How do you define "love"?

I was thinking about pasting a long essay-ish piece that I wrote offline about my thoughts on the idea, but I felt it would turn out to be a TLDR piece so I'm going to just ask this and summarize my own personal answer here.

I think that love is subjective in nature and that because of this, everyone has their own view of love in all its different types and what-not.

I have been doing a lot of contemplating on the idea of "love" through the past couple years and this is what I have landed on...

Love consists of 4 Pillars to me. Anything other than these four pillars, which are in the POSITIVE spectrum of emotion in any way, all seem to fall under these four pillars.

Acknowledgement
Acceptance
Understanding
Respect

I'm not completely sure still about "respect", at least not at a glance. It might just be an issue of semantics that I'm scared for, but either way, I'll figure it out.

These four pillars of love, I seem to find consistently in everything I experience in the positive spectrum of my every day life, and every other element that I have been able to think of has fallen under one or more of them and has not shown to be separate from them.

I think these four ideas, while existing in all things experienced, are responsible for the opportunity for "unconditional love" toward any person.

Love seems to become a lot more manageable, possibly even simplified when narrowed down to these four ideas, and it has helped me to see the subject a lot more clearly and find it in things I had never found love before.

So how about you?

How do you define love for yourself?
Do you resonate with this view of it in any way?

I find it extremely difficult to define love, as such. Although I know that there are biological/chemical aspects to it, love is, to me, a feeling or emotion, and any emotion is an extraordinarily complex thing. For me that makes it impossible to define love. What you have done seems to me to be to list some of the commonly seen features or characteristics of love. Or perhaps you could see them as pre-requisites of love. I do agree with them though, and I think that any loving relationship, romantic or otherwise, needs to have those things in order for the love to endure. In this way, I also don't believe in love at first sight - I think that you have to know the person first, and build up the four pillars that you have described.

In general I find that I that I share the Greek idea of there being agape (unconditional love), eros (passionate love), philia (friendship or kinsmanship) and storge (natural affection, usually between family members). You say that you feel the pillars are essential for unconditional love. But are they essential for the others? I'm not sure that all of the pillars are always seen in passionate love (I do mean love, not lust. Equally, I'm not sure that all of the pillars have to be present for friendship or family love, as the bonds created by living in close proximity for a long time can result in people loving others despite strongly disapproving of or disliking aspects of the other person. For instance, I love my mother whilst not really feeling as though I respect, understand or accept her most of the time.

A biological process, marked by three stages of varying chemical activity in the brain.

That for which we find words is something already dead in our hearts. There is always a kind of contempt in the act of speaking.

- Friedrich Nietzsche, The Twilight of the Idols

I love this question. I have two thoughts. First, that love is unknowable, untouchable. For me, I can describe it but even in the act of speaking, I am taking something from what exists without the words. And, of course, when each of us speaks of love do we mean the same thing? This is an interesting question to ponder but does not make for good dialog.....so

Second, I think that English gets it wrong with the word "love" as it does with the word forgiveness. My experience of the word forgiveness is not that I give it to someone but that it is something I give myself. For love, we are so limited in having only one word to express a concept that spans many different acts and feelings. And while romantic love has had its place in my life, I think of Charity or the love of greater humanity when I think about the spiritual path that I am on......

I'd say love is one of the hardest things to define.

From what I can tell, it's different for everyone who experiences it.

Personally, I'd say love is a mutual respect, dedication, affection, understanding, want (not need), and acceptance between two people.

That'd be romantic love, anyway. :dry:

I wonder if love is the biochemical opposite of pain!? If you experience pressure it might not start as pain, but when reaching a level of stimulus which your body inteprets as damaging - then your brain inteprets it as pain, to try and tell you to stop. So perhaps love is the state where your body starts to intepret stimulus as the 'right thing'. So then what we fall in love 'with' might be what our subconscious mind, physical body, and perhaps soul, believe is best for yourself.

So in that light I think its the feeling when all your energies line up, agree or get into synch about something. If having a belief in the metaphysical it probably includes that as well and all that things that might include. If two people love each other then you get sparks and a relationship based on love would be one about keeping the love alive and include all the things needed to keep each other the 'right thing' for each other. I think we can love more then one person at once and becoming more connected to the Force does for me seem to promote the experience of universal love within oneself. So perhaps through greater awareness of the Force we might be able to better understand the meaning of everything around us by being involved with everything at a deeper level.

