Is love real? Many people say they're in love and it confuses me. How? Throughout my young years, I have not seen love. Not real love.

When you fall in love, it's like getting hit in the head with the happy stick. You just can't stop smiling. It's real alright, once you taste love, it's a flavor that you'll never forget.

Keep looking ! It's out there for you !

Dear Anonymous,

The fact that you realize that you have not (yet) seen real love, that in a way proves love does exist...

William Shakespeare gave us for all time a wonderful description, his Sonnet 116:

* * *

Let me not to the marriage of true minds  

 Admit impediments. Love is not love  

 Which alters when it alteration finds,  

 Or bends with the remover to remove:  

 O, no! It is an ever-fixed mark, 

 That looks on tempests and is never shaken;  

 It is the star to every wandering bark,  

 Whose worth’s unknown, although his height be taken.  

 Love ’s not Time’s fool, though rosy lips and cheeks  

 Within his bending sickle’s compass come; 

Love alters not with his brief hours and weeks,  

 But bears it out even to the edge of doom.     

If this be error, and upon me prov’d,      

I never writ, nor no man ever lov’d.

Love is very real ... As long as it's with the right person for you.  But .. Many people call all sorts of things "love" .. When it's not that at all.  That's mainly when people get confused about it.  When you're really in love .. You're not confused at all.

No, it's not. Not true love anyway. This generation has no idea what love is or what it means.

I am assuming you mean 'romantic' love ... Of course it is real .. You, personally, may not have found it yet, or may have found it but not recognized it .. Or maybe you may never find it at all due to a number of factors.  Love is evident everywhere .. It's even exists where it may not be so evident.  It's evident in relationships you probably see everyday.

I have seen this level of love .. not just in my own life .. but in relationships between partners who openly adore each other .. and .. believe it or not .. in relationship where two partners in a relationship aren't even speaking (at the moment) because they are having a 'tiff'.  Being angry or even just pissed off doesn't eliminate love .. not even a little bit.

Love is not something that "just happens".
Attraction based on looks and pheromones and chemicals, "just happens".

Love is something you work at, after the initial attraction wears off.

Oh when i was first in love i was crazy otis icouldnt think straight

I think searching, looking, hoping to find (however you describe it) true love can be misleading.

That great feeling that you will eventually experience with romantic love is partly due most likely to a neurotransmitter storm---which doesn't make it any less fun and certainly no less real.

But ultimately, love is something that you do.  It is an act that you perform and it involves care, respect, responsibility, and knowledge.

And loving your brother, your parent, your sister, your friend, and your boyfriend involve loving, but it is individuated---in other words, brotherly and sisterly love are different from romantic love and the love necessary for a long term relationship, but all loves have common actions.

Read about love.  Eric Fromm's The Art of Loving is a great start.

And then, just live.