I Believe Love Is Very Powerful

I'm not sure if love is "just-one-thing" to the point where one definition is necessarily better than certain other definitions. I think that one good definition is that love is care-ful - it takes the time to really consider what's best for the loved one. It "handles with care," which ironically sometimes means acting on instinct without thinking much at all, because you recognize that there are a lot of situations where agonizing over the proper response or whatnot will just make the other person uncomfortable and feel like they have to tiptoe around, whereas just speaking your mind will unconsciously give them permission to speak their mind as well. Love is everything, because it takes the time to figure out what's best in every situation. Sometimes love is stern, sometime's it's gentle, sometimes it's punitive, sometimes it steps back and lets people make their own mistakes. All of these - and many, many more - are examples of love in some situations, and all of them are also NOT love in other situations. Love is about taking the time to recognize the difference, so that you can apply the right tools to the right situations.

But of course, love also recognizes that if you try to be too perfectly loving in every situation, you'll just burn yourself out and become useless to everyone, so love also figures out which situations require you to be truly care-ful, and which situations you can give yourself a break in.