ALOHA: To Love is to Be Happy With

ALOHA: To Love is to Be Happy With

You think you know what love is? Bullshit.

You’ve been fed a fairytale diet of Hollywood romance, sappy greeting cards, and pop songs that have rotted your understanding of the most powerful force in the universe. You think love is a feeling, a fleeting emotion that comes and goes like the tide. You think it’s about finding your “other half” to complete you, as if you’re some broken goddamn vase.

Let me tell you, that’s not love. That’s neediness. That’s codependency. That’s a recipe for a miserable, backward-looking life.

Real love, the kind the ancient Hawaiians understood with their fifth Huna principle, ALOHA, isn’t a sentiment. It’s not a transaction. It’s a state of being. It’s the profound recognition that to love is to be happy with. It’s about alignment, not attachment. It’s about flowing with the universe, not fighting against it.

And believe it or not, it all comes down to thermodynamics.

The Problem: Your Disney-fied Idea of Love is Making You Miserable

You’re chasing a ghost. You’re swiping right on dating apps, hoping to find that one person who will finally make you feel whole, who will rescue you from your own damn life. You’re clinging to relationships that have long since expired, terrified of being alone, because you’ve bought into the lie that your value is tied to someone else’s affection.

This is the backward-looking person’s (BLP) approach to love. It’s a desperate attempt to create a closed system, a little bubble of certainty in a universe that is fundamentally uncertain. You’re trying to freeze time, to hold onto a perfect moment that never really existed in the first place. You’re fighting against the second law of thermodynamics, the universal tendency towards disorder, and you’re losing. Badly.

Love isn’t about finding someone to fill your void. It’s about being so full that you overflow into the lives of others.

This constant struggle, this resistance to the natural flow of things, is exhausting. It creates friction, anxiety, and suffering. You’re so focused on what you can get from someone that you forget what you have to give. You’re trying to possess love, to own it, and in doing so, you kill it. Love, like life itself, is a process, not a possession. You can't bottle a hurricane, and you can't put a leash on love. The moment you try, it's gone. It becomes something else – a performance, an obligation, a damn prison. And you're both the inmate and the warden.

The Application: How to Love Like a Forward-Looking Person

So how do you apply this to your own damn life? How do you stop being a BLP and start being a forward-looking person (FLP) when it comes to love?

First, you have to let go of the idea that you need someone to complete you. You are already whole. You are a complex, self-organizing system, a universe unto yourself. Your job is not to find your other half, but to become so unapologetically yourself that you attract others who are on the same wavelength.

One particularly lonely Saturday night while I was at home in front of my computer watching porn (at this point, I had yet to hold a girl's hand, let alone kiss one), I had a moment of clarity. "What the fuck am I doing?" I thought. Do I plan to spend the next 50 some-odd years in front of the computer screen fantasizing about girls who would never want touch me? Does this life even have a point? Does it even have a purpose? I had no answers, only questions. However, for the first time in my life, I was able to set aside my absurdly large ego for long enough to realize I needed serious help.

I had to learn to be happy with myself, first. I had to learn to love my own company, to enjoy my own thoughts, to be my own best friend. It was a long and painful process, but it was the most important thing I’ve ever done. Because once I learned to love myself, I was no longer looking for someone to save me. I was looking for someone to share my journey with. The shift was profound. It was like going from being a beggar to being a king. I had something to offer, something to give. And that changed everything.

This is the essence of ALOHA. It’s about sharing your abundance, not your scarcity. It’s about being a fountain, not a drain. It’s about being so full of love and life that you can’t help but share it with others. It's about creating a positive feedback loop of love and appreciation, a self-organizing system of mutual growth and support.

The Takeaway: Your Action Items for Thermodynamic Love

Ready to stop being a love-sick puppy and start being a love-generating powerhouse? Here’s your homework:

1. Practice Self-Love: Spend time with yourself. Get to know yourself. What makes you tick? What are your passions? What are your dreams? Fall in love with the magnificent, messy, beautiful person that you are. This isn't just some new-age fluff. It's a radical act of self-preservation in a world that wants to tell you you're not enough. Meditate. Journal. Go for a walk in nature. Do whatever it takes to connect with your own damn soul.
2. Let Go of Outcomes: Stop trying to control everything. You can’t. The universe is going to do what it’s going to do. Your job is to adapt and evolve. When it comes to relationships, let go of the need for a specific outcome. Be present. Enjoy the journey. And if it ends, it ends. The arrow of time moves on. This doesn't mean you don't have standards or desires. It means you hold them loosely. You state your intentions, you act with integrity, and then you let the universe handle the details.
3. Be a Giver, Not a Taker: Ask not what your partner can do for you, but what you can do for your partner. How can you support them? How can you help them grow? How can you make their life better? When you focus on giving, you’ll be amazed at how much you receive in return. This isn't about being a doormat. It's about being a source of strength and inspiration. It's about recognizing that the more you give, the more you have.
4. Embrace Impermanence: Everything changes. Everything ends. That’s the nature of reality. Don’t be afraid of it. Embrace it. Love is not about holding on forever. It’s about cherishing the time you have together, and then letting go with grace when it’s time to move on. Every relationship has a lifespan. Some last a lifetime. Some last a night. The length is irrelevant. The depth is what matters. Be grateful for the experience, for the lessons learned, for the love shared. And then, when it's time, let it go.

Closing

Love isn’t a destination. It’s a direction. It’s the direction of the arrow of time, of increasing complexity, of life itself. It’s the courage to live in a far-from-equilibrium world, to dance on the edge of chaos, and to find joy in the ever-unfolding mystery of it all.

So stop chasing fairytales. Stop trying to find your “other half.” Stop fighting the universe. Instead, learn to be happy with. Learn to love the flow. Learn to love yourself.