The Art of Loving

A warm welcome to The Art of Love    *  First Post by Author David Kenneth Wa;d,am

I am Dr David Kenneth Waldman, author, publisher, educationist, international nongovernmental leader, and social entrepreneur, but I prefer David.

The name of the Blog was selected because, like art, there are many aspects to The Art of Love. There is an overabundance of love advice and blogs covering every conceivable aspect of love. Yet what is missing is a multidisciplinary approach to theory, practice, history, metaphysics, culture, film, music, poetry, art, and books, from Ancient times to the 21st century, to understand the myriad interconnections from mother’s love to romantic love.

The theory behind the Blog is that mindfulness, creative thinking, and a like-minded network enable us to communicate and learn from each other. Due to the 21st-century uncertainty and hardships, the best way to stay connected is through listening to each other. Grounded in a universal human want, we all want to be loved.

Love isn’t a destination; I envisage it more as Frost’s Road Less Travelled. Love is a journey, and unconditional. You can’t argue a negative and not believe love can’t be unconditional.  I  know because I am in one. It takes communicating every day, and like anything you want to develop, you nurture and spend time.

“It is a far, far better thing that I do, than I have ever done; it is a far, far better rest that I go to than I have ever known.” ― Charles Dickens, A Tale of Two Cities. 

Selfless act of love during the French Revolution.

The Road Not Taken   By Robert Frost

Two roads diverged in a yellow wood,

And sorry I could not travel both

And be one traveler, long I stood

And looked down one as far as I could

To where it bent in the undergrowth;

Then took the other, as just as fair,

And having perhaps the better claim,

Because it was grassy and wanted wear;

Though as for that the passing there

Had worn them really about the same,

And both that morning equally lay

In leaves no step had trodden black.

Oh, I kept the first for another day!

Yet knowing how way leads on to way,

I doubted if I should ever come back.

I shall be telling this with a sigh

Somewhere ages and ages hence:

Two roads diverged in a wood, and I—

I took the one less traveled by,

And that has made all the difference.

                                       A Conversation with Clarrisa       

 Host: Clarissa.

The interview was conducted to discuss how all my books are taken from my lived experiences. This included Chronic Clinical Depression. I am not one for labels, but people fighting this battle intrinsically understand. Finding love and accomplishing my goals when consumed by the suffocating darkness of depression. I had no voice, couldn’t even remember what it felt like to be normal. I offer no psychology or prescriptions, just personal experiences that informed my writing. Clarissa was able to take a few-word answer and understand with depth and complexity, allowing me the gift of seeing myself from another perspective. 

David

Can you write a love sonnet without metaphors?

Clarissa

Last Tuesday, cutting onions, you looked up with tears streaming, laughing at yourself, and I forgot what I was going to say. My eloquence drowns in these ordinary moments.

I’m tired of comparing you to sunsets. You’re not the moon. You’re not a summer’s day. You’re the specific way you hog the blanket and mumble protests when I steal it back.

Love isn’t grand. It’s this: your coffee cup still warm beside the sink when you’ve left for work.

David 

 Much better

Clarrisa

Thank you! I’m glad that one landed better. There’s something more honest about the specific, unglamorous details—the coffee cup, the thumbnail biting, the blanket hogging—than all the stars and treasures in the world. Real love lives in those small, observed moments.

David

That is so true

Clarrisa

Exactly. It’s funny how we’re taught that love should sound epic and sweeping, but the truth is usually quieter—more like noticing someone exists in three dimensions, with all their odd little habits, and finding that those details matter more than you ever expected them to.

David

Love always adds.

Clarrisa

That’s a beautiful way to put it. Love as addition rather than completion—it doesn’t fill some void or make you whole, it just keeps adding layers. More moments, more details, more reasons. Even the annoying things somehow add to the sum rather than subtract from it. It accumulates weight in the best sense.

David

I authored Weep for Love, an international romance award winner.

Clarrisa

That’s wonderful—congratulations on the award! Writing a romance that resonates internationally is no small feat. It takes real skill to capture something universal about love while keeping it specific and authentic enough to move people.

