The Architecture of a Throne

What the Matriarchs Knew About Love

I have always taken after my grandmother.

So I will begin this essay with a scene from Bridgerton, a show I initially refused to watch because, at first glance, it seemed too romantic, too idealistic for my temperament. But one scene stayed with me. It reminded me of my grandmother, of the way she taught me that the world could be cruel and that softness alone would not carry you through it.

In the scene, Lady Danbury speaks to the young Duke of Hastings, the heir to a title he feels unworthy of carrying. He has grown up believing himself broken.

And so she tells him this:

“You may think you are too damaged and too broken to ever allow yourself to be happy. But you can choose differently, Simon. You can choose to be happy. You are you. And you are stronger than you know.

When I was a young lady, I was quite shy. I attempted to go unnoticed at gatherings. But soon I realized I would need to be recognized for my own merit if I was to make my way in this world. So I sharpened my wit, my wardrobe, and my eye, and I made myself the most terrifying creature in any room I entered.

You can do the same. You must make yourself into such a paragon of men that you will be worthy of all the attention you will one day doubtless receive.”

What stayed with me was not the romance of the moment, but the philosophy beneath it. She was comforting him but in a powerful yet dignified way. She somehow mastered both strength and softness. She was calling him upward. She urged him to stop trying to blend into the shadows.

My grandmother loved in much the same way.

She did not raise me to be sheltered from life. She raised me to meet it.

And I have realized, perhaps belatedly, that I inherited that same instinct in love.

I love deeply. But my love is not gentle in the way people expect. It does not exist only to soothe. It exists to witness someone fully, not only who they are in comfort, but who they could become if they stopped negotiating with their own fear.

I’ve been thinking lately about the different ways people love.

Some love is built like a shelter. It is quiet, steady, and protective. It keeps the wind out. It asks very little of you except that you arrive and rest. For many people, this is the deepest form of devotion, a place where the nervous system can finally soften. There is nothing small about that kind of love.

And then there is a love that does not only want to hold you, but to call you forward. The kind that sees not only who you are when you are comfortable, but who you could become if you stopped shrinking from your own scale.

That kind of love can feel unsettling. At times it can even feel relentless. Not because it is cruel, but because it refuses to pretend that your growth has already reached its ceiling.

For a long time, I did not understand that these two forms of love are not interchangeable.

Some people want to be protected from the world. Others want to be seen fully in it. One kind of love offers refuge. The other offers witness. I think my instinct was always the second. Not because I wanted to change anyone, and certainly not because I believed myself wiser. But because when I care for someone deeply, I cannot help but see the version of them that stands taller than the one they are currently inhabiting.

And I know now that kind of love is not always comfortable to receive.

It does not let you disappear into a smaller life. It does not easily accept the story that you are less capable than you are. It believes in the strength it sees, even when you are still negotiating with your own doubts. It is the kind of love that looks at someone and quietly thinks: you are meant for more than this.

And sometimes that feels like pressure or a standard so high that love becomes exhausting.

I understand now that not everyone wants to be loved that way. Sometimes what a person needs most is simply a room where the lights are low and the expectations are quiet. There is grace in recognizing that difference.

I used to think that the highest form of love was helping someone become who they could be. Now I understand that the highest form of love is respecting who they are willing to be.

There is a certain kind of woman who is not easy to love. Not because she is chaotic or demanding, but because she cannot pretend not to see what she sees. She believes deeply in the people she loves, sometimes more deeply than they believe in themselves.

That belief can feel like fire. But fire is not meant for everyone. Some people prefer warmth without heat. Some people choose a life where love is quieter, softer, less demanding. And that is a beautiful choice.

I don’t see it as failure that people love and want to be loved differently.

I see it as a difference in the kind of life they are building.