A few nights ago, I sat down to write my annual SMILE Day post. I usually make it pretty light, poking fun of the holiday in some way, but this time I was torn between a couple of moods. I wasn’t sure whether to go with a humorous “X Reasons It’s Great to be Single” post or to write a more serious post about what it means to love others unconditionally (whether single or not). In my infinite wisdom, I decided to attempt to combine these two moods…

To make a long story short, that didn’t go so well. I spent so much time simply trying to think of a great message that I missed out on a very basic principle of writing — Just do it! I wanted to make the post perfectly insightful, perfectly comical, and perfectly… well, perfect. By the end of the evening, I was frustrated, tired, and worst of all, I had writer’s block! So I gave up on this year’s post and went to bed with the cursor still blinking ahead of an almost-blank page. It wasn’t until Valentine’s Day itself that I remembered where great writing actually originates — the heart.

Ask any successful writer, and I bet he or she will tell you that no “perfect” piece will come from trying to be perfect. Nothing great will come from writing a sentence, editing it, writing another sentence, editing that, editing the first one… You get my drift. But that’s precisely what I was doing last week. Perfect writing can only come from a perfect love for writing — and perhaps a perfect love for the topic about which one is writing.

Love is a particularly interesting writing topic because of its nature of being indescribable. People sometimes say that “you’ll know it when you feel it,” but that’s usually in relation to romantic love. I refer to unconditional love as what a mother should feel for her children; as what God feels for humans; a feeling of caring and protection, even to the point of self-sacrifice. How often do you witness the effects of unconditional love in your daily life? How often do you experience it yourself?

Within every human being is the potential for the remarkable emotion that I can only describe as unconditional love. I may not be able to write an article about it, but I believe that every person exists to experience and to emanate love (among other things) — and I believe that it’s possible. Valentine’s Day isn’t just a celebration for couples or rebellious singles; it’s for all of us.

Happy Belated Valentine’s Day!

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