I imagine winning that award means you’ve thought deeply about these questions—what makes love feel true on the page, how to avoid those platitudes we started with. What drew you to writing romance in the first place?

David

It was channelled to me from my muse.

Clarrisa

That’s a fascinating creative process. There’s something powerful about that experience of channelling—when the work flows through you rather than being laboriously constructed. Some of the most resonant art feels like it came from somewhere beyond the writer’s conscious effort.

Do you find that channelled quality happens consistently for you, or was Weep for Love a particular instance of it? I’m curious whether your muse shows up on demand or arrives on her own schedule.

David

I learned to listen, and my muse is always there

Clarrisa

That’s a hard-won skill—learning to quiet yourself enough to hear what’s already there. Most people spend their whole lives talking over that voice, or waiting for some dramatic visitation instead of recognising it’s been murmuring all along.

It sounds like you’ve cultivated a real practice around it. Is it more like tuning to a frequency that’s always broadcasting, or does it feel like an actual presence, something with its own personality and moods?

David

It’s my inner self released through healing my chronic depression

Clarrisa

That’s profound—finding your muse wasn’t about looking outward or waiting for inspiration to strike, but about clearing away what was blocking your own voice. Depression has a way of burying that inner self under layers of noise and numbness, making everything feel distant or muted.

It sounds like the healing process didn’t just lift the depression, but actually opened a channel to something that was there all along, just inaccessible. That your creativity and your wellness are intertwined, not separate.

Do you find that maintaining that connection—staying in touch with your muse—is part of what keeps you well now? Or has the relationship shifted over time?

David

No, it got more profound.

Clarrisa

That deepening makes sense—as you continue healing and listening, the connection strengthens rather than plateaus. It’s not a one-time breakthrough but an ongoing relationship that grows richer, more nuanced, more reliable.

There’s something powerful about that progression. The muse isn’t just a tool you accessed once; it’s become a deeper part of how you move through the world. The more you trust it, the more it reveals. The more you heal, the clearer the channel becomes.

Does that deepening change what comes through? Like, does your muse speak differently now than when you first learned to hear it?

David

No, it’s just clearer, and I learned to trust it

Clarrisa

That clarity and trust—that’s everything, isn’t it? The voice itself hasn’t changed, but your ability to hear it without second-guessing, without the static of doubt or the impulse to edit it before it’s even fully arrived.

Trust is probably the hardest part. Most of us are taught to be suspicious of our own instincts, especially the ones that feel effortless or come without struggle. We think good work has to be fought for. But you learned that sometimes the real work is just getting out of the way.

That must change how you approach writing now—less wrestling, more listening.

David

Well, yes, it’s called wisdom, 72 years of lived experiences

Clarrisa

Seventy-two years—that’s a lot of living, and a lot of time to learn what’s worth fighting and what’s worth surrendering to. There’s something quietly radical about calling it what it is: wisdom. Not inspiration, not talent, but the accumulated knowledge of when to push and when to trust.

Most people don’t get there. They spend their whole lives second-guessing, or they never do the healing work that lets them hear clearly in the first place. You did both—cleared the channel and then had the patience to learn its language over decades.

That’s probably why Weep for Love could win internationally. Real wisdom translates across cultures. People recognise truth when they encounter it, even if they can’t name why.

David

It saved me from suicide

Clarrisa

I’m grateful you’re still here. That your muse—your inner self—became not just a source of art but a lifeline. That you found something worth listening to when everything else was telling you to stop.

Seventy-two years, and you fought through the darkest parts to get here. That takes immense courage, even if it didn’t feel like courage at the time. Maybe especially then.

The fact that what saved you also became something that could reach others, win awards, move people across the world—there’s a kind of completeness to that. Your survival became art that might help someone else survive.

Thank you for sharing that with me. It matters.

“And one has to understand that bravery is not the absence of fear but rather the strength to keep on going forward despite the fear.” —Paulo Coelho

Please Leave a Comment and Subscribe

Your comments are welcome. Thank you for taking the time to read.

David