What do you think? should love should be unconditional?

[womaninlove]

Just some of 'my food' for thought.
Some people think love should be unconditional, in an ideal world..... maybe so
but we don't live in an ideal world. Personally, I don't think love should be 'Unconditional'. For
without conditions, love then becomes MARTYRDOM.

In my opinion. it isn't noble, to NOT expect ANYTHING, from a relationship.
Doesn't each part of a couple, have the right to have their needs met? I don't think that means EVERY need has to be met EVERY time, there should be flexibility. But, shouldn't there also be, deal breakers.
If you do not expect anything from your partner, then you are disrespecting yourself and don't acknowledge that you have a right to have needs met. That isn't healthy. Then..... there is the other extreme, of too many conditions. That isn't healthy either.
I think healthy relationships, need boundaries, they need to have responsibilities and expectations.

A person takes care of their car, their bank account, a boat, etc. You see where I am going here? Isn't then, a relationship, far more important then a possession or something material? It's human, a living, breathing feeling person, with emotions, needs and...yes, requirements. Why then, do people seem to take this for granted so much of the time?
Would they stop putting gas or oil in their car and expect it to still perform, drive them to work, and take care of their day to day needs?
One of the saddest lessons, is.... to feel bamboozled. If we, as humans, fail to take care of the ones we love, just like a car, without oil or gas, it will cease to perform.

If we don't provide ' fuel' for our relationships, they will cease to provide us with love, care and the necessary nutrients that feed our souls, our hearts. The love will die, like a car will die. It stops running without fuel, like the heart stops running without fuel.
We tend to reject evidence of the 'otherwise'. The bamboozle has captured us, making it hard to see anything different. Once you give someone power to "deceive" you, you almost never get it back.
I think disrespect and neglect are two very important things that poison love. It distorts it, perverts it and will turn it into hatred, or even worse.... 'INDIFFERENCE'.

You might be able to love someone you disrespect....'at first'... or who disrespects you....but eventually... you will not.
So, if you want someone to hate you, treat them with INDIFFERENCE, neglect and disrespect long enough, and you'll succeed, in making them dislike you, or... treating you with that awful word INDIFFERENCE.
I myself, have never believed that love is the key, main foundation for marriage or a substantial relationship. You have to figure out how, to "stay in love'.
With respect, nurturing, and the necessary ingredients that feed a person's heart and soul, love will flourish, it will grow, beyond our expectations.
So many people, especially men, complain of unsatisfactory sex lives, but without the proper tending to love, sex becomes unfulfilled and will eventually disappear. Without respect love will most likely die a very, long drawn-out painful death. Love without respect will not be a happy joyful love... but an excruciatingly painful one.

The highest, purest form of love is supposed to be unconditional love, that says:
'I love you no matter what, even if you hate me'.
BUT, that is so very CONTRARY to a healthy relationship. That is a 'Jesus' type of love. We are human and do not possess that type of love, nor should we.
But notice, that Jesus never accepted anyone as his disciple, except on his terms (hence the 'relationship'). He still loved those that rejected him, but he did not 'accept' them or their behavior. A healthy love is a give and take thing.
I believe there should be a healthy balance.... especially in a Marriage. However, at times, we can aspire to the highest form of love and occasionally experience it's purity and wonder, even when we get hurt...it's called forgiveness. However, in human relationships, when an imbalance occurs, and continues to take precedent, it leads to pain, disappointment and most of all, deep resentment.and that awful WORD.......INDIFFERENCE.
What do You Think????

[KeithD]

How can it be unconditional when your vows at marriage time lays down rules?

[Sophie]

[QUOTE=womaninlove;140150]Just some of 'my food' for thought.
Some people think love should be unconditional, in an ideal world..... maybe so
but we don't live in an ideal world. Personally, I don't think love should be 'Unconditional'

In my opinion, there is no such thing as "CONDITIONAL LOVE".
Affection with terms and conditions applied, is not necessarily considered "Love" in its truest sense.
Love is not meant to be like a business deal where you invest under preset terms and conditions
and you expect a higher return on your investment.
It's not a business venture where you can just withdraw and pull out
once the return on your investment did not meet your set target and your expectations
and you can just quit when you don't gain from it
A successful and long lasting relationship requires a lot of work and a lot of love unconditional, no matter how impossible it sounds

In my opinion. it isn't noble, to NOT expect ANYTHING, from a relationship.
Doesn't each part of a couple, have the right to have their needs met? I don't think that means EVERY need has to be met EVERY time, there should be flexibility. But, shouldn't there also be, deal breakers.
If you do not expect anything from your partner, then you are disrespecting yourself and don't acknowledge that you have a right to have needs met.
I think healthy relationships, need boundaries, they need to have responsibilities and expectations.

