See No Stranger: A Memoir and Manifesto of Revolutionary Love

by Valarie Kaur

“Love” is more than a feeling. Love is a form of sweet labor: fierce, bloody, imperfect, and life-giving—a choice we make over and over again. If love is sweet labor, love can be taught, modeled, and practiced. This labor engages all our emotions. Joy is the gift of love. Grief is the price of love. Anger protects that which is loved. And when we think we have reached our limit, wonder is the act that returns us to love.

Wonder is where love begins, but the failure to wonder is the beginning of violence.

You are a part of me I do not yet know. I practice orienting to the world with wonder, preparing myself for the possibility of connection.