It’s Valentine’s Day — did you remember? Hopefully you have awesome plans.

Or maybe you’re flying solo, by choice or otherwise.

Even if that’s the case, though, we would wager you still love something. Maybe it’s wings, or antique cars, or thrifting or sewing. Maybe it’s your cat or dog or plant or fish or bird; your coin collection or the sweet deer skull you found in the woods.

Point is, everyone has something, or someone, they love — and that is beautiful and should be nurtured.

There’s a toxicity to our society wherein love isn’t considered “hip.” Consider the masculine urge to belittle the chick flick!

But don’t we all want to be loved? We are social creatures and thrive on community and having support networks. As the saying goes, it takes a village — and you don’t get villages without love.

Why do displays of affection make so many of us uncomfortable? It could be lingering cultural malaise from the Puritans and the Victorian era, or the piles of repression and trauma that many people unfortunately have to contend with.

These are some questions for Valentine’s Day, and we should all ask ourselves what our relationship with love is.

Do we judge others for loving things? For loving certain people?

We are, all of us, on our own journeys through life, and if anyone tells you they have it all figured out — well, there’s a bridge for sale.

Love is pure, and beautiful and sacred.

It should be sacred.

But too often, we taint it with judgment. We tell a child that it’s not right for them to love a TV show. We tell a teen that it’s not right for them to love their friends or their hobbies. We tell adults that it’s not right to love anything other than their job.

Love is enough, though. It is worth suspending judgment for.

Let people enjoy things. Let people love who they wish.

We have little enough time on this rock as it is. It should be filled with love and happiness, and we should do everything we can to make that world possible for ourselves and those around us.

Instead, the world all too often gets the best of us. We are stuck in the rat-race, with little time for the people and things we love, and that just… becomes life.

This Valentines Day and its attending weekend, make time for love.

There’s little enough of it.