What Does Unconditional Love Mean to You?

"Unconditional love" is an illusion for love always has conditions. Any man, or woman expects some form of reciprocation. A young man, feverish with his first infatutuation, craves for even the faintest glance, the crudest smile from the subject of his dreams. A mother, fatigue from an overnight of tending to the endless whims of her infant, lights up from her darling baby's smiles and laughter. A girl comforts a heartbroken friend, for she too, in her lowest point, had been comforted. A deeply in love wife, expects her husband to share the commitment. Religions too, promise eternal bliss, if people profess full submission to God.

Unconditional Love is caring for and doing what is best for the others, even when they don't care for you. What is best for them is quite often not necessarily what they want or think should be done for them.

It is given to all, equally, without thought of worth or deserving.

Unconditional love knows no favoritism and is not reserved for those who have a special relationship or bond to the giver.

It is not related to how much the giver likes or dislikes the others, and it is possible to not like a person, because of the things they do or the way they are which is unlikable, but still love them all the same.

Love is spiritual, not physical, and being spirit, it is immortal, eternal and infinite.

When you love someone it has no limitation and is eternal and infinite. So, you either love someone or you don't love someone, there is no measurement.

As far as marriage is concerned, love is the mortar that holds the relationship together. When you make a marriage commitment, it is sharing and devoting yourself wholly to the other, and accepting the other as they are, becoming one flesh and one indivisible entity. It is a commitment that should not be undertaken lightly and is built of feelings which cannot be felt for any other. Through good and bad times, the loving each other, the special feelings of connectedness and the sacrificial bond of unity are the corner-stones upon which the marriage should be built. If it is built upon any other foundations then it is not a marriage in the true sense, but rather is a partnership or contract of convenience. And thus when it becomes no-longer convenient, it falls apart.

When bad times come, they should serve to bring the couple together, as they unite to overcome the problems, not drive them apart.

Love itself is entirely conditional. You can not love without loving a person for all that they are, faults or not. If you're not being loved, you're not being unconditionally loved and so, not loved at all.

I think the term "unconditional love" was bound because of our natural instinct to look for some greater explanation. Some people will say they know unconditional love, they know love. Like out of some sort of illusionary heiarchy of emotional compassion and understanding. It just doesn't exist. Love or do not love, but for certain, know what Love is. So I don't appreciate the term but it is said that if you ignore the shadow side of another your "Love" is devoured by the darkness.

But shadows are everywhere, and, sometimes most what inspires us to Love and give hearts entirely. So, it's like the unconditional feeling that comes with love is a feeling, kind of a response to a condition. If you are happy in your marriage, and satisfied by the wholeness that you feel, you go ON to Love [and not to mention..... have a DAMN good honeymoon!], Love under the condition of feeling a lack of condition itself.

I think we had the wrong idea of unconditional love. The heart that has the gift of God's love in it, offers love unconditionally. However, the reception of that love may be blocked by conditions existing in the other person's heart or mind. Someone may be disinclined to trust well enough to receive the benefit of the love. Also, in order for love to exist in sacramental marriage (which is under God) both people must be taught the Doctrine of Love and subscribe to the conditions that keep love in the marriage. An obvious condition is faithfulness, but a less obvious condition is to cherish the other and refuse lustfulness as it destroys the purity of love. There is a great deal to this subject and people have not taken much time or sacrifice to encounter Christ in their marriage and a prayerlife is necessary for virtue. If you are thinking about marriage and who to marry, I hope you will look into the Church's teachings on this subject, as well as many good books by Catholic and Christian teachers. Below is the article written by the Pope about Love, see paragraph 3.

I am here to get this right, then I get to go home.

A long time ago I thought that love was something that you reserved for some special set of people that you had judged worthy of it.

After a while I got to thinking about what Jesus had said about turning the other cheek and loving our neighbor I put the two together and realized that he had made no exceptions in these statements. It became obvious to me that he intended that we exclude no one from the love that we are supposed to be giving. I started thinking about my idea of love and suddenly realized that I had not been loving anyone at all. I had simply been judging everyone and every thing.

