Story of the Teenager

Doesn't everyone struggle with infatuation? Or what I call 'Teenage Affection'. The teenager is not sure if he abhors it, or if he actually like the pleasure of being in that state of affection. It was something new to him when he was a teenager. It felt good. It felt like what people call 'being in love', only that Love is actually very far from it. It felt like you were giddy when you are near the person. It felt like your pulse is racing, and your heart beats faster. It felt like any kind of cliches that were already mentioned countless times. It felt just like what people describe. It felt normal. It comes at a time when a guy or a girl is discovering his or her sexuality.

But infatuation has its own tests. The best test is the test of time. Love must be eternal, so if at any moment that affection cannot sustain itself over time, it must be infatutation, and not love. And once the teenager discovers this truth, he finds that almost any affections he had felt belonged to the category of Teenage Affection. What does he need to turn it into Love?

The Will. The Will to sustain it. Eternally.

If all the teenager ever hopes to get in this kind of affection is to feel being "loved", and feel the pleasures of it, then he will come to realize that the feeling will be short lived. The pleasure will be short lived. And unlike the first time, he now realizes that this affection is not special to the one he is attracted to. He realizes that he can find this sort of pleasure and sub-Love in almost any persons whom he finds attractive. So he changes the person, but he still gets the same pleasure and the feelings out of it. And it all feels the same to him.

And then there must come a time when the teenager must grow up. He would want to find a kind of Affection quite unlike any other he had experienced before. He might get pleasure, but pleasure is definitely not what he is aiming for. A kind of Affection that must stand the test of time. The test of place. Whatever tests being thrown at It. Yes, even the test of Disappointment. For Love can Disappoint, but it can never Fail. Love can break hearts, but it will not be destroyed. Love can be Trying, but it cannot Die.

Over time, the teenager finds that Love is something quite extraordinary. Quite unlike other kinds of Affection. Quite unlike something he used to imagine. Quite unlike something he would find himself easily capable of doing. Sustain the Will? For Eternity? That is not easy. That would be impossible even. The teenager loses hope, and wonders if one day God would bring such a special person to him. He wonders if he would taste such a wonderful and delicate Affection he longs to have.

He still struggles with infatuation these days. But each time these affections come, he simply shrugs it off and say, 'I shall not be bound to it. I must find the True Affection'. Sometimes he wonder, though, if he is deceiving himself, if he had purposefully avoided all sorts of affections just because he knew Love is a Very Difficult Affection. But can not Love grow from simple affections?

And so the teenager grows older and older, still waiting for Love to come. He does not mind waiting. Afterall, the time he has to wait is nothing compared to the time that Love must exist, and sustain Itself.