I’m sitting in my backyard. It’s officially 10:39 pm of Sunday; March 25, 2012. The sky is no longer cloudy as I can see the stars. It’s absolutely quiet out here and it’s a bit cold as I can see my breath when I exhale with the dim light provided by my laptop screen. As I am writing these words, my ear buds are in and I am listening to one of my favorite songs. I have never taken the time to officially rank my favorite songs, but if I did, this song would be on the top of my favorites. I had a unique thought that came to me as I was walking my dog, Lucky, with my brother through our suburban neighborhood earlier. It was a thought, a desire of wanting to sit under the stars, listening to songs and soundtrack from the Lion King, gazing up at the stars every once in a while, being present in the beauty of the moment, and writing an article on how I feel about one of my most beloved songs of all time. As I’ve said, it’s a song from The Lion King, and if you’ve read my previous articles so far and the title of this article, you probably know what it is.
Can You Feel the Love Tonight by Elton John.
This is the song that changed my life. It feels weird for me to say it, even as I imagine myself telling this to the people closest to me. As a guy, I feel like I’m not supposed to love this song. We listen to songs because of the way they make us feel no doubt. It’s strange to think that it was also due to talking with a friend that I mentioned in my last post, that made it extremely clear what it is I love about this song. I know I’ve listened to this song in high school, junior year, once every few months or so as it was in my YouTube favorites at the time already. I knew I liked the song, but back then it did not impact me the way it did after I saw The Lion King last October (2011) in 3d for the first time since I was a kid. As a Kid, when I watched the Can you feel the love tonight scene with Simba and Nala reuniting, I didn’t think much of it. I felt like they were happy and in love, and I did not really know what true love felt like. I certainly did not think that the feeling of love could be duplicated for close friends as I’ll explain. Watching it at age 19 made me look and feel about The Lion King in a completely different way. I feel much more able to connect with the emotions of The Lion King than when I watched the movie as a kid on VHS.
The climax of my new found awareness of the emotions in the movie came during the CYTFLT scene in the movie. Nala’s piercingly beautiful eyes as she lowered her jaw and looked at Simba suggestively implied in my mind of being sexually aroused and swept away in the moment. It was a sexual turn on for me to be very honest. I felt those emotions of Simba and Nala reuniting after not seeing each other for a long time, and with the reunion came those feelings of childhood love they had for each other as cubs, and now with the song playing in the background, I felt their love for each other and the sexual tension in the air. The music, lyrics, and sexual tension of the moment, all accumulated to create that romantic moment. On a brief side note, I find it extremely interesting how the creators built up the sexual tension in that scene. I may very well write my observations on that soon.
What is CYFTLT about? And what does it make us feel? Many people would say it’s about romance. For someone just thinking about the concept of romance, it may seem like a vague loving feeling we can’t put our fingers on. Is romance the love between two people who feel they were brought together by fate mixed with the emotion of finding each other sexually attractive? That seems like a reasonable description. For me, CYFTLT song sung by Elton John, is the ultimate song that expresses and represents the feeling of true love for another, regardless of their gender. It is not specifically about romance, although love is huge component of romance. This is one of the few songs out there that I will listen to for hours on end. I want to remind myself and others that may be reading this, my definition of love. It has nothing to do with hormone levels after puberty and a desire to have sex. Romance only happens between a man and a woman. But romance and close friendships have one huge similarity, and one difference. Romance is a combination of feeling a deep emotional connection with someone and having sexual attraction towards each other. As an extra, having that sexual chemistry and sexual tension in the relationship spices up the romance. As I deducted from my last article, true love for another person, regardless of gender, is achieved when we genuinely connect with them on an emotionally deep level, and is usually felt when connecting on a vulnerable emotion. It’s during these moments, where nothing else matters, but connecting with each other, that it seems like the surroundings and quiet neighborhood merely are the extras of a movie scene put into place perfectly to make that special moment happen. That’s true love. And as anyone can see, gender is really irrelevant to making that happen. The only difference between romance and the relationship between really close friends is obviously the sexual interest, and the sexual chemistry in the relationship. I would even argue that the feeling of romance can happen in an opposite sex relationship without needing much sexual chemistry present. If we connect with someone on such a deep, emotional level, it may not even matter if there is flirting and sexual tension for that moment and feeling of fate to happen. All you really need is that feeling of connection and being physically attracted to each other.
Sexual chemistry in a relationship definitely increases the sexual feelings of romance and intensifies it to a certain degree, but the feeling of deep connection with another is still the most important to sustain romance. Would the feeling of romance still be present if the emotional connection was weak and the two of you were merely sexually turned on by each other? I think most people would agree with me that the answer would be no. That would merely be a one night stand with hot sex, but it’s no longer romance. Hence deep emotional connection is the ultimate and only necessary component to feeling true love or romance. I know for a fact because when I talk and connect with a close friend of mine, I feel exactly the same way I feel when I listen to CYFTLT. Sounds scary for those who don’t necessarily understand the difference between true love felt from deep connection with that of feelings of sexual arousal. It’s a big difference. Even for those people who don’t talk as deeply and intimately with their friends, the reason they even look for people to have friendships with is because they want to feel loved, connected, and happy. Now can we truly feel happy if we do not feel loved by anyone? No. No amount of money in the world or promotions at work can replace that feeling of love. It’s just that some of us desire a deeper level of love.
And unfortunately, not everyone who subconsciously desires deep, meaningful, intimate relationships realizes it consciously, as I was definitely one. Looking for connection after watching The Lion King 3d in theaters, I went to YouTube and rewatched the Can You Feel The Love Tonight scenes over and over again. Then as I scrolled down and read one of the comments for the video I have posted several paragraphs above, and I immediately connected with one comment even more than with the others. I felt so connected to what the commenter was saying I later copy and pasted the comment onto my YouTube channel’s comment section as a reminder of how I felt that day and the truism of the comment. This is what user Godzilla00X said, “i love this scene but it always makes me feel so forever alone”. For some reason I could completely understand what the user was feeling. At the time I didn’t know why I felt like a song that made us feel love, made us feel so alone. My theory is that after listening and feeling the love from the song, I ended up feeling empty because the feeling of love was gone after the song ended. Evidently I wasn’t the only one who felt that way as the comment received multiple thumbs up.
Deeply discussing, truly understanding, feeling a vulnerable emotion, and connecting on that feeling with someone is felt the strongest the very first time. This is not to say that the feeling of connection and love wanes, because it’s still a very strong feeling of love. That night, as described in my last post, where I deeply connected with my friend, was life-changing to the point where more than a year since that happened, my memory of that night is still clear in my mind. When I truly connect with someone for the first time, I really do feel grateful to have the opportunity to connect so deeply with another. I truly appreciate the emotionally deep friendship I have as this friendship has helped me realize the type of friendships and romantic relationships I want in life.
http://www.lyricsmode.com/lyrics/e/elton_john/can_you_feel_the_love_tonight.html
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