Judging someone worthy of love is not love, it is only judgment. I actually started to cry when I realized this. I saw just how much of my life I had wasted being judgmental, thinking of myself as a Christian, when I was actually doing just the opposite of what Jesus had asked us to do.

I thought about the verse judge not lest ye be judged, and I understood it for the first time.

I realized that I have a lot of catching up to do. So many opportunities were wasted. I now try to apply the love that I have for the world in a universal way like Jesus asks us to do.

If I start to feel afraid and think that I see someone that I should not love because of something I have thought or heard I try to catch my mistake as soon as possible. I tell myself that I have forgot the truth and have fallen for the same old trick that had cost me so many opportunities to be loving in the past. The horror of this realization is often all that is necessary to bring me back to my senses and make me drop the judgmental nonsense I was thinking.

I still have a lot to learn about love, but at least I’m making progress.

Love and blessings

Your brother

don

Very Good question. Very high ideal, very hard to practice.

I do believe it is what we strive for, it is the Divine in us, but many times my human nature will fail, yet, it does not mean I don't keep trying.

Unconditional love only happens when I see the reality of the person, & refuse to judge them by their errors. It happens when I can stand in total understanding of another, even when their behavior is what I know to not be useful to them or painful to me.

All can feel compasion for the abused, but if you can understand the pain of the abuser, see the abuse that took them to the place they stand, & truly feel as much for them, you can begin to touch unconditional love.

Unconditional love does not mean you accept the behavior of another no matter what, or condone it, it merely means you see that all, no matter how misguided or misled, are still a part of all of us.

Unconditional love does not mean that you can always help or fix the person, some are best helped when we love them from a distance, but it does mean you see difference between the real person & their misguided actions.

Many Blessings!

I've screwed up plenty in my marriage (viewing porn). Yet I have a desire to do better.

Unconditional love is what has been shown to me by my wife's forgiveness of what I've done to hurt her. She still loves me even if I offend her.

I unconditionally love her. Even if she cheated on me, I would be able to forgive her. It would hurt, and there's damage - but the love doesn't die... unless you let it.

But at some point there is a point that staying with someone doesn't make sense (like abuse). Unconditional love doesn't mean you stick it out indefinitely. But I'm sure there are a lot of ex's out there that still love their ex... right? It can probably fade over time... again if you let it.

There isn't anything my wife could do that would cause my love to disappear. Same goes for my family members... Kids, Parents, Siblings, etc... That seems unconditional to me! That's what it means to me.

Marriage is simply a legal relationship (i.e.between in-laws in law ( :-)))))

Over the time an emotional attachment develops between husband & wife which is nothing but a by-product of PURE CHEMISTRY ( :-))))) . How? For that we need to understand the human anatomy & physiology. During physical interactions(sex etc) various biochemicals & hormones are released which are called bonding bio-chemicals. These cause people to get attached & love each other. And the same bio-chemicals are released in mother at child birth. You may hate me to say this , but ask any physician.

So the love between husband & wife or mother & child is basically due to chemical reactions. If you dont believe this then look at your child then look at someone else's child. Why you feel more love to your child, why your love is not equal? Because for different cases different levels of bio-chemicals are released. And that is not unconditional love.

Unconditional love happens when your heart & mind are without any hatred or animosity and then you behave equally to others for their well being without considering how close they are to you.

But for that , one needs to fill his/her heart with universal love and remove negativities of violence,hatred,sex,greed & anger.

Unconditional love means that can I forgive you if you hurt me. Although I might not accept you back for my own safety, I will come and help you if you need help. You have to be intelligent about some things. Taking a person back after they have done bodily harm to you is asking for trouble but still coming to their aid in their time of need is still considered, I think, unconditional love.

I am so sorry for Voice of Reason above! I hope that's a joke, because sweetie if it isn't your parents are not true Christians themselves. You have a good attitude toward peace however don't let that go!

Ok so unconditional love really can't be can it? I mean - we try to love unconditionally like with our children and I think that is the truest form you'll ever see.....well actually maybe even more with our grandchildren!

In marriage, we try. But of course if one's spouse cheats or falls out of love can we keep loving him or her?

In this life I think it's good enough if we try real hard.......even if sometimes we fall alittle.

Peace!