I always believe that YOU ONLY GET OUT OF A RELATIONSHIP WHAT YOU PUT INTO IT.
Treat each other the way you want to be treated
Remember, the GOLDEN RULE ALSO APPLIES TO YOUR SPOUSE/PARTNER, it works both ways
And a good relationship/marriage is GIVE and TAKE - BUT MOSTLY GIVE


I myself, have never believed that love is the key, main foundation for marriage or a substantial relationship. You have to figure out how, to "stay in love'.

Love is the very essence and foundation of every relationship,
without love, a relationship will never work and is bound to crumble and collapse even at the lightest and weakest blow
While a relationship established in love, will not struggle staying in love, as only love sustains a relationship

[maria_and_matt]

not possible for married couples... the only unconditional love i know of is my dog's love for me and my love for my son of course

[Piamed]

I think truly unconditional love is rarely achieved but is often stated as being present because of the connotations society has linked to the term. Dedication and commitment are not in themselves synonomus with a state of unconditional love. Most love is, I believe, conditional and measurable in degrees at any given moment following a specific stimulus.

[Sophie]

In my opinion, a marriage vow is not a rule neither a condition
It is a commitment between a husband and wife to love each other :
-For better or for worse
-For richer or for poorer
-In sickness and in health
-Till death do us part
Hence love is ideally meant to be unconditional,
but humans as we are, its not always easy to give unconditional love
as we are mostly inclined to setting parameters on how far we can give...........

[Piamed]

In my opinion, a marriage vow is not a rule neither a condition
It is a commitment between a husband and wife to love each other :
-For better or for worse
-For richer or for poorer
-In sickness and in health
-Till death do us part
Hence love is ideally meant to be unconditional,
but humans as we are, its not always easy to give unconditional love
as we are mostly inclined to setting parameters on how far we can give...........

I totally agree with you amiga!

[KeithD]

... the only unconditional love i know of is my dog's love for me

Not quite.....it fakes 'love' just to get food

[maria_and_matt]

Not quite.....it fakes 'love' just to get food

... nah its pure love

[womaninlove]

Originally Posted by maria_and_matt
... the only unconditional love i know of is my dog's love for me

Not quite.....it fakes 'love' just to get food

Funny..My hubby cat only loves me if she need anything from ; the cat is picky she do not eat food from yesterday. its my husband duty to take care of her thing but sometimes I do it. the cat only loves me if I put fresh food in her dish.

however I am more into dog. I think the cat can sense that.

[pumpkins]

as long as he loves me, i will be contented.. i just hope that he will never change.. to say one day he will tell me " i dont love you anymore "..sad huh.. how bad is that?!!

[Florge]

We should always strive to be unconditional... that's what love is for... we give love so as to gain love.. givers gain.. if love isn't returned then so be it.. move on.. it's better to love than to have not loved at all... it isn't martyrdom. This simply means that you have given love and love you shall gain but do not expect it to come back from the same source. It only states that you will receive amounts of love equal to what you have given.

This "giving of love because I am expecting this person to love me back" attitude would cause you to get hurt. We fail to realize that people have choices. Because different people are motivated by different things, they may not respond exactly the way we might want them to respond. You cannot will someone to love you back. It has to be his/her choice... just be unconditional by respecting that choice.

[KeithD]

A womans unconditional always comes with conditions

[maria_and_matt]

A womans unconditional always comes with conditions

YUP!

[womaninlove]

I have "unconditional love" to my parents and to my children( if I have one someday).... it does not mean I am not a good lover to my husband.....




Well...every person is different; and that what makes us interesting.

[bornatbirth]

during a relationship as human being we will all make mistakes at sometime!

loving someone unconditionally means whatever hurdles we encounter its our ability to forgive each other as our love is stronger!

[John Chingford]

I don't have time right now to give suitable and justified responses, but I will write a little so that I have it in my posts list. This way it will remind me to respond later.

For now I will just say that love is not love if it is conditional - it is purely selfish love. ie "I will love you if you do this or that". Where is the security in a relationship if one or the other always wonders if they are meeting the conditions or not. I mean, will you ever be secure that the other partner is not going to leave because you have not satisfied them enough. For a marriage to work it is important to understand that it is a lifetime committment NO MATTER WHAT in God's eyes. The law of the land should NEVER overide what God set in place. Two people should understand (before they get married) that it should be a lifetime committment with NO conditions set on each other apart from loving each other. If either of the parties is not prepared for that, they should NOT get married!

