How do you know you are in love???
(to make it very clear ..i aint talking bout maternal/paternal or any family tree or proximity bound love..talking bout the very ambiguous man to woman Shakespearean kinda love)
I was posed with this question a few days back and I gave but a very clichéd answer..
“you just know it!!!”
Don’t know whether that was convincing to the questioner but was sure baffling to me..It made me think at length about this whole love thing…
How do you know if he /she is “the one’??With so many fish in the pond the dilemma is understandably complicated ..
But how is it that some souls are privileged with the cognition that they are in presence of pure eternal love while the oders are bombarded with self doubt and introspection bout “will it work??”Why is it smooth sailing for some and impossible enough to get-on for the oders??How does one decide if its infatuation..attraction..or adoration??How do you differentiate ‘like’ from ‘love’ and ‘love ‘ from ‘commitment’??Does a friend not love you or is it that the one who loves you isn’t a friend???Is romance jus for fairy tales or are all we mortals entitled to it?
Is it really possible to analyze love and draw a conclusion??Is what you feel real or jus a delusion??
If it is love why does it hurt ..and if it is not love ..still why does it hurt???
The known..the imagined ..the remembered.. 
I dont agree with your line … differentiating between love and commitment.
In my view… and this is my view only… I think love and commitment go hand in hand. The willingness to go that extra mile (an extra mile more than you would go for your friends) is all that differentiates “the Love” and love between friends.
As for the “so many fishes in the pond”, Lets compare your childhood to one of the child in the slums. I am sure you would have had lots of dolls to play with, some expensive ones as well. A slum dweller of similar age may have played with clay toys. Can you ever claim, that the happiness which you got from playing with your dolls was anyway less from the one derived from simple clay toys? What I am coming to is… Love is something you fell for someone, regardless of the looks, finances and status. If a relation is heartfelt and has unfaltering commitment… I will be love.
Then what about infatuation / Liking? you may ask… Infatuation given time and some considerable distance, will show its true colors. If it is love, your feelings will not whither away. The desire to be with the one you like(not Love)… remains until your dependence on that person wears off or until you find ONE habit of his which you dislike. If it is still love, You will overlook the faults, you would not want the dependence to wear off. I dont mean, love makes you a parasite. it is just that the longing is so huge, that you would not want to leave the relationship, whatever it takes.
I dont think there is pure eternal love unless you try and are prepared to commit yourself to iron out the differences. Some work towards it with complete dedication, and it is those people we call… “some souls are privileged with the cognition that they are in presence of pure eternal love”. Pure love does not work without compromise, from both sides.
A compromise from one side leads to heartburn. Too much expectation leads to pain. Trampling your ego and conceding takes a lot of effort and guts. And then there is an ever present danger of the “newer model”, a “better design” :). The feeling of losing the intimacy in ones relationship is ever present. This hurts.
Love never hurts. What hurts, is the desire to be with your love. The desire to have him/her for yourself. The desire to be the last and only love of his/her life… The desire to control. Its the desires that causes pain, not Love itself. Love is but a feeling not a cause or effect.
Does a friend not love you or is it that the one who loves you isn’t a friend? A Love if a friend first, Love next. A friend who you can share everything, your likes, dislikes, fears and strengths. Then where do friends come into the picture? A movie… needs a producer, Director, Protagonists and the antagonists. Is the film complete? NO, you need supporting actors, support staff, music, choreography… etc etc. Thats what this is … You 2 are the protagonists ( no need to divulge into the antagonists part), friends are the support staff without whom the film is never complete. There is a saying in english : “familiarity breeds strife” To avoid excesses in the strife, we take timeout to enjoy with friends.
Just a humble try to put you into more confusion 🙂 (btw I am adding this to my blog as well)