Proteus I like your 4 cornerstones but dont know whether respect could instead be trust? Does trust fit into those already somewhere? I felt respect might be a type of acknowledgement.

I would define love as the feeling of being connected to and caring about all living things. To me it is a deeply spiritual experience and one that is inseparable from my belief in the Force.

Love is defined for me in the emotion in this song, "Nothing Without You" by Nusrat Fateh Ali Khan, a Sufi Qawwali singer:

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=q_YnHeK_edg

MTFBWY

V-Tog wrote: I find it extremely difficult to define love, as such. Although I know that there are biological/chemical aspects to it, love is, to me, a feeling or emotion, and any emotion is an extraordinarily complex thing. For me that makes it impossible to define love. What you have done seems to me to be to list some of the commonly seen features or characteristics of love. Or perhaps you could see them as pre-requisites of love. I do agree with them though, and I think that any loving relationship, romantic or otherwise, needs to have those things in order for the love to endure. In this way, I also don't believe in love at first sight - I think that you have to know the person first, and build up the four pillars that you have described.

I acknowledge the chemical causes of love as well. They are quite relevant to me. Specifically though, I think the most useful approach to thinking about love is in the area of its function from after that point, onward. My objective is to try to somewhat organize the feelings that these chemicals create. This helps me to try to make more sense out of it. The four pillars I have are actually like umbrella categories which help me know as to where the more detailed concepts like passion and lust, are located in the whole spectrum, and in this way, they seem to inherit their category's orgin of function.

In general I find that I that I share the Greek idea of there being agape (unconditional love), eros (passionate love), philia (friendship or kinsmanship) and storge (natural affection, usually between family members). You say that you feel the pillars are essential for unconditional love. But are they essential for the others? I'm not sure that all of the pillars are always seen in passionate love (I do mean love, not lust. Equally, I'm not sure that all of the pillars have to be present for friendship or family love, as the bonds created by living in close proximity for a long time can result in people loving others despite strongly disapproving of or disliking aspects of the other person. For instance, I love my mother whilst not really feeling as though I respect, understand or accept her most of the time.

This is how I have arranged it in my head when put into thought:

Examples in each pillar are not limited to what is written here. They are simply what I could think of off the top of my head, and it seems everytime somebody mentions almost any concept like these, I am able to easily place them under any of these categories.

Acknowledgement
Any instance where one's attention is drawn or focused in either a basic or very intense manner, and expression is given that it is initiated. Examples of this can include

- Passion (intense acknowledgement)
- Affection (physical or other type of acknowledgement)
- Lust (sexual acknowledgement)
- Loyalty (devotion of acknowledgement)
- Determination (A relentless acknowledgement of desire)


Understanding
The act of identifying, first hand or otherwise, a thing, concept, or person, or even a detail or details of that thing, concept, or person in a fair manner. Examples of understanding can include:

- Compassion (identifying via either empathy or sympathy with another thing or being)
- Reason (the act of logical understanding)
- Wisdom (understanding of actions and consequences)
- Intelligence (understanding of any general or in-depth technical concepts)


Acceptance
The willing undertaking of an idea, thing, or person for the sake of the greater good. Examples of acceptance can include:

- Trust (or Faith)
- Admiration (A feeling of deep approval)
- Confidence (Accepting one's self and abilities)
- Courage (Accepting a bold choice in the face of fear)
- Forgiveness (Accepting of anything or anyone despite personal conflict)
- Tolerance (Accepting of conflict in general)
- Honesty (Acceptance of one's reality)
- Honor (Acceptance in one's beliefs and actions)

Respect
A perception and expression toward any thing, concept, or being as being special for any given reason. Examples of respect may include:

- Courtesy (A respectful act of manners)
- Appreciation (An expression of respect via gratitude)
- Generosity (An act of giving out of respect)

I also acknowledge that the definitions of these examples are mostly my own and it very well may differ even if slightly for anyone else. These definitions are what I have personally come to perceive out of the concepts.

