What does mathematics mean, anyway?

What does mathematics mean? Where do we use mathematics? Why do we love mathematics? Why do we hate mathematics? 

I consider myself to be a "scientific" thinker. I am always coming up with lists in my head and trying to figure out how things work. I feel that I always need to find the answer to a problem before moving on to the next one.

My boyfriend, on the other hand, hates mathematics. I asked him why he hates mathematics and when that started, and he replied that Mr. Jones spoiled it for him in graded eight when he couldn't understand the material that Mr. Jones was teaching them. 

Brandon is really good at mental math, adding simple numbers, and figuring out the price of an item after sales tax. But at the same time, feels that he cannot apply for a job in accounting because he "sucks at math".

I think that everybody thinks mathematically, whether or not they care to admit it or not. Whether you are an artist, sculpture, writer, mathematician or scientist, everyday life is full of fractions, symmetry, shapes, geometry and counting. From the time children begin to speak, we are counting their fingers, the number of steps that they are taking, the number of blocks in the tower they build. 

As humans, we are built to think mathematically! Do you have a song in your head right now? You are counting the beats of the song rhythmically into measures. Did you do your makeup this morning? There was a certain fraction of your face upon which you applied your makeup. 
Did you cook supper this evening? You used fractions to measure each ingredient that you added. Mathematics is everywhere, in nature and in our everyday lives.

Stanford University states that mathematical thinking, despite what we learned primary through high school, is about thinking outside of the proverbial box: "Mathematical thinking is not the same as doing mathematics... School math typically focuses on learning procedures to solve highly stereotyped problems. Professional mathematicians think a certain way to solve real problems, problems that can arise from the everyday world, or from science, or from within mathematics itself. "