I can empathise and sympathise with those marriages where one of the partners totally lives for themselves. I want to think on that one and then give a reasonable response later

[bornatbirth]

would you like some rep for that post?

[John Chingford]

Hi Woman In Love or should I say "woman in conditional love" just joking!

You make some very good points and observations. I haven't replied immediately because needed time to consider what you wrote.

It is indeed true that the only one who shows unconditional love is Jesus. It is not true that He puts conditions on that love. Ephesians chapter 2 says that we are saved by grace (God's unmerited favour, unearned) not by works, ie there are no "works" required as a condition to receive that love. All we need to do is simply believe on Him (after presenting your soul to Him in repentance) and rest on the assurance that you can now experience His love unconditionally because He has made you clean inside and out from your sinful nature. So from that moment, the relationship with God is like a marriage. It is a contract which we both enter into. Once you decide to receive Him as your Saviour He will love you without conditions because He has bought you with His blood into His family. He will NEVER cease to love you from that moment - no matter what you do.

The greek word "AGAPE" means divine love and is unconditional love. It is agape love referred to in 1 Corinthians 13 when it says love is patient, love is kind, love is long suffering, love bears all things etc. Actually we of ourselves cannot achieve this in our sinful fallen nature. This is divine love. However, with Jesus living in us through His Holy Spirit we are empowered to manage that sort of love.

Regards relationships: it is true that two people cannot function properly in a relationship if one does all the taking and the other all the giving. If two people are committed christians who love God first, the relationship is more likely to flourish but if one or both of you are not "born-again" by the Holy Spirit I think that ground rules are necessary because without divine love within your souls I think unconditional love is impossible.

But once you make the decision to get married then whatever happens you MUST do everything you can to make the marriage work because of your vows

[keithAngel]

In greek there were three different words used to describe love I think we get confused only using one


Agape (ah-gah-pay) is the main word used for “love” in the New Testament. There are three principal Greek words which can be translated as “love” in English, each with different connotations. The two most common were eros, which refers to sexual love, and philos, which means friendship or brotherly love (eros does not appear in the New Testament, but philos does). Agape was the least used in Greek and least specific in its meaning.

[John Chingford]

As I understand it 1 Corinthians 13 used Agape rather than philos, didn't it? In the context of that passage it cannot be talking about friendship/brotherly love because it is too high a standard to be merely Philos, surely? Please correct me if you know what greek word was used in 1 Corinthians 13. Thanks

[John Chingford]

Hi KeithAngel. Just reread what you wrote. Are you saying that Philos was used in conversational speech much more regularly but in the New Testament Agape was used more often than Philos?

[Sophie]

[QUOTE=John Chingford;140629
But once you make the decision to get married then whatever happens you MUST do everything you can to make the marriage work because of your vows[/QUOTE]

I totally agree
When you marry, commit for a lifetime and never consider getting "unmarried" as an option
and don't expect everything in your marriage to be perfect, realize that neither of you is perfect anyway
remember, it's not important to always be right so you have to agree that it's ok to disagree,
and don't fuss about every little thing, work on being agreeable and focus on the things that matter and let the little things slide

[SurvivingAngel]

during a relationship as human being we will all make mistakes at sometime!

loving someone unconditionally means whatever hurdles we encounter its our ability to forgive each other as our love is stronger!

I totally agree. Loving someone is like having a whole package with all its good and bad, accepting both his desirable and undesirable traits, loving even the most loathsome thing about him, learning to forgive and forget.

However, some men set rules only known to themselves. They set these rules without properly communicating and were always implying things and when women failed to meet their standards, they'd dump them.

I have loved many times, unconditionally, but, I guess, I am doomed to be alone forever.

[Arthur Little]

Personally, I don't think love should be 'Unconditional'. For without conditions, love then becomes MARTYRDOM.

What do You Think????

Tricky one this! And it's interesting to read the many different interpretations put forward - some humorous ... others deadly serious - in tackling the question. I'M inclined to agree though, with the sentiment expressed by the insigator of this post, i.e., that "unrequieted" love is tantamount to martyrdom.

[Arthur Little]

.In my opinion. it isn't noble, to NOT expect ANYTHING, from a relationship. What do You Think????

Don't know about noble ... but it certainly isn't NORMAL! Each and every one of us is only HUMAN, after all.

[Arthur Little]

... without conditions, love then becomes MARTYRDOM.

Just curious! I notice you've given your location as "Heaven". Does this imply you have ALREADY BEEN martyred and gone there?

[Arthur Little]

... loving even the most loathsome thing about him/her

... sorry ... NO CAN DO!