Love and lust are both exhilarating emotions, but they can be hard to tell apart.
Here, marriage and family therapist Racine Henry, PhD, and couples and sex therapist Corrin Voeller explain the difference between the two and how to figure out whether you’re in love or just lusting after someone.
1. Love is selfless
Loving someone isn’t always easy, and it takes a lot of effort. But if you love someone selflessly, you can work through the rough patches of your relationship together.
Loving someone selflessly is about supporting them in their goals and putting them first. It’s also about allowing them to experience challenges and hardships with you because you know that these experiences will grow your relationship.
2. Love is patient
A key difference between love and lust is that it’s patient. This is especially true in relationships.
During the lust stage, you’re primarily focused on physical intimacy and don’t want to get involved with any other activity with your partner.
This makes it hard to tell if they’re the right fit for you long-term. It also makes it difficult to see any red flags that may indicate a potential problem.
3. Love brings happiness
Love is an emotion that involves affection, compassion, and care. It also involves sacrifice and selflessness.
It’s been shown that love can help you live longer and with fewer health problems. It can reduce stress, lower your blood pressure, boost your immune system, and help you have more energy.
4. Love is long-lasting
Love is one of the most intense emotions that people experience in life. It can be felt for friends, spouses, family members, and pets.
Despite being a difficult word to define, love is often referred to in a variety of ways, including “a strong affection for someone,” and even “a belief in a higher power.” It can also refer to principles or beliefs, like freedom or the rights of animals.
5. Love is a goal
A strong feeling of affection or respect toward another person. This is different from feelings of lust.
People who love have an emotional bond with another, whether it’s a child, a parent, a spouse or a romantic partner.
One way to feel loved is to set goals that will strengthen your relationship. These goals can be anything from greeting each other with a kiss every day to spending 15 minutes a day talking to each other without distractions.
6. Love is a means to an end
According to the Cambridge dictionary, love is liking someone very much and being romantically and sexually attracted to them. However, it can also mean having strong feelings of affection toward a person or animal.
Many philosophers believe that love is a means to an end, rather than an end in itself. This is because it’s a way of being with another that requires us to make sacrifices and compromises.
7. Love is a feeling
In a relationship, it can be hard to tell if you are feeling love or lust. The difference between the two is that lust is focused on sexual gratification, while love is focused on building a solid relationship.
The best way to determine whether you are feeling love or lust is to look for signs of affection. If your partner wants to spend time with you outside the bedroom, wants to share their thoughts and feelings with you, or plans to make future plans together, these are all indicators that they are feeling love towards you.
8. Love is a choice
You can choose to love a person or not. It’s up to you if you want to forgive them for being late, stay up with them when they’re sick, make sure they get their hair done or buy their latest clothes.
It’s also up to you if you want to build trust, intimacy or emotional security in your relationship. You can decide to work on it every day.
9. Love is a choice
The difference between love and lust is often confusing, especially when you’re in a relationship. Both can be intense and lead to feelings of elation and excitement, but only one will last: love.
While love may be influenced by hormones, it’s still an emotional choice that can only be made with conscious decision-making. Building love involves building a bond between two people and creating a strong connection with each other.