Young love, a term that so many of us have heard growing up and used, but not many of us understand or even think about.

Ever since I've had my first boyfriends, I can remember my parents, as well as other adults, gawking about how nice it must be to have a "young love," a "fresh love," but it wasn't until recently that it has hit me -- is there even such a thing? Recently I have been leaning toward no. Love is love, right? No matter your age, gender identification, race and ethnicity or location, the feelings are all the same -- happy, excited, caring and more.

In light of the recent and tragic event in Orlando, Florida, this past Sunday, the topic of love has been weighing heavily on a lot of minds across the nation, if not just us then the world around us as well. By nature we are all scared, curious and confused to different degrees, and a lot of people have their own assumptions of why/how someone could do this awful thing. And while I've gone about my days and asked all of those questions, my mind stays with the topic of love. We don't call it gay love or straight love, so why should we call it young love or old love?

Of course as we get older and mature, the relationships that we have change, the things that we are looking for progress and so does our idea of love. Over time we realize the things that we want and the things that we don't. Our perceptions of love change, but the feelings that we experience stay the same. Whether you are 20, 40 or older, the butterflies that you feel are still butterflies. Have you ever seen a couple in their 70s looking at each other just like a couple in their 20s? I know that I have, and regardless of their age they look just as excited and happy to be together just as they should.

That said, there are two ways of looking into the well-known phase of "young love."

1) Taking age as the sole meaning

or

2) Taking it like a grain of salt and believing that love has no limits

Whatever way you decide to look at love, just know that you can't be wrong. No type of love is wrong. No type of love is greater than the next. And no one should be able to tell you how long your love will last because of your age, race or gender. There are only as many limitations to love as you make for yourself and no one else is to say otherwise.

This world needs more love, and that can start with us accepting our loves in life no matter how young we are. The younger that we allow ourselves to look at love as being in our hands, more open we can allow our hearts to be into the future.