Where is the Love?

I just finished the book "An Unquenchable Thirst" by Mary Johnson...I haven't read such a brave and honest story in awhile.  I could relate to so much of her story, even though mine is nothing the same.  She joined Mother Teresa's Missionaries of Charity when she was 19, in a passionate search to love and be loved.  The book is her story of life in the order.  She is so very honest about everything, which results in a story that neither glorifies nor trashes the order and the people in it, even though it definitely puts no one on a pedestal, esp. Mother Teresa.  I was very moved by her strong inner 'push' for what she wanted...I could so relate to that.  She is so frank and personal about her struggles with chastity and with the power seeking individuals she ran into, with her desire to know Jesus intimately and how difficult that is, etc.  I don't want to tell you how it ends in case you want to read it...but if you do be warned - by the time I was more than halfway through I could hardly put it down. 
I am wondering about all of us in our pursuit of God...I wonder what happens between the time we meet his love in a real way and then at a point 10 years or more into our journey with him.  It seems like when we meet Jesus we are overwhelmed with how he loves us just as we are, and we are so happy to have found what our hearts have been crying out for.  But then I wonder if we slip back into that same mode we were in before we found him; the mode of searching for love.  This time though our search isn't in the dark like it was before, but it has morphed into striving to please and earn more love: to please God, to be better people, to achieve personal growth and maturity, to be good self sacrificing servants of God...is it all just a continued search for love?  Do we forget what was so amazing about this love in the first place - that he first loved us?  Is this really following Jesus, this constant push to learn, grow, improve, be better people?  What would happen if we just stopped and lived in love unearned and undeserved and given freely?  What would happen if we loved each other so freely?  Would we all go to hell in a handbasket if we give up on being good, better and best all the time? 
Why does it feel like this freely given all encompassing love is not so, after awhile?