Her (My Take on the Movie)

Recently, I saw the movie "Her" with Joaquin Phoenix.

There had been a lot of talk about it and I thought to myself that it wouldn't hurt to give it a try. I thought it was going to be some weird look into a man's obsession with a computerized voice. I thought that the movie would be simple and strange and somewhat entertaining and the most that would happen is that I'd leave the movie feeling slightly confused but no better because of it. It's crazy how expectations can be so completely destroyed by reality. But in this case, I'm glad it was. You see, "Her" was so much more than I ever thought it could have been. It was not just about a man falling in love with his operating software. It was about love in general. The process, the act, the highs, the lows. All of these were touched upon in the movie with such softness and vulnerability that I saw reflections of it in my own personal life.

The movie captivated me, lifting my heart up while simultaneously breaking it. I experienced "love" in the time it took for the movie to start and finish. It awakened a resonating sense of understanding within me. Suddenly the movie was an echo of many of the things I had felt and then just as suddenly it went beyond me. Yet even as the movie reached heights that I had never bothered to think of, it didn't leave me in the dust. It took me along and made me understand. I feel a little wiser. A little better. A little more prepared to take on love in all its simple, complexities. Here is what I've learned.

Identity and Love: can it coexist? There is such a fine line between our own identity and our partner's own when love is involved. We find ourselves wanting to be around them more, wanting to do what they do, experience what they experience. Every one of their joys become ours and their pains become our pains. It becomes easy to lose ourselves in the world love has created for us. We combine all that we are into the couple we have become, but the sacrifice here is a big one. We no longer have that line of demarcation separating us from the one we love. We are just one entity with two hearts, which on the surface sounds beautiful but is not always so, because when love is no longer there who are we? How do we get back to being ourselves when we've been connected to another for so long? Suddenly we are left trying to regain a semblance of who we once were. We begin to feel like we are nothing, like there's nothing left of ourselves. It's a painful process back to being our own person, but once we reclaim ourselves we realize how much we left behind and how much more we still need to piece together. It's a process of shattering and then gluing back together when it comes to love and heartache. But in the end, when we find that person we want to spend our lives with, we must remember to retain who we are in the process of becoming two people connected.

One of the quotes that really got to me in the movie was this one: "the heart is not like a box that gets filled up, it expands the more you love." This quote stunned me because it captured so perfectly the transcendence that is love. You can't bury the heart in memories and regrets, pains and fears. The heart cannot be filled. Instead all of those moments and emotions help it to grow and love most of all is a big source of its evolution. In order to love, we must understand that we cannot claim it. It is bigger than us and always will be. The boundaries are so much greater than a body allows and as we fall into love, it is simultaneously expanding, reaching higher, touching others. It's like a great consciousness that affects you but doesn't leave you as the only one, many others are being affected at that same moment and it is up to us to accept what love is, live in it and when the time comes, let it go. It is frail, and beautiful and infinite. And it is constantly growing.  Whether we are ready for that journey into the highs and lows of it are uniquely up to us, since love is also about the vulnerability of leaving ourselves open enough to let it in. Once we do, it stains us and we can never truly get it out. This is the risk we take to experience something so beautiful. But I truly believe it is worth it. Every single moment is worth it.