Is it better to have loved and lost, than to never have loved at all?

#3. :)

I currently am too close to the events to decide whether I regret the years I spent with her.

n/t

It doesn't have anything to do with the question. With a poll like this, you're pretty much limited to two choices: "loved and lost" or "never been in love."

And you married or otherwise-involved people can go rot in Hell, for all I care. (But I'm not bitter or anything ;-) )

:shrug: My partner had her heart ripped out and burned on a pyre about nine months before we met. She was betrayed in the worst way imaginable and she wanted to die. Although it hurs like hell, she's not bitter about having had the experience. She would vote "yes -- better to have loved and lost and in love now," just as I did.

If it's so much better to have loved and lost, - then realistically one would be willing to take the leap again regardless of the risk of loss.

loved and loved again.
Losing them sucks.

When Tennyson wrote those lines, he was writing about his friend Arthur Henry Hallam; he was memorializing Hallam, who died at 22. There is unjustice in the sudden swift parting of the death of the ones you love, just as there is gratitude for the time you were able to share their company: you were blessed with the opportunity to know someone who is gone. There is a purity to your feelings of love and loss.

But if the situation were different? If you loved someone and lost them because they turned out to be a lying sneaky snivelling Republican? If all your memories of your time together were tainted by the manner of the ending? I for one would choose never to have loved at all.

In my particular case, it's definitely number 2.

But I wouldn't wish that on anyone else.

I didn't even know it was from a Tennyson poem


In Memoriam:21

I hold it true, whate'er befall;
I feel it, when I sorrow most;
'Tis better to have loved and lost
Than never to have loved at all.

Every romantic and/or physical relationship for me has ended badly and I really am glad that I am not seeing these guys again at all anymore. There aren't really any lastly good memories in my mind even though I know that there were good points to the relationship.
As far as friendships, I am greatful for every friendship that I have had even though most of these friends are no longer in my life, mostly due to change in circumstances. I have one friendship though that I am completely unresolved with and I am still undecided if I am glad that I ever met this person or not.

I believe in my head it is better to have loved and lost. Ultimately, you learn something about yourself through the experience, but you still can feel like your heart is being ripped to shreds at the same time for making yourself so vulnerable to another person and then poof...it's gone. I can't answer the other part. I'm not single, but I'm in a marriage that has been so unhappy for so long that I know singleness is coming. Just not soon enough for my liking. I don't know if I will ever love anyone again though. I don't know if I can.

It took me two years to get over one lost love, but I knew it was worth it all the while.

It's going to be tough watching my daughters go through that, though.

It took finally finding someone else to make me understand that what happened wasn't a complete waste. This time around I'm much better at handling myself in a relationship and much more appreciative of what I have in my new girlfriend. I have no regrets and it's made me a stronger person, still I wouldn't wish it to happen that way for anyone. The luckiest ones are the rare precious few who get it right the first time.

to keep a relationship going. I never believed in love at first sight until I met my ex. And thus began an amazingly complex, always passionate, but often rocky seven-year relationship. We loved one another but ultimately we discovered that we didn't actually like each other very much. Sad, but true. Our differences were just too great in the end to make it work and being madly, passionately in love with one another just wasn't enough to make it work no matter how hard we tried-and we really did try. All relationships require work but it shouldn't require that much work. I'm glad that I had the chance to experience love on such an intense level no matter how much heartbreak I ended up going through-how much it hurt us both in the end to admit that it just wasn't going to work. Everyone should have at least one great love affair in their life. To paraphrase a line from one of my favorite movies, everyone should be able to say in their old-age, "I too, was once adored."

So innocent, so in love, but too young and too poor. My innocence died the day I left her. I learned the hard way you can't live on love alone. There are so many other things that go into it, especially when you start talking marriage. I'm just thankful I woke up and got out of it before we tied the knot, or worse brought kids into it.

I swore I'd never put myself in a position to break a heart like that again. The responsibility that comes with loving, and being loved, is the most important lesson I took from that relationship. Good one to carry with me, I think.

Finally got back into the swing of things after taking so much time off, which in retrospect was a good thing to do.

And then I met the REAL love of my life, my true soulmate. If I hadn't "loved and lost," I never would have met her!

I am divorced twice and have been single for the last year. But, I remember the first time I fell in love. The world is a much richer and more interesting place when you know what love is. Knowing its out there, even if you don't have it right know makes life better.

I have "Loved and Lost" REPEATEDLY, so I can't compare that to having "Never loved at all".

I forget, who wrote that? Oscar Wilde?

I never want to feel like that again. I never will because I will never date anyone ever again. It is much better to be alone than to be lied to constantly.

He had a high school girlfriend who he wasn't very phyiscal with. When they graduated they drifted into long distance friendship. They were both fine at the beginning of their college sophomore years when they started dating other people. In my husband's case, he started dating me. We've been together 6 and a half years and married three and a half years. He has never had to go through a nasty break up. He seems really happy with me and doesn't regret not having more experieince.

when the man I loved, the man I lived with, died suddenly and tragically by his own hand.

It is better to have loved and lost. However brief our time in this life I had an opportunity to share something deep with him while he was here.

With everyone we love, with every chance we take on something deep and lasting, we will face the hard cold hour which night fastens to all timetables. The choice is always the same: share while you can, or don't share. No one lives forever, and if in the time you're alive you can touch someone deeply, take the risk.

Love is very much an open door. However long a guest stays in your heart is joy.