Often when folks say they love X, they are saying X generates good feelings for them.

The deeper love. For me if I tell you i love you it doesn't just mean you are a good feeling generator. It means I want to be a ally in your over all well being and that I have a hope you might be an ally to me as well.

Romantic love. This is shimmering mysticism. If I go there I'm prepared to lose myself in the other to some extent, err- let me rephrase, I'm unprepared for what is about to happen, -this could be heaven or this could be hell- I don't regret my Romantic love connections but if I can help it I'm not out to reexperience any of them. This love involves letting the other have some admin like privileges in my boundaries and identity. Its not unscary. It can be ecstatic and can be disastrous.

There is a sort of love that is like background noise. Its an acceptance that to spite my brokenness and to spite the world's brokenness, we are all mostly OK. Not achievable all the time.