I could use to manipulate others into giving me what I wanted.  My attitudes and actions, when seen thru the 12 steps, showed me this. Even though I would have sworn that I knew how to love.

Even today, I can often confuse love with something else.  The way I measure it today is, if I am keeping score, if I am somehow measuring what the other person is doing, then I don't really love the person, I am simply making a transaction.  Measuring what I do for them versus what they do for me.  And if the score isn't even, or better yet, that I am ahead, then I resent.  Certainly not love.

So, today, I take the actions of love...regardless of what I think I might get in return, or how the other person reacts (or fails to react).  For me, it's only love if there is no price tag attached.

I make no distinction between "loving someone" and "being in love with someone".

I measure my love for someone by my willingness to take actions, not by what I may or may not be "feeling".  For 30 years, and to this very day, my "feelings" lie to me on a regular basis.