I constantly find myself asking, “What’s the point of life?” No one really knows, but I’m pretty sure its to find love. Find it in a sunset, in a good coffee, in walks with your childhood dog, in a brother’s hug, in a good laugh with friends, and finding it in yourself.

As a kid, the idea of love was framed by movies, music, books and your parents, if you had them. As I’ve grown up, my idea of love has changed. It used to seem so simple, so concrete. Today, I can’t say I believe the same.

Of course I believe in love. In fact, I consider myself a hopeless romantic, but that doesn’t skew reality. Love is what makes life worth living. Whether that means to love running, love traveling, love dogs, love an idea, or love someone, just to love anything I think, is what makes life worth all the bad, ugly and sad days.

How do I define such an overwhelming feeling, idea and act? Well, I’d say love is seeing something or someone for what it is or who they are, not what we want them to be or what we want to see. Love is selfless. Love is acceptance and understanding. Love is also challenging and frightening. It’s challenging yourself to be the best person you can be and supporting the people you love to do the same. Love is hard.

It may fade through the rainy seasons of life, but deep down, it will always be there. As naïve as it may seem, I think love makes the world a better place. It frees us from judgment, hatred, bitterness, selfishness, all the things that slowly rot the sole. It brings us back to innocence. When you see kids, you see innocence and love. The purest form of love. Love before its compressed by bias, heartbreak, stress and fear. I think we can learn from kids as much as we think they can learn from us.

For so long I let love take the back seat in my life. I let greed, selfishness, judgement and hatred take control and I almost didn’t come back from that. I make a point to love each and every day now, because it helps me be the person I want to be, someone I can love.

I have a tattoo on my wrist, “F.L.Y.” First. Love. Yourself. I think loving anything is nearly impossible unless you learn to love yourself first. I couldn’t love others or anything else in life the way those things and people deserved to be loved, until I learned to love myself. I had to admit mistakes, forgive myself, and let go of all the ghosts that I let haunt me. Only then, did I find true happiness. I got that tattoo to remind myself everyday that we aren’t promised tomorrow. Choose love over hate, over anything because if today was your last day, what would you choose?