Something else I am seeing as well, are three phases of love:

Phase 1 might be the chemical reaction in the brain to produce feeling, which are translated into the emotions and expressions/actions of the next phase.

Phase 2 is the actual feeling, expression, and/or action that is initiated and it is where the 4 pillars seem to manifest, even if we are only taking one single concept from one pillar and not all of them.

Phase 3 is what happens in turn, after phase 2 has been initiated. For example, the feeling/perception of peace, harmony, happiness... even skill and talent can be results of phase 2.


When I think of love, I can easily specify romantic love, friendly love, family love, etc. But I've been feeling a need to remove the lines that divide love like this. This is partly due to the fact that you can find all kinds of concepts of love (listed above) within more than one type of love. I can be best friends with somebody I'm married to for example. On the flip side, I can have a sexual attraction toward somebody to whom I'm only a friend. These concepts seem to be applied across the board. It doesn't mean all of them have to, it just means that they CAN appear anywhere like this.

But I can take it even further with my model. I'm not sure why love would start and end with just people. If love is ultimately made up of those for general pillars, I can apply any of them toward anything around me. Just acknowledging the sky for example can be a form of love. I can acknowledge it is there, I can understand that it is a sky and what it is made up of, I can accept that it is what I perceive it to be, and I can even respect it as being special and beautiful.

In terms of unconditional love toward a person, you would 1. Acknowledge them clearly and directly, 2. Accept them for everything they are including flaws and faults, 3. Understand (or learn to understand) how that person works and why they do what they do, and 4. Respect the person as being great in their own unique way and for whatever reason and express that to them. When it's explained like this, it sounds so simple and without dimension, but if you consider what falls under each of those, you'll realize that all of their sub-elements will be able to follow in suite (passion, sexuality, trust, etc). You can have unconditional love for yourself this same way, and for your own reality. Through TRUST, you have faith that sticking by these 4 pillars will grant you phase 3 which is the results of phase 2 - peace, harmony, happiness, etc.

Mikhal wrote: That for which we find words is something already dead in our hearts. There is always a kind of contempt in the act of speaking.

- Friedrich Nietzsche, The Twilight of the Idols

I love this question. I have two thoughts. First, that love is unknowable, untouchable. For me, I can describe it but even in the act of speaking, I am taking something from what exists without the words. And, of course, when each of us speaks of love do we mean the same thing? This is an interesting question to ponder but does not make for good dialog.....so

Second, I think that English gets it wrong with the word "love" as it does with the word forgiveness. My experience of the word forgiveness is not that I give it to someone but that it is something I give myself. For love, we are so limited in having only one word to express a concept that spans many different acts and feelings. And while romantic love has had its place in my life, I think of Charity or the love of greater humanity when I think about the spiritual path that I am on......

I very much agree here. I believe that love is unknowable or untouchable because love is not a tangible thing. It is an abstract element created in our minds, much like color and light.

Darren wrote: I'd say love is one of the hardest things to define.

From what I can tell, it's different for everyone who experiences it.

Personally, I'd say love is a mutual respect, dedication, affection, understanding, want (not need), and acceptance between two people.

That'd be romantic love, anyway. :dry:

Absolutely. Every one of those you mentioned are all parts of my 4 pillars and I think are the building blocks of not just romantic love, but all love.

Love is the most essential condition to life and that is not just for love encourages reproduction. Indeed, I doubt that love in the way our society uses to define it is known also between e.g. fish and yet, humans who experienced love on the spiritual level have no desires to compensate anything. Values like honor or community become ridiculously insufficient beneath the value of love, for this is what grants people happiness that is not further to explain or to analyse. It is there, it is good, it is, what gives sense and purpose to our lives beyond the values we brought into this world. Love is given to us through the gods or the Force or whatever - nature itself. To rephrase or redescribe it using human values expressed through our primitive narrow language is not just impossible. I doubt that among those who actually experienced love there are two here who would have different opinions on it (provided there is the denotation of the word concerned, not the various alternate values that may have been added to the term's connotation).

I believe that as we age our preception of love changes.

When I was as young as most of you I precieved love, lust and desire with almost the same value.

At this time of life (coffin dodger), love, lust and desire couldn't be more worlds apart.